Through the Lens: A Cultural Study of Women's Fashion Photography in Australia, 1890 to 2000. This study supports growing academic interests in Australian fashion and provides the nascent fashion industry, and the media, with a cultural and historical context for their current practices. It sets up debate and expands available information about local fashion photography, challenging the assumption that it is solely dependent on overseas ideas and practices. It has the further potential to export ....Through the Lens: A Cultural Study of Women's Fashion Photography in Australia, 1890 to 2000. This study supports growing academic interests in Australian fashion and provides the nascent fashion industry, and the media, with a cultural and historical context for their current practices. It sets up debate and expands available information about local fashion photography, challenging the assumption that it is solely dependent on overseas ideas and practices. It has the further potential to export understandings of Australian fashion and its photographic representation, including its creative and aesthetic aspects, and by implication will assist the fashion industry, and the public, develop understanding of its workings.Read moreRead less
Representing Kanaks: Generic Variation, Identity, and the Politics of the Everyday Semiotic. The project hypothesizes that representational struggles over indigenous identity are crucially shaped by the range of genres in which identity is asserted. Through the case of Kanaks in New Caledonia, as represented by several everyday genres hitherto neglected by scholarship, the representational politics of indigeneity are interrogated with the aim of demonstrating that Kanak existence is constituted ....Representing Kanaks: Generic Variation, Identity, and the Politics of the Everyday Semiotic. The project hypothesizes that representational struggles over indigenous identity are crucially shaped by the range of genres in which identity is asserted. Through the case of Kanaks in New Caledonia, as represented by several everyday genres hitherto neglected by scholarship, the representational politics of indigeneity are interrogated with the aim of demonstrating that Kanak existence is constituted in the semiotic detail of everyday generic variation. The project's significance lies in its radical reconception of identity and representational politics: going beyond indigenous versus colonial binaries, it reveals the complexity of day-to-day competition over and consolidation of indigenous identity through representational systems.Read moreRead less
Transforming the technologies and modalities of learning: The case of the New Life Sciences in secondary schooling. This project aims to provide theoretical and analytic frameworks for understanding changing intellectual, technological and communicational parameters of contemporary education, but it also aims to make these frameworks accessible enough to become part of the conceptual repertoire of professional practitioners and flexible enough to allow practitioners to maintain currency in evolv ....Transforming the technologies and modalities of learning: The case of the New Life Sciences in secondary schooling. This project aims to provide theoretical and analytic frameworks for understanding changing intellectual, technological and communicational parameters of contemporary education, but it also aims to make these frameworks accessible enough to become part of the conceptual repertoire of professional practitioners and flexible enough to allow practitioners to maintain currency in evolving fields of knowledge in the NLS. As the NLS, and education in this field are both expanding export industries, this study will offer Australian practitioners and authorities evidence and ideas for the growth of the NLS in schools, thereby supporting the maintenance of Australia's prominence in the region as a high-quality, current education provider.Read moreRead less
Australia's Forgotten Culture: the Pulp Fiction Industry 1939-1959. Australia's Forgotten Culture systematically examines the Australian 'pulp' industry (1939-1959). In 1939 imported American cultural products were banned; this ban created a vacuum in the Australian market. Sydney publishers filled the gap with paperback books written by Australians for Australians. These books sold millions of copies and inspired a plethora of cultural products such as radio serials and comics; they were also ....Australia's Forgotten Culture: the Pulp Fiction Industry 1939-1959. Australia's Forgotten Culture systematically examines the Australian 'pulp' industry (1939-1959). In 1939 imported American cultural products were banned; this ban created a vacuum in the Australian market. Sydney publishers filled the gap with paperback books written by Australians for Australians. These books sold millions of copies and inspired a plethora of cultural products such as radio serials and comics; they were also successfully exported overseas. Carter Brown alone sold over 80 million books in dozens of languages. In 1959, the bans were lifted. Overnight the industries died. This project analyses a rich but lost period in Australian culture, one that has been ignored presumably because it was popular.Read moreRead less
Can muscles tune foot stiffness to enhance efficiency of human locomotion? This project aims to understand the key role that muscles might play in supporting the arch of the foot and determine if this improves the efficiency of human walking and running. The human foot is known to act like a spring to store and return energy during walking and running. The project hypothesises that this function is enhanced by muscular contributions within the foot that act to tune the stiffness of the foot and ....Can muscles tune foot stiffness to enhance efficiency of human locomotion? This project aims to understand the key role that muscles might play in supporting the arch of the foot and determine if this improves the efficiency of human walking and running. The human foot is known to act like a spring to store and return energy during walking and running. The project hypothesises that this function is enhanced by muscular contributions within the foot that act to tune the stiffness of the foot and maximise efficiency of force production. Exploration of how foot stiffness is controlled during human movement is expected to improve our understanding of the evolution of human walking and running and contribute to improving the design of modern footwear.Read moreRead less
