Professor Lynette Russell
Director and Deputy Dean, Faculty of Arts
Centre for Australian Indigenous Studies (CAIS)
View contact details in Monash Staff Directory
I trained as an archaeologist before turning to historical and Indigenous studies and the application of post-colonial theory. Consquently I have published widely in the areas of Archaeological theory, Aboriginal History, post-colonialism and representation of race. Savage Imaginings explored authorised historical and contemporary constructions of Australian Indigeneity however A Little Bird Told Me presented a more personal account of Aboriginality based on the life of a Wotjabaluk woman imprisoned in a series of mental institutions in the early part of the 20th century. I have edited Colonial Frontiers: Indigenous-European Interactions in Settler Colonies and co-edited Constructions of Colonialism: Perspectives on Eliza Fraser's Shipwreck and recently completed a book with Dr Ian McNiven on the colonial underpinnings of archaeology as practiced in settler societies entitled Appropriated Pasts: Indigenous Peoples and the Colonial Culture of Archaeology (AltaMira Press). In 2005 Boundary Writing: An Exploration of Race, Culture, and Gender Binaries in Contemporary Australia,(University of Hawaii Press) was published. I am currently working on a new book on Indigenous workers in the early sealing industry.
The driving force in all of my research is an exploration of the sociology (and socio-politics) of knowledge. In short I aspire to understand not merely the past but how we come to know the past, how we describe, categorise, interpret and analyse it.
Teaching
I co-teach honours coursework units.
Postgraduate supervision
I am very serious about the importance of supervision and the postgraduate research process. I currently supervise a number of PhD and masters students in a range of areas. These include: Indigenous knowledge systems, Aboriginal History, Torres Strait islands settlement history, Australian archaeology and ethics of research and Indigenous education.
As a guiding principal I believe that it is a privilege to be allowed to work with ATSI people and materials. It is for that reason that I believe it is important to disseminate information in both the popular and academic arenas. I am also committed to the production of non-jargon research reports for Aboriginal communities.
Research project
Food, Traditional Aboriginal Knowledge and the Expansion of the Settler Economy
Research publications
Monographs
Appropriated Pasts: Indigenous Peoples and the Colonial Culture of Archaeology, AltaMira Press with Ian McNiven, http://www.altamirapress.com
Boundary Writing: An Exploration of Race, Culture, and Gender Binaries in Contemporary Australia (edited), University of Hawaii Press.
A Little Bird Told Me, Allen and Unwin, 2002.
Colonial Frontiers: Cross-cultural interactions in Settler Colonies, Studies in Imperialism, Manchester University Press, March 2001.
Savage Imaginings: historical and contemporary representations of Australian Aboriginalities, Australian Scholarly Publications 2001.
Constructions of Colonialism: Perspectives on Eliza Fraser's shipwreck,(Edited with Ian McNiven and Kay Schaffer), Leicester University Press. 1998
Chapters in books
The Undecided in Boundary Writing: living across the boundaries of race, sex and gender University of Hawaii Press.
'Either, Or, Neither Nor' resisting the production of dichotomies; gender race and class in the pre-colonial period in Beyond Identities, edited by Eleonore Cassella and Chris Fowler, Plenum/ Kluwer Press. 2005
"Towards a postcolonial archaeology of Indigenous Australia", in H.D.G. Maschner and R. A. Bentley (eds) Handbook of Archaeology Theories, Altimira Press.
"Ritual response: Rock art, sorcery and ceremony on the Australian colonial frontier", in M. Wilson and B. David (eds) Constructed Landscapes; Rock-Art, Place and Identity. University of Hawaii Press. 2002 (with Ian McNiven)
"Dioramas at the Museum of Victoria", in C. Rasmussen (ed.) A History of the Museum of Victoria, Museum Victoria. 2002
"Archaeology and Star Trek: Exploring the past while investigating the future", in Miles Russell (ed) Archaeology and Science Fiction, pp 20-35.Bournemouth University Press. 2002
"Gone Walkabout: images of Aboriginal Australia in the 1950s", in Julie Marcus (ed) Picturing the Primitif, pp 195- 211, LBR Press. 2000
"The Wurundjeri of Melbourne and Port Philip", Encyclopaedia of World's Endangered Indigenous People, pp 220-245, Greenwood, New York. 2000
"Mere Trifles and Faint Representations: the representations of savage life offered by Eliza Fraser", in I. McNiven, L. Russell and K. Schaffer (ed)Constructions of Colonialism: Perspectives on Eliza Fraser's shipwreck, pp 51-63, Leicester University Press. 1998
"Focusing on the past: visual and textual images of Aboriginal Australia in museums and archaeology". In B. Molyneux (ed.) The Cultural Life of Images, pp 230-248, Routledge. 1997
Journal articles
The Undecided in Boundary Writing: living across the boundaries of race, sex and gender University of Hawaii Press.
