African Research Institute Committee:
Dr David Dorward- History (Director- Semester 1/ Long Service Leave Semester 2), Prof. Martin Chanock- Law & Legal Studies, Dr Elizabeth Dimock [Seminar Coordinator and Acting Director, Semester 2] , Issah Farah (Post-Graduate Representative), Eva Fisch (Library Representative).
Members of the Institute:
Dr David Dorward (History)
Professor Martin Chanock (Law and Legal Studies)
Dr Sue Thomas (English)
Dr Nicola Stern (Archaeology)
Dr Apollo Nsubuga-Kyobe (Business)
Eva Fisch (Borchardt Library)
Associate Members:
Dr Elizabeth Dimock [seminar coordinator and Acting Director, 2nd semester 2005]
Colin Fenwick (University of Melbourne)
Postgraduates:
Issah Farah (History) research in progress
David Wines (Archaeology) research in progress
Mary Ross (English) research in progress
Abdurrahman Mohammed Muhammed (Histrory) research in progress
Matthew Doherty (History) research in progress
Postgraduate Completions:
Derek Overton (History) -successfully completed PhD 2005
Matthew Durban (Grad. School of Business Management) successfully completed PhD 2005
Kwebena Adu-Boahen (Affiliate Member, University of Melbourne) successfully completed PhD 2005 under Dr Dorward's joint supervision
Simons, Allison The Development of Pastoral Societies in South West Kenya. Ph.D Thesis 2005 , Archaeology, La Trobe University.
Dr Liz Dimock served as Acting Director while Dr Dorward was on
Long Service Leave in Second Semester 2005.
Recent Accolades
Professor Martin Chanock was Smuts Visiting Professor at Cambridge University in 2005.
Seminar Program
The seminar program has been organized by Dr Liz Dimock. In addition to academic papers, the Institute is conscious of its role as a forum for African community groups. Consequently, in addition to normal academic seminars, the Institute tries to make available forum for African community groups within Victoria to discuss problems of settlement and multiculturalism, as well as what are often burning issues of political and social contentions in their countries of origin.
Matthew Albert (Victorian Young Australian of the Year 2005) , "The Impact of East African Politics: the Sudanese Refugee Story"
Matthew Albert is Overseeing Co-ordinator and Founder, Sudanese Australian Integrated Learning (SAIL) Program and Director, Sudanese Online Research Association. He was a legal intern with the UNHCR in Kenya in 2004, working in Nairobi and in Kakuma refugee camp.
Colin Fenwick (University of Melbourne, Law School), 'Legal Culture and Labour Law in Southern Africa'.
Yusuf Sheikh Omar, 'Somali Poetry: transmission and teaching'.
Conference/seminar presentations by members
Dr Dimock gave a paper at the Victorian Traffic conference at La Trobe University , February 2006, entitled: 'Miss Platt: an early Victorian traveller and translator
A. Simons, "Exchange networks, socio-political hierarchies and the archaeological evidence for differential wealth amongst pastoralists in south-western Kenya". Paper presented to a session on Africa's past: trade, exchange and other recent studies, Australian Archaeological Association/Australasian Institute of Maritime Archaeology Joint conference, Fremantle, 27th - 30th November
S. Spiers, "The role of trade in the emergence of complexity in southern Ghana: a view from the Eguafo Kingdom". Paper presented to a session on Africa's past: trade, exchange and other recent studies, Australian Archaeological Association/Australasian Institute of Maritime Archaeology Joint conference, Fremantle, 27th - 30th November
Dr N. Stern, "Introduction to the session on Africa's past: trade, exchange and other recent studies", Australian Archaeological Association/Australasian Institute of Maritime Archaeology Joint conference on Trade and Exchange, Fremantle, 27th - 30th November
Dr N. Stern, "Early hominin activity traces at FxJj43, a one and a half million-year-old site in the Koobi Fora Formation in northern Kenya". Paper presented to a session on Africa's past: trade, exchange and other recent studies, Australian Archaeological Association/Australasian Institute of Maritime Archaeology Joint conference, Fremantle, 27th - 30th November
D. Wines, "Meat-eating and Homo ergaster: new information from FxJj43, a 1.5 million year old site in northern Kenya". Paper presented to a session on Africa's past: trade, exchange and other recent studies, Australian Archaeological Association/Australasian Institute of Maritime Archaeology Joint conference, Fremantle, 27th - 30th November
Inter-university Activities:
In accord with its charter, "to promote interaction and cooperation in research and teaching with members of academic or research staff of other institutions in Victorian, elsewhere in Australia and overseas."
Members of the African Research Institute have supported an initiative by Dr Colin Fenwick (Associate Member) who has founded the African Legal Interest Group at the University of Melbourne.
