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In September 2021, heritage managers and researchers joined our President, Professor Lesley Head, in conversation to discuss the latest thinking in dealing with the challenges posed by climate change. Watch the full recording below.
Critics of same-sex unions often cite references to homosexuality in the New Testament to support their standpoints, but what were the people of antiquity really saying – in their world, and in their terms – about sexuality? Researcher William Loader conducted painstaking textual, theological and ethical analysis of every religious text from his chosen period, including the Dead Sea Scrolls, the Apocrypha, the Septuagint and the writings of Philo of Alexandria and Josephus to find out.
Our Discovering Humanities series is a celebration of more than fifty years of humanities research and discovery. It was born out of the 50th anniversary of the Australian Academy of the Humanities in 2019 but is not limited to the work of Academy Fellows. Of necessity it covers just a small fraction of the many advances across the humanities made by researchers in Australia since the Academy was first founded.
Having supported hundreds of scholars over more than five decades, the Publication Subsidy Scheme is one of the Academy’s longest running awards programs.
Our Publication Subsidy Scheme supports quality publication in the humanities, with funding awarded to early career researchers to support costs associated with publication, such as illustrations, maps, and copyright fees.
Tasmanian researcher Zoe Rimmer, who is documenting the removal and destruction of some of the earliest examples of rock art dating back 14,000 years, is the recipient of the 2021 Australian Academy of the Humanities’ John Mulvaney Fellowship. Excitingly, almost five decades later her work holds a special connection to the Fellowship’s namesake.
In our second Past Presidents’ Perspectives article, the Academy’s Immediate Past President Professor Joy Damousi reflects on the influences that led her to a career in the humanities, as well as her time as President and the biggest challenges the Academy faced.
The entire world is currently bearing witness to the ‘demise or death of what we love’ due to the effects of the climate crisis. But what do our environmental educators who have dedicated their lives to learning about and teaching, while at the same time witnessing, this catastrophic phenomenon, have to say about impact of ecological anxiety on students?
In our inaugural President’s Conversation which took place on 22 June, Professor Lesley Head asked a panel of educators at different career stages how they approach their teaching in this context, how they empower students, and how they protect their own and their students’ wellbeing.
We are delighted to announce the recipients of this year’s Humanities Travelling Fellowships and David Philips Travelling Fellowship – two grants that form part of the Academy’s suite of annual grants and awards.
Described by his nominator as ‘among the best of his generation of historians working in and on the history of Australia and New Zealand at present’, Wollongong-based researcher, Dr Andre Brett, is the recipient of the Australian Academy of the Humanities’ 2021 Max Crawford Medal.
The other forty-nine pieces in Discovering Humanities have described discoveries, advances, breakthroughs and new understandings in humanities from the last fifty years in Australia. But there is so much more … By describing a tiny proportion of the many other discoveries made in the same period, this last, fiftieth, piece is a reminder of just how much more has been discovered and is being discovered by humanities researchers.
Today, on the 52nd anniversary of the Australian Academy of the Humanities, we are introducing a new monthly feature in which we reconnect with many of our past Presidents.
It’s a chance to cast our minds back, learn lessons from the past; weigh up the current state of the humanities; and consider how, as a collective, we can address some of the biggest challenges of the future.
Our first Past-Presidents’ Perspective is with leading Australian musicologist Emeritus Professor Malcolm Gillies AM FAHA, who was President of the Academy from 1998-2001.