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The Australian Academy of the Humanities (AAH) has welcomed the release of the Strategic Examination of Research and Development (SERD) final report, Ambitious Australia, and its recognition that Australia must invest strategically in its national knowledge and innovation capabilities.
Elected in 2025, Professor Andrekos Varnava FAHA FRHistS FRSA from Flinders University is an expert on modern British empire, and the pre-eminent specialist on the history of Cyprus under British rule. His current research focuses on political assassinations, and the social, political, and economic context in which they happen, on public health in the British empire, and on Cypriot migration.
In our 2026-27 Pre-Budget submission, the Australian Academy of the Humanities calls on the Government to back Australian thinking by investing in the humanities capabilities that underpin productivity, social cohesion and democratic resilience.
Andy Kirkpatrick FAHA, a scholar of World Englishes, English as a lingua franca, and language education, has shown how attitudes towards the primacy of English in Southeast Asia can negatively affect the quality of communication in high-level regional organisations, while also harming children’s education at a foundational level. He argues for greater recognition of the value of linguistic diversity across all levels of education and diplomacy.
In Germany, a new research hub led by AAH Fellow Professor Kate Rigby FAHA, Multidisciplinary Environmental Studies in the Humanities brings international researchers together to reshape our knowledge of global environmental challenges and seed change in research and policy agendas across the world. Prof Rigby shares how German funding is driving large-scale multi-disciplinary research programs.
With legislation currently before Parliament, debate is intensifying about the proposed role of the Australian Tertiary Education Commission (ATEC). In the second reading of the ATEC bill this week, we welcomed the contribution of Labor MP Tim Watts, Chair of the House Standing Committee on Employment, Education and Training, whose speech highlighted the opportunity for ATEC to play a strategic role in strengthening national capability through our university system.
Desire, passion, yearning, and grief — the ancient Greeks wrote and sung love stories that define the ages. Professor Marguerite Johnson FAHA, a cultural historian of the ancient Mediterranean shows how, though millenniums later, love songs endure.
As the Winter Olympics & Paralympics take place in Italy this month, Emeritus Professor David Rowe FAHA FASSA, scholar of culture studies and sports media, considers the history of sports diplomacy surrounding mega sporting events like the Olympics, and whether their social licence is running thin.
Australian linguists help us understand how language works, and solve real-world problems across fields of law, public health, and communication. Emeritus Professor Pam Peters FAHA from Macquarie University shares how her research helps develop effective and inclusive communication for all Australians.
New research published by AAH Fellow Professor Adam Brumm FAHA , and co-authors Professor Maxime Aubert, Professor Renaud Joannes-Boyau and Adhi Oktaviana reveals cave art found in Sulawesi, Indonesia, is over 67,000 years old — making it the oldest cave art found anywhere in the world. The findings provide insight into the lives and origins of early humans.
A snake winding around a goblet, poised at its rim as if about to drink, has become a well-recognised symbol of pharmacy in the intriguing motif of the “Bowl of Hygeia”. In the 2026 Trendall Lecture, celebrating distinguished research in Classics, Associate Professor Gina Salapata explores ancient stories of snakes and their cups that link them to gods, demi-goddesses, heroes, sorceresses and pharmacology.