James Cook University’s Humanities, Social Science and education postgraduates have recently returned from the second annual JCU CASE HDR Conference, held at the Cairns Institute this year. The institute itself is a fascinating research centre—its architecture aptly reflecting the disciplinary intersections at play under its roof. It is, foundationally, a research and training institute seeking to capture the diverse interests of the tropics—linguistic, social, environmental, and anthropological. At the helm of this endeavour is Distinguished Professor Stewart Lockie, whose research “is multidisciplinary, high impact and focused on critical issues associated with global social and environmental change.”
Patrick White, a PhD candidate in History, reminds us that North Queensland has long had something of an image problem.
This year’s conference revealed many surprising and useful interdisciplinary convergences, drawing from English literature, history, and social sciences. It brought together presentations including paleo-environmental research into the fire histories of Northern Australia, Spenser’s The Faerie Queene, mental health and wellbeing among postgraduates, pedagogical approaches in the tropical region, egoism in the avant-garde manifesto, mobile money in Uganda, the restoration of self-determination to the Gugu Badhun people in Northern Australia, and public perceptions of science fiction and fantasy.
Alongside four great workshops, the content covered over these two days sat well with the broad aims of the Cairns Institute itself: “to provide innovative research with local, national and global applications.” Next year will hopefully see increasing international participation, engagement with new technologies, and if I have anything to do with it, a snorkelling day on the Great Barrier Reef.
Further information about the Cairns Institute can be found at https://www.cairnsinstitute.jcu.edu.au/
The JCU CASE HDR Conference can be found on Twitter at https://twitter.com/jcuCASE_HDR?lang=en