Pop Cultures in Indonesia: a New Asian Politics of Pleasure and Identity. The study addresses one of National Research Priorities (Goal 4 'Safeguarding Australia'), by better 'understanding our region and the world', and boosting Australia's 'soft power'. Recent changes in Indonesia render much of our knowledge about that society outdated. The study will deliver a significant contribution to the urgent revitalisation of Indonesian and cultural studies. It will hopefully elevate the quality of ou ....Pop Cultures in Indonesia: a New Asian Politics of Pleasure and Identity. The study addresses one of National Research Priorities (Goal 4 'Safeguarding Australia'), by better 'understanding our region and the world', and boosting Australia's 'soft power'. Recent changes in Indonesia render much of our knowledge about that society outdated. The study will deliver a significant contribution to the urgent revitalisation of Indonesian and cultural studies. It will hopefully elevate the quality of our public debate about the world's largest Muslim populated country and Australia's neighbour, by paying serious and overdue attention to the brightest sides of contemporary Indonesia that have occupied the minds of one hundred millions or so ordinary people there.Read moreRead less
Skin and kin in Aboriginal Australia: linguistic and historical perspectives on the dynamics of social categories. Indigenous Australians have unique ways of talking about social relations, linking them over wide regions as family. This project will trace the history of these terminologies and the evolution of these relations. The results will reveal the dynamics of Indigenous societies and resolve long-standing questions about human society generally.
Visual evidence: transforming modern sex research (1880s - 1930s). This project aims to explore how photography and film transformed understandings of human sexuality. By analysing how and why doctors and scientists shifted their attention from textual to visual evidence, the project will contribute to understandings about how images have been used historically to create medical norms and communicate scientific knowledge to broad audiences. Focusing on Germany as the international centre of earl ....Visual evidence: transforming modern sex research (1880s - 1930s). This project aims to explore how photography and film transformed understandings of human sexuality. By analysing how and why doctors and scientists shifted their attention from textual to visual evidence, the project will contribute to understandings about how images have been used historically to create medical norms and communicate scientific knowledge to broad audiences. Focusing on Germany as the international centre of early twentieth-century sex research, the project will examine how the turn to visual evidence had a transnational impact by paving the way for post-war researchers such as Kinsey, Masters and Johnson, and for a better understanding of the history of human sexuality in Australia.Read moreRead less
Aboriginal song cycles from the Simpson Desert and the Cooper: an integrated linguistic and musicological study. The project will produce a detailed linguistic analysis of four previously undocumented Wangkangurru song cycles from the Simpson Desert, recorded by the applicant in the nineteen sixties, including a study of the singer's comments on esoteric meanings. It also involves similar work with the Nguninta ?travelling ceremony? from the upper Cooper. Integrated with this will be an ethno-m ....Aboriginal song cycles from the Simpson Desert and the Cooper: an integrated linguistic and musicological study. The project will produce a detailed linguistic analysis of four previously undocumented Wangkangurru song cycles from the Simpson Desert, recorded by the applicant in the nineteen sixties, including a study of the singer's comments on esoteric meanings. It also involves similar work with the Nguninta ?travelling ceremony? from the upper Cooper. Integrated with this will be an ethno-musicological study aimed particularly at showing the distribution of song-styles and the way songs were transmitted.Read moreRead less