Dr Helen Lee

Associate Professor, Sociology/Anthropology Program Coordinator

Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences

School of Social Sciences

MB 479, Melbourne (Bundoora)

 

Qualifications

PhD (ANU).

Membership of professional associations

The American Anthropological Association, Tonga Research Association, and a Fellow of both the Australian Anthropological Society and the Association for Social Anthropology in Oceania. Currently President-Elect of the Australian Anthropological Society

Area of study

Anthropology
International Development

Brief profile

My research has focused on the people of Tonga in the South Pacific and Tongans who have migrated and settled in countries such as Australia. The main focus of my research has been the question of cultural identity, especially the ways in which identity is formed by children and young people. I have also studied family relationships both in Tonga and in the Tongan populations overseas, and the networks of ties between those overseas Tongans and the ‘homeland’ in the Pacific. I teach an introductory anthropology subject to first year students, and subjects on Kinship, Gender and Marriage, and Childhood, Youth and Culture, to later year students. I am actively involved in several professional associations, particularly the Tonga Research Association, of which I was Vice-President 2007-9 and the Australian Anthropological Society, of which I am currently President-Elect. Also, I established and continue to maintain an online bibliography of Tonga.

Research interests

Migration

- Migration, ethnicity, transnationalism

Social and Cultural Anthropology

- Childhood and Youth

- Psychological anthropology

- Tonga, the South Pacific

Social Studies in Science and Technology

- Cyberspace

Teaching units

Recent publications

Books

Journal Articles (since 2000)

Book Chapters (since 2000)

Conferences (since 2000)

Research projects