Exploring Indigenous histories and cross-cultural collecting encounters in German art, archival and material culture collections: The Agnes S Schulz and Frobenius Expedition to Arnhem Land, Australia 1954-1995
Seminar
In June 1954, Agnes Susanne Schulz, a member of the Frobenius Institute in Frankfurt am Main, Germany, travelled to the Northern Territory, where, over a period of nearly two years, she recorded rock art, cultural knowledge and practices, and collected material culture of local Aboriginal peoples…
Small apes, small brains—big lessons for human evolution
Seminar
The brain and inner ear ducts are critical for an animal’s survival yet (almost) never fossilise. To learn how these neural and sensory structures have changed over human evolution, we can look to endocranial casts of the skull and bony labyrinth that surround them. In this talk, I’ll discuss…
Criminality and Femininity: Undoing the Paradox
Lecture/seminar
Women involved in violent crime, both perpetrators and victims, are often vulnerable to forms of representation that distort or overwrite their experiences. Their identities can be reduced to sexist stereotypes, while their bodies are displaced, manipulated and represented in ways that reinforce…
'Each book, in a word, carries a history': New Insights from First Fleet Association Copies
Lecture/seminar
The First Fleet sailed from England on 13 May 1787, carrying more than 1,500 people. What books they read, owned or carried with them remains a subject of great historical and research value for understanding Early European settlement in Australia. This paper examines surviving books of First Fleet…
Ancestral futures in practice - museums as platforms for continuities
Lecture/seminar
Recognising and embedding First Nations concepts within museum work has characterised museum practice for the past two decades. Today, First Nations leaders within museums have the opportunity to extend on this – translating concepts into practice in ways that feel natural and empowering.Hear from…
Wellspring Series 2026: Beyond the Algorithm: challenging the manosphere
Theatre
Can we use social media to stop hate?How might we redesign digital spaces to minimise misogyny and associated social harms?Beyond the Algorithm pilots theatre-based critical empathy training with young people through an adapted form of Forum Theatre, an interactive theatre style that invites…
“Something about this job and many other kinds of jobs is essentially rotten”: Autofiction in the Amazon Fulfilment Centre
Lecture/seminar
In German novelist Heike Geissler’s Seasonal Associate (translated into English in 2018), the author details her time working as a temporary labourer in an Amazon fulfilment centre. As a work of autofiction, Geissler’s novel offers an unconventional twist: the novel is written in the second person,…