Hancock Lecture
The Academy is dedicated to supporting and celebrating emerging leaders in the humanities. Named in honour of W.K Hancock, the first President of the Academy, the Hancock Lecture invites outstanding scholars at the earlier stages of their careers to talk about their work to a public audience.
Emeritus Professor Sir (William) Keith Hancock KBE FAHA (1898—1988) was a Foundation Fellow and the first President of the Australian Academy of the Humanities. This lecture is made possible by a bequest from the estate of Sir Keith. The first Sir Keith Hancock Lecture was given by (then) Associate Professor Christine Alexander in 1993.
Since 1993 we’ve hosted the lecture almost every year.
Past lectures
Tenth lecture
The 10th Hancock Lecture was presented by Dr Frances Flanagan, Sydney Fellow and Lecturer, University of Sydney. The Lecture was held on Tuesday 31 May 2022 at the State Library of New South Wales.
*Recording courtesy of ABC Radio National, The Science Show
Ninth lecture
The 9th Hancock Lecture — Maaya Waabiny: Mobilising song archives to nourish an endangered language — was given by Wirlomin Noongar researcher Associate Professor Clint Bracknell from the Kurongkurl Katitjin Centre for Indigenous Australian Education and Research and WAAPA, Edith Cowan University. It was the curtain-raiser event for the Academy’s 50th Symposium Humanising the Future, held on Wednesday 13 November 2019 at the Griffith University Art Museum, Brisbane.
Eighth lecture
Hybrid Civilisations of Clash of Civilisations?: Re-visiting the Muslim Other (PDF, 950KB) (watch the video)
Dr Raihan Ismail
16 November 2018, Sydney
Dr Ismail is also the joint recipient of the Australian Academy of the Humanities’ 2018 Max Crawford Medal, Australia’s most prestigious award for early-career researchers in the Humanities.
Seventh lecture
Life at the edge of extinction: Spectral crows, haunted landscapes and the environmental humanities (PDF, 2.1MB)
Dr Thom van Dooren
15 November 2013, Brisbane
Sixth lecture
Was the twentieth century the great age of internationalism? (PDF, 762Kb)
Professor Glenda Sluga FAHA
19 November 2009, Canberra
Fifth lecture
Foreign values; or, on English as a Chinese language
Professor Meaghan Morris FAHA
Fourth lecture
Representations of their lives: Archaeology and the tangibility of the past (PDF, 939KB)
Dr Susan Lawrence FAHA
11 November 2001, Canberra
Third lecture
Being and nothing: Figuring Aboriginality in Australian art history (PDF, 1,408KB)
Dr Ian McLean
11 November 1998, Sydney
Second lecture
Mabo and the Humanities (PDF, 1,094KB)
Mr Noel Pearson
5 November 1994, Sydney
Inaugural lecture
Charlotte Brontë’s paintings: Victorian women and the visual arts (PDF, 1,347KB)
Associate Professor Christine Alexander FAHA
23 March 1993, Melbourne