- Australia
Celmara Pocock
University of Southern Queensland, Anthropology, Faculty Member
- Anthropology, Culture, Technology, Environmental Anthropology, Cultural Heritage, Heritage Tourism, and 34 moreAnthropology of Tourism, Anthropology of the Senses, Aboriginal History in Australia, Environmental History, Museum Interpretation, Tourism in protected areas/World Heritage, Tim Ingold, History of Museums, History of Collecting, Queensland history, History, Social Sciences, Cultural_History, Environmental Studies, Cultural_Tourism, Intangible Cultural Heritage (Culture), Tourism Studies, Cultural Heritage Management, Travel & Tourism, Heritage Studies, Cultural Landscapes, Marc Augé, Non-Places, Space and Place, Australian History, UNESCO world heritage, Australian Indigenous Archaeology, Indigenous Studies, Heritage Management, Indigenous Archaeololgy, Indigeneity, Environmental Aesthetics, Annemarie Mol, and Critical Heritage Studiesedit
- Celmara Pocock is Director of the Centre for Heritage and Culture, and Professor in Anthropology and Heritage Studies... moreCelmara Pocock is Director of the Centre for Heritage and Culture, and Professor in Anthropology and Heritage Studies at the University of Southern Queensland, Australia.
Celmara's research interests fall broadly fall into the area of human relationships with the environment, cultural heritage tourism and human-animal relations. Current research projects include aesthetics and labour on the Great Barrier Reef, heritage and wine tourism in regional Australia, and the impacts of ecotourism and World Heritage listing on local communities.
She was awarded her PhD by James Cook University for her research on visitors' sensuous experiences and aesthetics of the Great Barrier Reef.
Celmara has also worked for The University of Queensland, the University of Tasmania and in the public sector as Head of Cultures and Histories at Queensland Museum and Assistant Director of Indigenous Heritage in the Australian Heritage Commission. She was formerly the Cultural Heritage Tourism Research Theme Leader for the CRC for Sustainable Tourism.edit
Respect for any form of life entails nurturing all the potentialities proper to it, including those that might be unproductive from the human point of view. Are there lessons to be learnt about decolonisation of the tropics from a focus... more
Respect for any form of life entails nurturing all the potentialities proper to it, including those that might be unproductive from the human point of view. Are there lessons to be learnt about decolonisation of the tropics from a focus on ‘weeds’? The contributors to this photo-essay collectively consider here the lessons that can be learnt about the relationship between colonisation and decolonisation through a visual focus on life forms that have been defined as weeds and, consequently, subject to a contradictory politics of care, removal, and control – of germinating, blooming, and cutting. The essay demonstrates the continuing colonial tensions between aesthetic and practical evaluations of many plants and other lifeforms regarded as ‘invasive’ or ‘out of place’. It suggests a decolonial overcoming of oppositions. By celebrating alliances of endemics and ‘weeds’ regeneratively living together in patterns of complex diversity, we seek to transcend policies of differentiation, ex...
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Landfilling organic waste generates greenhouse gases and contributes to climate change. While the management of organic waste has been identified by all tiers of Australian government as paramount to meeting net zero emissions targets,... more
Landfilling organic waste generates greenhouse gases and contributes to climate change. While the management of organic waste has been identified by all tiers of Australian government as paramount to meeting net zero emissions targets, diversion of domestic organic waste from landfill is primarily the responsibility of local government. This review of academic and grey literature considers developments in food organics and garden organics collections in Australia and the implications for regional communities. It reviews source-separated collections and the treatment of organic waste administered by regional local governments and identifies there is a dearth of information in this area. Key knowledge gaps emerging from the study include: (1) There is a disconnect between the various state governments’ policies, strategies, and regulation of organics diversion and action on mandating or supporting kerbside collections; (2) there is insufficient funding and subsidy to encourage council...
