2004 News 

Singapore Studies Workshop 2004

CAPSTRANS hosted a Singapore Studies Workshop titled “Handing over the rei(g)ns: Civil society under Lee Hsien Loong” on the 22nd October 2004. The workshop brought together scholars with an interest in civil society and NGO activism in Singapore. 

Public Lecture on Australian-Indonesian Relations

CAPSTRANS and the Indonesian Student Association presented a joint seminar analysing Australian-Indonesian relations in light of the recent Jakarta bombing. The speakers were Professor Adrian Vickers, Associate Dean (Research and Graduate Studies), Faculty of Arts; Professor Philip Kitley, Head of the School of Social Sciences, Media and Communication; and Mr Ari Poespodihardjo, PhD student in Faculty of Creative Arts, and practising journalist in Indonesia.

Public Lecture on Islamic Education

The Director-General of Islamic Institutions, Ministry of Religious Affairs, Indonesia, Professor A. Qodry Azizy presented a public lecture on Islamic Education on 1 September.

URC Small Grant Awarded to Dr Julia Martínez

Dr Julia Martínez has just been awarded a URC 2005 Small Grant for her project “Labour migration from the Netherlands East Indies to northern Australia”. The advent of a colonial pearl-shell industry in Australia in the 1870s brought with it a small number of “Malay” divers from Netherlands East Indies (NEI) and by the late 1880s several hundred Indonesians were employed in the pearling ports of Thursday Island, Broome and Darwin. Precisely where these men came from, and what their experiences were, is yet to be fully researched. This small project, which forms part of Dr Martínez's broader ARC proposal, will consider the role of the NEI colonial administration in regulating migration from the 1880s to the 1930s. It aims to map the origins and socio-political status of indentured labour migrants from the eastern islands of the archipelago; and to present a NEI perspective on government regulation of labour migration into northern Australia, and NEI attitudes towards Australian pearling ventures within NEI waters.

International Korean Studies Conference 2004

(11-12 November 2004)

The Faculty of Arts and the University of Wollongong are extremely honoured to be hosting the International Korean Studies Conference 2004.

The conference theme, “The Park Era: A Reassessment After 25 Years”, reflects some of the key questions that need to be examined by academics and other commentators on Korean affairs, about how Korean culture, psychology, democracy and national infrastructure has come to be what it is today.

Lord Meghnad Desai CAPSTRANS Seminar

Lord Meghnad Desai presented a seminar in the CAPSTRANS series on “New anti-capitalist movement, civil society and global finance” on Monday, 23rd August 2004.

Fellowship from Max Planck Institute

Professor Christoph Antons has been awarded a Fellowship from Max Planck Institute for Intellectual Property, Competition and Tax Law in Munich to carry out research on Southeast Asian Intellectual Property Law in November and December 2004.

Leverhulme Visiting Professorship

Professor Geoffrey Samuel was appointed as Leverhulme Visiting Professor at School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London, August 2003 to May 2004.

CAPSTRANS Graduations July 2004

Five students graduated in CAPSTRANS Master of Social Change and Develoment course at the 15 July 2004 ceremony as follows: Christian Banno, Luciana Futema, Chiara Ridolfi, Elijah Mbuli and Sue Cunningham (in absentia). A pre-graduation lunch was held in CAPSTRANS for graduands and their families and friends.

Dr Brian Finn Awarded Honorary Doctor of Education

Dr Brian Finn, Chairman of the CAPSTRANS Advisory Board, was awarded an Honorary degree of Doctor of Education at the Faculty of Commerce graduation ceremony on July 14. Dr Finn also presented the Occasional Address. Dr Finn was Chief Executive of IBM Australia from 1980 to 1993 and Chairman from 1991 to 1998. He was also a director of Telstra and chaired the Council of the National Science and Technology Centre. In 1996 he was invited to become the independent Chair of the Board of Impart, one of Australia's largest e-learning companies, which, with UOW, won the Australian Interactive Media Association Industry award for excellence in 2001.

University of Wollongong's Internationalisation Committee's Strengthening Strategic International Links Scheme

Dr Lenore Lyons received a 2004 UIC grant to travel to Gadjah Mada University in Indonesia in November. This project will examine how understandings of national identity and regional identity are constructed within debates about regional autonomy and separatism in the Riau islands of Batam and Bintan in Indonesia. This research will be carried out as a collaborative program with Dr Pratikno, Associate Dean of the Social Sciences Faculty of Universitas Gadjah Mada. Research findings will contribute to the broader scholarly project of understanding nation-building processes in Indonesia by problematising the relationship between citizenship, nationality and sovereignty. It will also enhance and further develop linkages between CAPSTRANS and Gadjah Mada.

Dr Brian Yecies received a 2004 UIC grant to research on “Overcoming Attitudes of Distance: Conjoining Overseas Students with Real-time Web-camera Technology”. This new initiative builds upon the seed-funded UIC project and track record established in 2003 by Brian Yecies and Daniel Saffioti, which explored opportunities for a collaborative online teaching project between the Faculties of Arts and Informatics at University of Wollongong and the School of Film and Multimedia at Korea National University of Arts (KNUA) in Seoul.

URC Small Grant Awarded to Dr Lenore Lyons and Dr Michele Ford

Dr Lenore Lyons and Dr Michele Ford (Flinders University) have just been awarded a URC 2004 Small Grant for their project, “Becoming Trans/national citizens: Indonesian female domestic workers in the IMS-GT” ($11,000 for one year). The project aims to explore the ways in which women who migrate to Singapore and Italy to work as domestic workers are constructed as “trans/national citizens”. Through the use of focus group interviews, the project will explore the ways in which women who work as domestic maids construct their own sense of Self, particularly in relation to their status as transnational labour migrants.

URC Small Grant Awarded to Dr Ruchira Ganguly-Scrase

Dr Ruchira Ganguly-Scrase has just been awarded a URC 2004 Small Grant for her project, “Gendered Exclusion: Women and Forced Migration in Eastern India” ($6,000 for one year). The project examines women's experiences of cross-border force migration from Bangladesh and internal displacement in Eastern India. It aims to evaluate the contemporary applicability of the concept of “refugee” in postcolonial contexts and explores its gendered significance. Building on earlier comparative research on minority women and with a different method of inquiry, it will contribute to an emerging debate on the difficulties of distinguishing economic and political refugees.

ARC Discovery Grant Awarded to Associate Professor Adrian Vickers

Associate Professor Adrian Vickers has just been awarded an ARC 2004 Discovery Grant for his project, “Re-Writing the Nation: The Politics of Indonesian History since Suharto” ($89,000 over three years). The project is concerned with the processes by which political legitimacy is being reshaped by the contending groups in Indonesia - state, Islamic, nationalist and others - who are all struggling for power in the wake of the New Order era under President Suharto, during which history served a direct propaganda role in state ideology. As yet, no replacement state ideology has been formulated by the three subsequent governments. Analysis will be conducted through the examination of the politics of historical debates in Indonesia since 1998. This project aims to advance the understanding both of the public uses of history and of the unstable nature of Indonesian political discourse.

 Professor Christoph Antons Involved in Australian Network for Asian Studies

Professor Christoph Antons participated in a successful ARC Special Research Initiative application convened by Professor John Fitzgerald and Professor Robin Jeffrey at La Trobe University to develop an Australian Network for Asian Studies. A steering committee for the network was formed and the first meeting held in Melbourne in January. The project is currently setting up regional and thematic nodes. The Australian National University will be convening the network.

The Class Between: Conference Postponed

This conference has now been postponed until late 2004.