VOL 6.2, 2001:   editorial   |   inasa   |   executive   |   essays   |   conferences   |   news   |   publications   News from the Centres Asialink Arts Residencies 2002 Centre for Australian Cultural Studies, Canberra Edward A Clark Center for Australian and New Zealand Studies Australian Studies Centre, University of Ballarat Australian Studies Centre, University of Madras Asialink Arts Residencies 2002 Amanda Lawrence Asialink is now inviting applications for Arts Residencies in Asia during 2002. The program covers the areas of Visual Arts/Craft, Performing Arts, Literature and Arts Management. Artists, writers and arts managers have an opportunity to undertake 3-4 month residencies in Asia including China, India, Indonesia, Japan, Korea, Malaysia, The Philippines, Singapore, Sri Lanka, Thailand and Vietnam. The Arts Management program invites applications across all art forms and includes project managers, curators, policy makers, technical personnel and editors. Asialink Residencies offer the challenges and rewards of in-depth cultural exchange only possible through an extended stay in an Asian country. The Asialink Residency program provides a grant for travel, living and project expenses and provides initial contacts in the host country. Closing date: 7 September 2001. Download guidelines and application forms from the Asialink website: http://www.asialink.unimelb.edu.au/ Or request application information from: The Asialink Centre The University of Melbourne Victoria 3010 Tel: 03 8344 4800 Fax: 03 9347 1768 Email: arts@asialink.unimelb.edu.au The Asialink Residency Program is supported by: The Australia Council, Australian Network for Art & Technology, Arts Victoria, the NSW Ministry for the Arts, Arts Queensland, Arts ACT, Arts WA, Department of Arts & Museums NT, Arts SA, Arts Tasmania, the City of Melbourne, Nagasawa Art Park in Japan, the Hijjas Foundation in Malaysia and the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, through the Australia Indonesia Institute, Australia Korea Foundation, Australia India Council, Australia China Council, Japan Cultural Program, the Australian High Commissions in Malaysia and Singapore and the Australian Embassy in Thailand. Amanda Lawrence Literature Program Manager, Asialink Email a.lawrence@asialink.unimelb.edu.au Report from the Centre for Australian Cultural Studies, Canberra David Headon University of New South Wales The Centre for Australian Cultural Studies (Canberra) plays a unique role in the continuing creation and understanding of, and national and international publicity for, Australian culture. It does this through the recognition of the particular strengths of its two university partners (UNSW (ADFA) and University of Canberra) and its affiliates, and its strategically important location in the nation's capital. The Centre's record of activity in 2000-2001 has again been an impressive one. Conferences in 2000 included a seminar on 'Australia and Timor' on 5 May 2000 (Main Committee Room, Parliament House, Canberra in association with Manning Clark House); an international tour: 'Shamrock and Wattle' Centenary of Federation Speaking Tour of Ireland, in June 2000, conducted by Dr David Headon and Dr Jeff Brownrigg (sponsored by Australian Embassy in Ireland, NCCF, Irish Tourist Board, Waterford Wedgwood, ScreenSound Australia and six Irish tertiary institutions); the 'Water Policy for a Dry Land', Seminar on Water, 10 November 2000 (Main Committee Room, Parliament House, Canberra in association with Manning Clark House); and a seminar entitled 'National Identity in Australian Cinema' at ScreenSound, in collaboration with ScreenSound Australia in October 2000. In February 2001 an international conference: 'A Century of Citizenship in Australia and Canada' was held at University of Ottawa, Canada (sponsored by the Institute of Canadian Studies, the Australian High Commission in Ottawa, the Forum of Federations, the Australian Studies Association of North America and the Centre for Australian Cultural Studies); A collaboration between the Centre and Canberra Museum and Gallery resulted in the Good Sports Exhibition, which was opened by then Chief Minister Kate Carnell on 5 September 2000. The Exhibition proved so successful that CMAG extended its run until January 2001 (four months in all). Makers of Miracles – the Cast of the Federation Story (Melbourne University Press, 1999) was launched by Senator John Faulkner in March 2000 in the gardens of Manning Clark House. Makers of Miracles is being hailed by MUP as the most user-friendly Federation book on the market. Manning Clark's 'The Ideal of Alexis de Tocqueville' – (Melbourne University Press – edited by Dymphna Clark, Dr David Headon and Dr John Williams), was launched by the American Ambassador , Edward W. Gnehm in October 2000 at Manning Clark House. The 2000 Annual National Cultural Awards winners were The World Upside Down, Australia 1788–1830, National Library of Australia (Group category) and Peter Carey, True History of the Kelly Gang (UQP) (Individual category). A presentation ceremony took place in the gardens of Manning Clark House in January 2001. Dr David Headon, Director Centre for Australian Cultural Studies, Canberra University College, University of New South Wales Edward A. Clark Center for Australian and New Zealand Studies John Higley The Clark Center, University of Texas As the change in the Clark Center's title indicates, the Center will from this North American fall expand its activities to include New Zealand Studies. There's long been a substantial but basically ad hoc exchange of UT-Austin scholars and students with New Zealand locales. It's also transparently the case that CER and the multifaceted trans-Tasman connection make it a nonsense to focus on Australia without also