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Indigenous heritage: working ancient wetlands for social benefit and cultural understanding. This research will answer important theoretical and practical questions about Aboriginal community engagement with Heritage research. It will generate significant archaeological outcomes on the nature of Indigenous occupation in ancient eastern Australian landscapes, and this research will also improve the employability of young Aboriginal people.
A reliable absolute chronology for the Aboriginal rock art in the Kimberley, Western Australia. The Aboriginal rock art in the Kimberley region of Western Australia is an internationally significant record of human occupation and cultural evolution. This project will determine the antiquity of human expression in one of the richest (and possibly the oldest) rock art regions in the world using advanced analytical techniques.
From the Desert to the Sea: Managing Rock Art, Country and Culture. This Project will expand our understanding of Aboriginal settlement and land-use in north-west Australia by investigating how the mythological narratives of Australia’s deserts enable the transmission of knowledge in water-limited environments. Combining traditional ecological knowledge and novel scientific approaches (e.g. anthracology, remote sensing, oxygen-isotopes) will provide new insights into human behaviours at rock art ....From the Desert to the Sea: Managing Rock Art, Country and Culture. This Project will expand our understanding of Aboriginal settlement and land-use in north-west Australia by investigating how the mythological narratives of Australia’s deserts enable the transmission of knowledge in water-limited environments. Combining traditional ecological knowledge and novel scientific approaches (e.g. anthracology, remote sensing, oxygen-isotopes) will provide new insights into human behaviours at rock art site complexes. It will develop management regimes and formal certification for Indigenous rangers while building heritage capacity in these partner communities: enabling intergenerational, culturally appropriate knowledge transfer protocols are in place to ensure sustainable economic heritage futures.Read moreRead less
Aboriginal rock art and cultural heritage management in Cape York Peninsula. The Laura Sandstone Basin of Cape York Peninsula hosts one of the richest bodies of rock art in Australia and the world. It documents the life-ways of generations of Aboriginal Australians from their original settlement, through major environmental changes, to European invasion. This vast area, much of which is now jointly managed as National Parks by Traditional Owners, remains virtually unexplored archaeologically. Th ....Aboriginal rock art and cultural heritage management in Cape York Peninsula. The Laura Sandstone Basin of Cape York Peninsula hosts one of the richest bodies of rock art in Australia and the world. It documents the life-ways of generations of Aboriginal Australians from their original settlement, through major environmental changes, to European invasion. This vast area, much of which is now jointly managed as National Parks by Traditional Owners, remains virtually unexplored archaeologically. This project aims to record this unique rock art so that its testimony remains for future generations. This will provide a framework for its sustainable management and findings will have profound implications for our understandings of the cultural behaviour and dispersal of the earliest modern humans to colonise Australia.Read moreRead less
Indigenous foodways in colonial Cape York Peninsula. This project aims to trace historical Indigenous foodways in colonial Cape York Peninsula, Queensland, through a program of collaborative community-based archaeological and anthropological research. Food was a key medium for cultural exchanges between Indigenous peoples and settler-colonists. The analysis of foodways is known to provide unparalleled insights on daily life, as well as the development of both cultural values and social relations ....Indigenous foodways in colonial Cape York Peninsula. This project aims to trace historical Indigenous foodways in colonial Cape York Peninsula, Queensland, through a program of collaborative community-based archaeological and anthropological research. Food was a key medium for cultural exchanges between Indigenous peoples and settler-colonists. The analysis of foodways is known to provide unparalleled insights on daily life, as well as the development of both cultural values and social relationships. This has received limited attention in archaeological investigations in Australia. Results will provide greater insight into the history behind our current society.Read moreRead less
Axes, exchange, social change: new perspectives on Australian hunter-gatherers. This project refocuses attention on the importance of South East Australia for understanding the role of exchange in social change amongst hunter-gatherers. Our study will develop new perspectives on Aboriginal hunter-gatherer societies by tracing changing patterns of stone axe exchange over time using a new non-destructive provenancing technique (PXRF).