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This paper explores how the imagined landscapes that act as a catalyst for World Heritage listing, are unable to be reconciled with formal heritage assessments. We explore this tension through two Australian World Heritage landscapes: the... more
This paper explores how the imagined landscapes that act as a catalyst for World Heritage listing, are unable to be reconciled with formal heritage assessments. We explore this tension through two Australian World Heritage landscapes: the Great Barrier Reef and the Tasmanian Wilderness. The history of these listings suggests a teleological process driven by a desire to create authentic utopias. While utopias are imagined spaces, Paradise at the Reef and the Tasmanian Wilderness are realised through hyperreal landscapes (fakes). However, these wholistic landscapes dissolve into a series of inventories of species and numbers in official listing. We suggest the failure to recognise the hyperreal is a form of false consciousness that creates a tension between managing for formally recognised values and managing the unmanageable utopia, and that a broader use of cultural landscapes might be useful in addressing this divide.
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Much of the literature on cultural heritage tourism is focused on the inherent tensions between conservation and tourism. Highlighted conflicts include the restrictions and high costs imposed by conservation and the potentially damaging... more
Much of the literature on cultural heritage tourism is focused on the inherent tensions between conservation and tourism. Highlighted conflicts include the restrictions and high costs imposed by conservation and the potentially damaging impacts of visitors on heritage sites. These tensions are perceived and portrayed as an underlying factor in the potential failure of many cultural heritage tourism businesses. A number of studies have been commissioned to address these concerns and ensure the success of the Australian cultural heritage tourism sector. However, this paper suggests that these studies, too, are characterised by an entrenched business - conservation dichotomy. Consequently the suggestions and guidelines offered to cultural heritage tourism operators and managers fail to develop new insights that might assist in more effective outcomes for cultural heritage tourism. I suggest that a more complex understanding of what success means within cultural heritage tourism might benefit the sector by recognising it as a unique enterprise with its own particularities and needs.
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Publishing details for: Alan McKee, The Public Sphere: An Introduction, Cambridge, UK & Port Melbourne, Cambridge University Press, 2005, 265pp.
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Review(s) of: Fantastic Dreaming: The Archaeology of an Aboriginal Mission, by Jane Lydon, AltaMira Press, Lanham, MD, 2009, xvii+319pp, ISBN 9780759111042. Includes references.
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The Great Barrier Reef is inscribed on the World Heritage List for its natural values, including an abundance of marine life and extraordinary aesthetic qualities. These and the enormous scale of the Reef make it unique and a place of... more
The Great Barrier Reef is inscribed on the World Heritage List for its natural values, including an abundance of marine life and extraordinary aesthetic qualities. These and the enormous scale of the Reef make it unique and a place of ‘Outstanding Universal Value’. In the twentieth century, protection of the Great Barrier Reef shifted from limiting mechanical and physical impacts on coral reefs to managing agricultural runoff from adjacent mainland to minimise environmental impacts. By the early twenty-first century, it was apparent that threats to the Great Barrier Reef were no longer a local issue. Global warming, more frequent extreme weather events and increased ocean temperatures have destroyed vast swathes of coral reefs. Conservation scientists have begun trialling radical new methods of reseeding areas of bleached coral and creating more resilient coral species. The future of the Great Barrier Reef may depend on genetically engineered corals, and reefs that are seeded, weede...
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This paper uses historical and ethnographic information to examine how local communities have turned huts on the Central Plateau, Tasmania into heritage. The Central Plateau was subject to increased environmental regulation in the late... more
This paper uses historical and ethnographic information to examine how local communities have turned huts on the Central Plateau, Tasmania into heritage. The Central Plateau was subject to increased environmental regulation in the late 1980s and early 1990s following the inscription of the Tasmanian Wilderness World Heritage Area. These regulations disrupted a range of community practices that maintained communal attachment to and ‘ownership’ of the land. Some locals responded by using the huts on the Plateau to memorialize their attachments to the mountain, creating a new status for the huts as heritage. Consequently, the government and community agreed that these buildings now required conservation management. This marks a fundamental shift in community attachment from practices (intangible heritage) to material hut preservation (tangible heritage), that has required community to accept the regulatory framework that disrupted their prior cultural practices that formed the basis of their traditional ‘communal’ ownership of the land.