taking New Zealand into account. To mark this expansion of its activities, the Clark Center will host various New Zealand scholars during the coming academic year, and it hopes to have the current New Zealand Ambassador to the U.S., former PM Jim Bolger, uncork a ceremonial bottle of Kiwi wine. Readers of Crossings should note that ASANA - the Australian Studies Association. of North America - has also decided to incorporate New Zealand Studies, starting with its 28 February-1 March 2002 annual meeting, held next year at U.B.C. in Vancouver. The ASANA Board is currently applying itself to the hunt for a catchy acronym that reflects the Association's expansion. The Clark Center will be the recipient of a series of Fulbright scholars from both Australia and New Zealand over the next several years. Foreign and Trade Affairs Minister Alexander Downer has announced that the Australian Government will start to fund a special Professional Fulbright Award in Australian-United States Alliance Studies. Earmarked for junior and mid-level Australian academics working on contemporary aspects of the Australia-United States Alliance (defence/security) or on the broader bilateral relationship (trade/economics/politics), this Award will enable one scholar during each year to spend 3-6 months at UT-Austin and at the ANZ Center at Georgetown University. Potential applicants should contact the Fulbright Commission in Canberra (www.fulbright.com.au). The deadline for applications for the 2002 Award is 31 August 2001. Simultaneously, the Fulbright Commission in New Zealand has announced the start of a multi-year Fulbright Visiting Professorship in New Zealand Studies at the Clark Center and UT-Austin. As with the Australian Government's special Fulbright, this New Zealand initiative is earmarked for scholars in fields that relate to New Zealand and American trade policies in the Pacific Basin. One relatively senior scholar for each of the next three years will be chosen to spend a semester of teaching and research at UT-Austin. Interested New Zealand scholars should contact the Fulbright Commission in Wellington. The deadline for applications for 2002 is 15 August 2001. For its part, the Clark Center intends to establish a continuing biweekly Workshop on Australian and New Zealand political, trade and foreign policy issues. This will afford the increasingly numerous doctoral students working on these matters at UT-Austin with a biweekly forum in which to present and critique their work and to interact with visiting scholars from the two countries. Report from the Australian Studies Centre, University of Ballarat Anne Beggs Sunter Australian Studies Centre School of Behavioural and Social Sciences and Humanities University of Ballarat Although our Centre is very small, we have been doing some interesting things this year. We have published Becoming Australians: the Movement towards Federation in Ballarat and the Nation, edited by Kevin Livingston, Richard Jordan and Gay Sweely, Kent Town SA, Wakefield Press, 2001 (ISBN 1 86254 520 0, cost $29.94). This is a collection of essays derived from a conference organised by our Australian Studies Centre in 1995. The essays trace a number of themes, looking at Ballarat and its distinctive contribution to Federation as the strongest supporter of Federation in the nation. There are essays too on broad national issues contributed by Helen Irving, John Bannon, John Hirst, Robert Birrell and the late Kevin Livingston, who was head of our Centre until his untimely death in 1998. As this year is the 150th anniversary of gold discovery, we are organising a 'Gold Semester' for the second half of the year, which will involve other schools of our university and the wider Ballarat community, in a series of public lectures, exhibitions and excursions which will explore the impact of gold on our local community, and its wider importance in terms of political and economic contributions to Australian development. Report from the Australian Studies Centre, University of Madras It was a long cherished dream that became a reality when the Department of English decided to introduce Australian Studies as part of its M.A degree program. This had a genesis. The New Horizons program of the Australian government had the foresight to involve both the University of Madras and the Indo-Australian Association in its bid to showcase Australia in India. Dr. C.T. Indra organised a one-day seminar to introduce prize winning Australian Writers to Chennai writers, academics, journalists and students. David Malouf, Gillian Mears and Libby Hawthorne captivated the audience both at the University and later at the writers' meet. Professor Eugenie Pinto was selected to visit Australia under the AIEF visiting fellowship and returned after a thorough research of Australian Studies' syllabi at selected universities. She constructed the syllabus for a core paper on Australian writing entitled Australian Writing — Texts and contexts. Dr. Indra spearheaded the introduction of this paper for the MA English course at the department. The Asia-link Writer-in-residence, Ms Lee Cataldi was the first to make a full-length visit to the department. She interacted with students and staff of the local colleges and helped us to get our act together by encouraging us in our maiden attempt to offer a full-fledged paper on Australian Writing. She also arranged for Dr. Indra to visit Australia. Eugenie Pinto's contacts also bore fruit when Dr. Paul Sharrad from the Department of English, University of Wollongong visited our department and delivered the keynote address in the Seminar on Australian Studies in December 1998. Other distinguished visitors soon followed. They were Anne Whitehead, Lyn Riddett and Satendra Nandan. The flurry of activities started with the