Contemporary Indigenous relationships to rock art. This project aims to understand the roles and meanings of archaeological heritage in the lives of Indigenous people today. Archaeological investigations typically rely on objects, images and places as evidence of past human activity, but these "artefacts" could also tell us about present-day relationships between people and their archaeological heritage. The project will examine how Aboriginal people from the south-western Gulf of Carpentaria en ....Contemporary Indigenous relationships to rock art. This project aims to understand the roles and meanings of archaeological heritage in the lives of Indigenous people today. Archaeological investigations typically rely on objects, images and places as evidence of past human activity, but these "artefacts" could also tell us about present-day relationships between people and their archaeological heritage. The project will examine how Aboriginal people from the south-western Gulf of Carpentaria engage with rock art, one of the most visual aspects of the archaeological record. By focussing on the cultural re-working of relationships to rock art, this project aims to provide new understandings to inform national and Indigenous futures, and support progressive advancements in land and sea management.Read moreRead less
Diving into the Desert. Indigenous and Future Floodplain Management. This project aims to discover how Indigenous communities managed cycles of drought and flood in the Lake Eyre Basin, and to learn from this to manage Australia’s inland rivers sustainably. By integrating archaeology – done underwater, on land and from the air – with Indigenous knowledge and environmental and flow modelling, the project expects to uncover a deep history of Indigenous environmental engineering in one of the worl ....Diving into the Desert. Indigenous and Future Floodplain Management. This project aims to discover how Indigenous communities managed cycles of drought and flood in the Lake Eyre Basin, and to learn from this to manage Australia’s inland rivers sustainably. By integrating archaeology – done underwater, on land and from the air – with Indigenous knowledge and environmental and flow modelling, the project expects to uncover a deep history of Indigenous environmental engineering in one of the world's last unregulated desert river systems . The project's outcomes – an Australian National Maritime Museum touring exhibition plus written, audio and 3D immersive communications – seek to benefit Australia's cultural life and flood mitigation, and to protect the Mithaka Aboriginal Corporation's culture and country. Read moreRead less
ARC Centre of Excellence for Indigenous and Environmental Histories and Futures. ARC Centre of Excellence for Indigenous and Environmental Histories and Futures. The proposed Centre aims to generate a new direction in knowledge creation based on Aboriginal- and Torres Strait Islander-led approaches to managing Land and Sea Country. The Centre expects to make a legacy contribution by developing complementary Indigenous and Western knowledge frameworks for modelling environmental, cultural, and hi ....ARC Centre of Excellence for Indigenous and Environmental Histories and Futures. ARC Centre of Excellence for Indigenous and Environmental Histories and Futures. The proposed Centre aims to generate a new direction in knowledge creation based on Aboriginal- and Torres Strait Islander-led approaches to managing Land and Sea Country. The Centre expects to make a legacy contribution by developing complementary Indigenous and Western knowledge frameworks for modelling environmental, cultural, and historical change in Australia over the last millennium and into the near future. Expected outcomes focus on sustainable Indigenous land and sea management planning for future decades. Benefits include improved forecasting of the trajectory of environmental change, an increase in the capacity of Indigenous research, creation of a pipeline for Indigenous students into research, and evidence-based policy-making.Read moreRead less
Before and after the Last Ice Age: GunaiKurnai archaeology along the Snowy. This project aims to transform our understanding of the deep-time Aboriginal occupation of Victoria's Snowy River landscape, by excavating a network of sites dating back to >52,000 years. This project expects to generate new knowledge in archaeology and palaeoclimatology through partnership research in Gunaikurnai Country. Expected outcomes of this project include unprecedented details of Aboriginal occupation, ritual in ....Before and after the Last Ice Age: GunaiKurnai archaeology along the Snowy. This project aims to transform our understanding of the deep-time Aboriginal occupation of Victoria's Snowy River landscape, by excavating a network of sites dating back to >52,000 years. This project expects to generate new knowledge in archaeology and palaeoclimatology through partnership research in Gunaikurnai Country. Expected outcomes of this project include unprecedented details of Aboriginal occupation, ritual installations, wooden artefacts, ancient human DNA, use of deep caves and open landscapes, and economic strategies dating back to the Last Ice Age and beyond. This should provide significant benefits in community research, greater social understandings of Aboriginal connections with Country, and a more inclusive Australia.Read moreRead less