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Archaeology in the Long Grass:
Understanding Contact Through the Analysis of Urban Aboriginal Fringe Camps. This research will contribute to the priority goal of Strengthening Australia’s Social and Economic Fabric through: 1) conceptual and methodological advances in archaeology; 2) making a substantive contribution to Native Title debates; 3) contributing to Closing the Gap of Indigenous disadvantage; 4) developing Indigenous research capacity; and 5) increasing public understandings of Abor ....Archaeology in the Long Grass:
Understanding Contact Through the Analysis of Urban Aboriginal Fringe Camps. This research will contribute to the priority goal of Strengthening Australia’s Social and Economic Fabric through: 1) conceptual and methodological advances in archaeology; 2) making a substantive contribution to Native Title debates; 3) contributing to Closing the Gap of Indigenous disadvantage; 4) developing Indigenous research capacity; and 5) increasing public understandings of Aboriginal culture. The Larrakia Nation Aboriginal Corporation will benefit from new data to inform policy decisions and recommendations, interpretive materials for planned tourism ventures and enhanced research capacity through the quality training of Aboriginal research associates.Read moreRead less
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.
Kimberley Visions: rock art style provinces in northern Australia. This project aims to examine the role that art has played in managing social and environmental change over the past 50 000 years. The project seeks to carry out the first systematic comparative analysis of different rock art repertoires and associated archaeology from the Kimberley and Arnhem Land. It is intended that identifying continuities and changes in this archaeological signature will provide direct evidence of how people ....Kimberley Visions: rock art style provinces in northern Australia. This project aims to examine the role that art has played in managing social and environmental change over the past 50 000 years. The project seeks to carry out the first systematic comparative analysis of different rock art repertoires and associated archaeology from the Kimberley and Arnhem Land. It is intended that identifying continuities and changes in this archaeological signature will provide direct evidence of how people adapted and signalled their identity. Intended outcomes are new understanding to contribute to inter-regional rock art studies and inform Indigenous and government heritage management practices.Read moreRead less
The Barrow Island archaeology project: the dynamism of maritime societies in northern Australia. This project will study human occupation from exceptionally rich sites on Barrow Island, located off northwest Australia, profiling a continuous reliance on coastal resources until isolation. Whaling and pearling started in the nineteenth century using Indigenous labourers after a 7,000 year gap in human occupation.
The two lakes project: a research history of Lakes Mungo and Gregory. This project investigates the history of research relations between scientists and Traditional Owners at Lakes Mungo and Gregory. Connecting recent histories of agency and reconciliation with deep time, it will produce a publicly accessible narrative that increases national understanding of significant stories in the peopling of our continent.
Establishing the provenance of Torres Strait Islander remains: genetics, craniometrics and isotopes. The repatriation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander remains has been a focus of Commonwealth and State Governments for over two decades. It remains as a significant social and cultural issue for many Indigenous Australians. One of the main hurdles to repatriation is the fact that hundreds, and possibly thousands of human remains have very little contextual detail associated with them. A num ....Establishing the provenance of Torres Strait Islander remains: genetics, craniometrics and isotopes. The repatriation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander remains has been a focus of Commonwealth and State Governments for over two decades. It remains as a significant social and cultural issue for many Indigenous Australians. One of the main hurdles to repatriation is the fact that hundreds, and possibly thousands of human remains have very little contextual detail associated with them. A number of techniques have been developed in the field of biological anthropology to reconstruct the history of individual skeletal remains. This innovative project aims to use advances in the fields of ancient DNA, isotope analysis and craniometrics to resolve the provenance of 113 trophy skulls from the Torres Strait Islands.Read moreRead less
History Places: Wellington Range rock art in a global context. The project aims to investigate one of Australia’s most extraordinary bodies of rock art, spread across Arnhem Land’s Wellington Range, in order to answer important archaeological research questions, provide Traditional Owners with a comprehensive digital record of their rock art heritage and develop a long term management plan. Field research will include survey, 2-D and 3-D rock art recording, limited excavation and sampling for da ....History Places: Wellington Range rock art in a global context. The project aims to investigate one of Australia’s most extraordinary bodies of rock art, spread across Arnhem Land’s Wellington Range, in order to answer important archaeological research questions, provide Traditional Owners with a comprehensive digital record of their rock art heritage and develop a long term management plan. Field research will include survey, 2-D and 3-D rock art recording, limited excavation and sampling for dating. The project is designed to situate Wellington Range rock art in regional and global contexts in order to better understand long-term north Australian Aboriginal experience and its expression in relation to other hunter-gatherer groups and to gain new insight into human cultural and cognitive development.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