Can the Relational Account predict search in multiple-element displays? . This project provides evidence of a novel mechanism that guides visual attention. Our results confirm the existence of a mechanism that can rapidly and automatically assess the dominant feature(s) in a visual scene and radically change how attention is tuned to a target object. Moreover, this attention-guiding target template can change systematically as observers search through different items in visual search, possibly d ....Can the Relational Account predict search in multiple-element displays? . This project provides evidence of a novel mechanism that guides visual attention. Our results confirm the existence of a mechanism that can rapidly and automatically assess the dominant feature(s) in a visual scene and radically change how attention is tuned to a target object. Moreover, this attention-guiding target template can change systematically as observers search through different items in visual search, possibly due to a re-shaping and narrowing of the target template. These are both ground-breaking discoveries that have not been described before. Work on this project promises to lead to important theoretical breakthroughs, resolve current discrepancies in the literature and advance methods of Cognitive Psychology and Neuroscience.Read moreRead less
Art and Human Rights in the Asia-Pacific: The Limits of Tolerance in the Twenty-First Century. The question of human rights is emerging as perhaps the most critical issue of the twenty-first century. This project aims to develop a cross-disciplinary methodology and a set of conceptual frameworks for analysing the interactions between contemporary art and global discourses on human rights in the Asia-Pacific. In the process we address the debate on universality versus cultural specificity in rel ....Art and Human Rights in the Asia-Pacific: The Limits of Tolerance in the Twenty-First Century. The question of human rights is emerging as perhaps the most critical issue of the twenty-first century. This project aims to develop a cross-disciplinary methodology and a set of conceptual frameworks for analysing the interactions between contemporary art and global discourses on human rights in the Asia-Pacific. In the process we address the debate on universality versus cultural specificity in relation to human rights issues, and we seek to place current Australian responses to human rights in the context of the dynamically changing region in which we live.Read moreRead less
Attention vs Perception: When is selection optimal, when relational? This project aims to investigate an important, newly discovered dissociation between early visual selection and perceptual decision-making. Contrary to current theories, attentional and perceptual processes are tuned to different stimulus attributes described in the relational vs. optimal account, which implies that current theories of attention do not describe early attention but later, decisional processes. This project will ....Attention vs Perception: When is selection optimal, when relational? This project aims to investigate an important, newly discovered dissociation between early visual selection and perceptual decision-making. Contrary to current theories, attentional and perceptual processes are tuned to different stimulus attributes described in the relational vs. optimal account, which implies that current theories of attention do not describe early attention but later, decisional processes. This project will provide an accurate description of these processes, which promises important theoretical breakthroughs. Work on this project will also significantly advance methods to detect and describe early attentional processes, by identifying error-prone methods of Psychophysics and Neuroscience studies, and proposing remedies.Read moreRead less
Testing metabolic theories in ecology. There are striking similarities in the way plants and animals take up and use energy (metabolism), despite enormous variation in size and life-style. This project will make the first experimental comparison of the predictions of the two major theories for these broad patterns. The results will significantly progress this controversial and exciting field.
Unsaturation of vapour pressure inside leaves: fundamental, but unknown. This project aims to determine when and to what extent the air inside leaves becomes unsaturated with water vapour. All current interpretation and modelling of leaf gas exchange assumes saturation under all circumstances. Compelling evidence has been obtained that suggests this is not true under moderate air vapour pressure deficits. A novel technique will be employed to assess the water vapour concentration of the air insi ....Unsaturation of vapour pressure inside leaves: fundamental, but unknown. This project aims to determine when and to what extent the air inside leaves becomes unsaturated with water vapour. All current interpretation and modelling of leaf gas exchange assumes saturation under all circumstances. Compelling evidence has been obtained that suggests this is not true under moderate air vapour pressure deficits. A novel technique will be employed to assess the water vapour concentration of the air inside leaves based on stable isotope analysis of carbon dioxide and water vapour exchanged between leaves and air. The project is expected to provide fundamental knowledge about how stomata regulate photosynthesis and water use, with significant implications for modelling vegetation function and for improving the performance of crop plants.Read moreRead less