Power of the humanities

Australian-written texts – like the 1882 serialised ‘Robbery Under Arms’ – were often compiled and published in London, where editors abridged and tampered the texts to suit British tastes. Dive deep into the research and analysis by academics around the country to reconstitute the first true-to-the-author versions of some of Australia’s greatest literary works.

As we face an era of monumental challenges around declining biodiversity and climate change, meet the scholars who first proposed a new environmental ethics for the Western world.

Did you know Australian English has its own vocabulary, grammatical rules and pronunciation that distinguish it from the original British version? Of course you did! But it took a long time to get it formally recognised as a variety of World English.

Find out how Australia became a global leader in marine archaeology thanks to the bloody mutiny on the ‘Batavia’ centuries ago. Analysis of the wreck and skeletons has yielded insights into the lives and gruesome deaths of the sailors, soldiers and civilians aboard.

Discover one scholar’s quest to track down lost Bronte works across auction houses, libraries and private collections.

Australia’s creative economy is far larger and more dynamic than previously thought, and knowing the full extent and rate of growth may help guide recovery after Covid-19.

Take a deep dive into two treasure houses of knowledge about Australian literature, culture and history that illuminate our national story, educating and inspiring us.

For many of us, loneliness has been a by-product of the COVID-19 pandemic. But, research reveals the concept of loneliness only began with nineteenth-century Romantic thinkers (though that doesn’t make it any easier for us today!). Learn how our conceptualisation of emotions has changed over time.

The loss of Aboriginal language and culture continues to be a major challenge facing Australia today. Discover how leading linguist R M W Dixon, along with his First Nations teachers, has helped to recover the “grammatical wonders” of Indigenous languages.

Thanks to the pioneering work of Australian researchers, we now have a greater understanding of how the humanities can tackle urgent environmental issues: from the degradation of the Great Barrier Reef to the bushfires that ravaged our nation. Welcome to the Environmental Humanities.

The excavation of a 3000-year-old cemetery in Vanuatu – the oldest known burial ground in the Pacific – has unlocked the secrets of pre-historic peoples of the Melanesian region.

What role did women play in the beginnings of colonial Australia? Feminist scholars have been reframing and challenging conventional nation-building narratives about white Australia since the 1970s.