'Either, Or, Neither Nor' resisting the production of dichotomies; gender race and class in the pre-colonial period in Beyond Identities, edited by Eleonore Cassella and Chris Fowler, Plenum/ Kluwer Press. 2005
"Towards a postcolonial archaeology of Indigenous Australia", in H.D.G. Maschner and R. A. Bentley (eds) Handbook of Archaeology Theories, Altimira Press.
"Ritual response: Rock art, sorcery and ceremony on the Australian colonial frontier", in M. Wilson and B. David (eds) Constructed Landscapes; Rock-Art, Place and Identity. University of Hawaii Press. 2002 (with Ian McNiven)
"Dioramas at the Museum of Victoria", in C. Rasmussen (ed.) A History of the Museum of Victoria, Museum Victoria. 2002
"Archaeology and Star Trek: Exploring the past while investigating the future", in Miles Russell (ed) Archaeology and Science Fiction, pp 20-35.Bournemouth University Press. 2002
"Gone Walkabout: images of Aboriginal Australia in the 1950s", in Julie Marcus (ed) Picturing the Primitif, pp 195- 211, LBR Press. 2000
"The Wurundjeri of Melbourne and Port Philip", Encyclopaedia of World's Endangered Indigenous People, pp 220-245, Greenwood, New York. 2000
"Mere Trifles and Faint Representations: the representations of savage life offered by Eliza Fraser", in I. McNiven, L. Russell and K. Schaffer (ed)Constructions of Colonialism: Perspectives on Eliza Fraser's shipwreck, pp 51-63, Leicester University Press. 1998
"Focusing on the past: visual and textual images of Aboriginal Australia in museums and archaeology". In B. Molyneux (ed.) The Cultural Life of Images, pp 230-248, Routledge. 1997
Journal articles
"Kangaroo Island Sealers and their descendants: ethnic and gender ambiguities in the archaeology of a creolised community", Australian Archaeology.
"Indigenous Community Aspirations-Heritage, Education and the Possibility of Self- Determination", The Artefact.
"Drinking from a pen holder: Can archaeology recover past intentions?"Cambridge Archaeological Journal 2004: 63-67.
"Public Records Private Life: The Story Of One Aboriginal Woman And Her Journey From Non-Citizen To Citizen". Australian Women in University's e-journal, 2003.
"The Instrument Brings on Voices: life story narratives and family history",Meanjin, pp 145-152, Vol (60)3, 2001.
"Bunjilaka Brooding", Meanjin Vol.60(4) pp.99-103. 2001.
"Where is the Past? Locating archaeological discourses and narratives in the Melbourne
Museum", The Artefact. Vol.23 pp.3-8. 2000.
"Those wonderful creatures that they had captured": reading the exhibition of the Australian Wild-children, Journal of Australian Studies, 2001, 70(1), 57-62.
"Beyond the Final Frontier: Star Trek, the Borg and the Post-colonial", in Intensities: Journal of cult studies, Vol 1(1) 2001, pp 10-24.
"Well nigh impossible to describe": dioramas, displays and representations of Australian Aborigines. Australian Aboriginal Studies. 1999 (2), pp25-34.
Monumental Colonialism: megaliths and the appropriation of Australia's Aboriginal past, Journal of Material Culture, Vol.3(3):283-301. (with Ian McNiven). 1998
A Question of Violence. Arena (37): 20. 1998
"Strange paintings" and "mystery races": Kimberley rock-art, diffusionism and colonialist constructions of Australia's Aboriginal past,Antiquity 71:801-809. (with Ian McNiven). 1997
Going Walkabout in the 1950's: Images of 'traditional' Aboriginal Australia, Olive Pink Society Bulletin, Vol 6(1): 5-8. 1995
Place With A Past: Reconciling Wilderness And The Aboriginal Past In World Heritage Areas, Royal Historical Society of QueenslandJournal, Vol 15(11): 505-519. (with I. McNiven). 1995
Australian Aborigines: New perceptions and altered states, Current Anthropology, Vol 35(2): 202-205. 1995
Institutions
I have been a visiting fellow at the following institutions:
- University of British Columbia
- Trent University
- Cambridge University
- Smithsonian Institution
- British Museum
- Klagenfurt University