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This paper explores how the imagined landscapes that act as a catalyst for World Heritage listing, are unable to be reconciled with formal heritage assessments. We explore this tension through two Australian World Heritage landscapes: the... more
This paper explores how the imagined landscapes that act as a catalyst for World Heritage listing, are unable to be reconciled with formal heritage assessments. We explore this tension through two Australian World Heritage landscapes: the Great Barrier Reef and the Tasmanian Wilderness. The history of these listings suggests a teleological process driven by a desire to create authentic utopias. While utopias are imagined spaces, Paradise at the Reef and the Tasmanian Wilderness are realised through hyperreal landscapes (fakes). However, these wholistic landscapes dissolve into a series of inventories of species and numbers in official listing. We suggest the failure to recognise the hyperreal is a form of false consciousness that creates a tension between managing for formally recognised values and managing the unmanageable utopia, and that a broader use of cultural landscapes might be useful in addressing this divide.
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The Great Barrier Reef is inscribed on the World Heritage List for its natural values, including an abundance of marine life and extraordinary aesthetic qualities. These and the enormous scale of the Reef make it unique and a place of... more
The Great Barrier Reef is inscribed on the World Heritage List for its natural values, including an abundance of marine life and extraordinary aesthetic qualities. These and the enormous scale of the Reef make it unique and a place of ‘Outstanding Universal Value’. In the twentieth century, protection of the Great Barrier Reef shifted from limiting mechanical and physical impacts on coral reefs to managing agricultural runoff from adjacent mainland to minimise environmental impacts. By the early twenty-first century, it was apparent that threats to the Great Barrier Reef were no longer a local issue. Global warming, more frequent extreme weather events and increased ocean temperatures have destroyed vast swathes of coral reefs. Conservation scientists have begun trialling radical new methods of reseeding areas of bleached coral and creating more resilient coral species. The future of the Great Barrier Reef may depend on genetically engineered corals, and reefs that are seeded, weeded and cultured. This article asks whether the Great Barrier Reef can remain a natural World Heritage site or whether it might become World Heritage in Danger as its naturalness is questioned.
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"Indigenous histories are notoriously obscured in official and documentary records. Recovering past indigenous perspectives depends on finding and reading fragmentary and incidental evidence. Photographic images are one such source... more
"Indigenous histories are notoriously obscured in official and documentary records. Recovering past indigenous perspectives depends on finding and reading fragmentary and incidental evidence. Photographic images are one such source and can potentially provide rich insights into Indigenous histories. However, the ways in which we read Indigenous people into these images, especially in settler societies such as Australia, is largely through physical differences. Such analyses often heavily on observed differences in skin colour. The problems and social consequences of racial classification based on skin colour are well known within anthropology, and increasingly the discipline seeks to reject or find alternative means to discuss difference. However, in the context of reading the past through imagery, we rely on the identification of physical characteristics. This raises issues for what or who can be read as Indigenous when individuals’ cultural identities might be obscured or misrepresented by skin colour. It also has implications for representations and recognition of Indigenous peoples today and in the future. This paper discusses some of the challenges of reading Australian Aboriginal people in images, including where Aboriginal people have (or may have) been used to represent an ‘other’ that is not necessarily their own identity; and where skin colour is not a defining element of self- identity. "
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Visitor Encounters with the Great Barrier Reef explores how visitor encounters have shaped the history and heritage of the reef. Moving beyond the visual aesthetic significance, the book highlights the importance of multi-sensuous... more
Visitor Encounters with the Great Barrier Reef explores how visitor encounters have shaped the history and heritage of the reef. Moving beyond the visual aesthetic significance, the book highlights the importance of multi-sensuous experiences in understanding the region as a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Drawing on archival and ethnographic research, the book describes how visitors have experienced the Great Barrier Reef through personal embodied encounters and the mechanisms they have used to understand, access and share these experiences with others. Illustrating how such experiences contribute to a knowledge of place, Pocock also explores the vital role of reproduction and photography in sharing experiences with those who have never been there. The second part of the book analyses visitor experiences and demonstrates how they underpin three key frames through which the Reef is understood and valued: the islands as paradise, the underwater coral gardens, and the singular Great Barri...