Fatou Kine Camara, of the University of Dakar addressed the inaugural meeting in October, speaking on "Research on Africa Customary Laws: A Methodology"
At the second meeting in November, the speaker was Professor Martin Chanock, of La Trobe University, on the topic "Exporting Constitutionalist Democracy: Fifty Years of the African Experience".
The Institute maintains close relations with AMES, through Lindee Conway and Dr Irene Donohoue Cline, Melbourne University Department of Educational Management and Policy, who are enaged with the Dinka Women's Mother Tongue Literacy Project.
Links with the University of East Africa in Bosasso, Puntland, northeast Somalia
The African Research Institute, in conjunction with the Somali diaspora in Melbourne, has continued to provide educational material and other support for the University of East Africa in Bosasso.
Activities of Members of the Institute:
During the first half of 2005, Prof. Martin Chanock completed his term as Smuts Visiting Fellow in Commonwealth Studies in Cambridge. He was working on constitutionalism and governance in African states since 1956. He
presented seminars in Cambridge, and also (by invitation) at the
University of Melbourne, in Saskatchewan and Durban. Work on this
project continues.Dr Liz Dimock has continued with research for, and writing of, a commissioned volume on Africa in a Routledge series on Women and Anglo-imperialism, 1750-1930. This comprises a collection of 100 primary sources with head-note material and scholarly introduction. The volume is nearing completion and will be published later in 2006.
Dr Dimock spent November 2004 in Cape Town, researching the archives and libraries of the University of Cape Town, the South African National Library and Cape Archives, funded by a La Trobe University Central Large Grant. In August 2005, she worked in Rhodes House Library, in Oxford.
Dr Dimock continued to serve as an Ordinary member of the executive committee of the African Studies Association of Australasia and the Pacific.
Dr Dorward is an Honorary Life Member of the African Studies Association of Australasia and the Pacific.
Both Professor Chanock and Dr Dorward are on the Editorial Advisory Board of The Australasian Review of African Studies.
Dr Dorward continues to serve as editorial consultant to Microform Academic Publications of Wakefield, West Yorkshire, England.
Donations:
In 2005, Dr Dorward donated to the Borchardt Library his extensive private collection on microfilm and microfische of primary sources relating to Nigeria, Sierra Leone and the Gold Coast (Ghana), the War Office Route Books relating to Africa, as well as a large collection of twenty-six rare African academic journals.
The Institute also transferred to the Borchardt Library a large collection of South African anti-apartheid literature and material relating to the Eritrean liberation struggle.
Dr Dimock publicises the activities of the Institute in the biannual edition of The Australasian Review of African Studies. Members of the Institute have used the journal as a vehicle for alerting scholars and potential postgraduates to the array of African Studies resources available in Australia.
Community Activities and Interface
Dr Apollo Nsubuga-Kyobe served as a member of the Victorian Cultural Diversity Committee of the Family Court of Australia and as African representative on the Ethic Council of Shepparton District in 2004-2005.
Dr Dorward is a consultant on African art and material culture for the Museum of Victoria and valuer of African art and artefacts under the Commonwealth Taxation Incentive Scheme.
Dr Dorward is Honorary Patron of HARDA (the Horn of African Reconstruction and Development Agency).
Members of the Institute continue to be regularly called upon by the Refugee Review Tribunal and Legal Advisory Services to provide testimony and serve as 'expert witnesses'.
Dr Dorward was invited to give a briefing to the Northern Division of General Practioners on the history, politics and cultures of recent Liberian and Sierra Leone refugees.
Dr Dorward was invited to address the Australian Labour Party's Commonwealth Affairs and Federal Relations Committee, what used to be known as the Foreign Affairs Committee, on contemporary African political-economy.
Members of the Institute regularly provide radio and television interviews on a wide range of subjects relating to African affairs. Issa Farah, a postgraduate affiliated with the Institute, is currently presenter of the SBS Radio Somali-language program.
Publications
P Orebach, F Bosselman, J. Bjarup, Martin Chanock and Hanne Petersen, The Role of Customary Law in Sustainable Development (London: Cambridge University Press 2005) pp1-502
Dr Liz Dimock co-authored with Dr Tanya Lyons a forthcoming chapter on 'The state of African Studies in Australia', Paul Zeleza, (ed.) African Studies in a Global Context . Univ of Rochester Press, 2004 (appeared in 2005)
Dr Dorward, "Liberia: Firestone: land, labour and the political economy of rubber", Encyclopedia of African History Kevin Shillington, ed., (London: Fitzroy Dearborn Publishers, 2005)
Dr Dorward, "Western Sahara in the 19th Century", Encyclopedia of African History Kevin Shillington, ed., (London: Fitzroy Dearborn Publishers, 2005)
Dr Dorward, African Editor, SBS World Guide 13th edition (Melbourne: Hardie Grant, 2005)