visit of top officials from the Australia India Council. Mr. Michael Abbott, Chairman, AIC and Mr. John Powys, Director visited the Department. Other distinguished visitors were Ms Denise Bradley, Vice Chancellor, University of South Australia and Mr. Ian Davey, Pro-Vice Chancellor. The current academic year 2000-2001 has witnessed a number of academic programmes and extra curricular activities connected with promoting Australian Studies in Chennai. As Judith Rodriguez, visiting Professor from Deakin University, Melbourne has put it, 'the kangaroo had indeed jumped high' at the Madras University. Dr. C.T. Indra networking with affiliated colleges was the prime mover behind the innovative programs conducted with the help of visiting Australian faculty and local scholars. In Jan 2000, the Dept was privileged to have Judith Rodriguez the poet-academic from Melbourne as visiting faculty to teach the paper on Australian Writing. She visited several affiliated colleges and lectured on Australian Studies. She delivered a series of lectures at the Refresher course for college teachers at the University of Madras. Professor Bruce Bennett had a face-to-face encounter with teachers from city colleges in connection with the teaching of Australian literature at the Madras University. Professor Peter Fitzpatrick from Monash University spoke on Australian Drama to a rapt audience tickled to hear that trying to present a complete overview of Australian Drama in an hour was not unlike negotiating the Chennai traffic! Louis Nowra's Radiance was staged in his honour by the students of the Dept under the direction of Dr. P. Rajani, Professor of Theatre Studies, Department of English, University of Madras. Professor Fitzpatrick remarked on the resourcefulness of the student performers who achieved so much with just 'two boards and a passion'. In July, Professor John Senczuk from the University of Wollongong was with us for a week and introduced the students of the university department and the affiliated colleges to Australian Drama. He donated a number of valuable texts to the Centre's library that has grown steadily with inputs by several visiting Australian academics and Universities, through the generosity of the AIC. In September 2000 four scholars from Tamilnadu read papers at the A-AASA International Conference at Mysore Peter Davis from the Lonely Planet Travel Guides visited the department and evinced a keen interest in our activities and our outreach programs. Inez Baranay, a novelist, was with us as Writer-in- Residence from December 2000 to January 2001 through AIC, and not only engaged the students in both Australian studies and creative writing classes but also met prominent local writers and lectured at several colleges affiliated to the university. Interviews with The Hindu and the Economic Times NN-ere arranged for her and the Department conducted a creative-writing workshop with Inez as the resource personnel. This was followed by a one day seminar on 'Globalisation and the Politics of Representation', with Dr. Radhakrishnan from Massachusetts, Amherst and Inez Baranay as keynote speakers for the two sessions. Papers were read on several cultural and literary topics. There were two papers on Australian Literature — one on the Ballad tradition and the other on Asian-Australian Fiction. Judith Rodriguez was at the department from January to March 2001 on her second visit to Madras University. She taught the Australian Writing paper and addressed students and staff at a number of local colleges. She was invited to address college teachers at the refresher course organised by the Stella Maris College at the request of the University of Madras. Eugenie Pinto spoke on Contemporary Australian Fiction at the same course. The Department organised a 3 day International Seminar on Literature, Culture and Translation with Professor Susan Bassnett, Pro-Vice-Chancellor from Warwick University, Coventry, U.K. as the guest speaker on the first day. She spoke on 'Translation and Remembering'. Several pieces of translations were read out and the difficulties encountered commented on. There was a translation into English of a short story by the Tamil-Australian Writer, Arun Vijayarani. The second day was entirely devoted to Australian Studies with Judith Rodriguez in the Chair. She delivered the Keynote address on New Directions in Australian Studies. Altogether eight papers were read on the following topics: Tamil Diasporic Writing in Australia- by T. Sumathi, Lecturer, Queen Mary's College The Gold Rush and Australian Ballads- by A. Sudha, Lecturer, Vaishnav College Lionel Fogarty's Guerilla Poetry- Eugenie Pinto, Quaid-e-Millat Govt. College Songs of Survival and Extinction-A Study of selected poems of Judith Wright and Coral Hull's Broken Land- R. Sreelatha, lecturer, Chellamal College Beyond Language: Transcultural Drama in Australia- Three Australian Plays-A. Smitha, SIET College Mudrooroo-Reclaiming Australia's Black History, Shamnugavel, M.Phil Student, Presidency College Les Murray and Nationalism-B.Srilakshmi, MA Student, University Dept. Indian and Aboriginal Myths- a comparative analysis of selected Myths - K.G. Naga Radhika, Ph.D. Student, University Department. The Australian Fare continued in the afternoon session with the staging of the play, Box The Pony by Leah Purcell and Scot Ranklin. A video of this presentation is available at the English Department. The proceedings of this seminar will be published shortly. Research Scholars are currently working on specific areas in Australian Studies and the collection of Australian Materials at the Centre has been made available to visiting scholars from other universities in India. Eugenie Pinto. Australian Studies Centre, University of Madras, Chennai 600005 Contents   |   Next Page