Research Interests: History, Human Geography, Aesthetics, Heritage Studies, Environmental History, and 15 moreHeritage Tourism, History of the Senses, Everyday Aesthetics, Coral Reefs, Sense of Place, Nature Culture, Australian History, Anthropology of the Senses, History of photography, Phenomenology of Space and Place, Tourism, Islands, Great Barrier Reef, Critical Heritage Studies, and Michael Taussig
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Review(s) of: Object Lessons: Archaeology and Heritage in Australia, by Jane Lydon and Tracy Ireland (eds), Australian Scholarly Publishing, Melbourne, 2005, viii+290pp, ISBN 1 74097 068 3.
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ABSTRACT This paper provides the context for a continuing research project on the potential benefits of World Heritage Listing for Indigenous people. The benefits of World Heritage listing are regarded as obvious by advocates of the... more
ABSTRACT This paper provides the context for a continuing research project on the potential benefits of World Heritage Listing for Indigenous people. The benefits of World Heritage listing are regarded as obvious by advocates of the system, but this view is not shared by many Indigenous communities. This paper provides an assessment of the issues that create conflict between the World Heritage system and Indigenous people. A review of academic and policy literature suggests that the World Heritage System is incompatible with many aspects of Indigenous worldviews, and that conflict arises over issues of sovereignty and translation. These deep-seated issues make it impossible for the World Heritage system to stay abreast of Indigenous concerns, and as a consequence World Heritage continues to be a site of protest and contestation for Indigenous people. This discursive essay offers preliminary insights from research currently underway using Australian case studies to explore these issues.
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ABSTRACT Reconciliation between Indigenous and non-Indigenous people in Australia is defined officially as consisting of ‘two-way relationships built on trust and respect’, recognition and acceptance of rights, histories and cultures, and... more
ABSTRACT Reconciliation between Indigenous and non-Indigenous people in Australia is defined officially as consisting of ‘two-way relationships built on trust and respect’, recognition and acceptance of rights, histories and cultures, and institutional and community support for ‘all dimensions’ of reconciliation. We suggest, after Alexandre Da Costa (2016. The (un)happy objects of affective community. Cultural studies, 30, 24–46), that the burden of supporting reconciliation is borne differentially by Indigenous and non-Indigenous peoples; it is seen by the latter as an apparently ‘happy object’ in Sara Ahmed’s sense, but as an ‘unhappy object’ for many Aboriginal Australians, who have argued that it requires first a process of makarrata, or peace-making. Traditionally this has included some reciprocal pain for perpetrators, and we suggest here that the desire of many Aboriginal people to develop a public heritage of massacre sites and former ‘fringe camps’ offers an opportunity for non-Indigenous people to take hold of, and hold onto, a prickly and difficult past as part of a process of makarrata.
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The Queensland Historical Atlas (2010) takes a fresh approach to the atlas form by interpreting Queensland landscapes as lived, embodied and practised. As a project conceived in partnership with Queensland Museum, the Atlas brings this... more
The Queensland Historical Atlas (2010) takes a fresh approach to the atlas form by interpreting Queensland landscapes as lived, embodied and practised. As a project conceived in partnership with Queensland Museum, the Atlas brings this approach directly into museum practice. This article outlines some of the challenges of the conventional atlas form, and examines how the Queensland Historical Atlas has embraced opportunities to reinvigorate the form, including the adoption of new technology and developing new affective interpretation frameworks. Significantly, the Atlas places material culture, including historical maps, at the centre of interpretation of Queensland landscapes. Although the Atlas is not an exhibition, it creates ready-made modules available for exhibition interpretation. Each of these reflects on how Queensland is shaped by its landscapes and how, in turn, museum collections can capture the diverse landscapes of Queensland and the people who create those landscapes....
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Waiting is one of the most common phenomena in ethnographic and other community-based research. Nevertheless, it remains under-explored in academic writing about the theoretical and methodological aspects of fieldwork. While waiting time... more
Waiting is one of the most common phenomena in ethnographic and other community-based research. Nevertheless, it remains under-explored in academic writing about the theoretical and methodological aspects of fieldwork. While waiting time often allows new data or information to emerge, we argue that such times have a significance independent of knowledge outcomes. We review various conceptions of waiting: as a time for self-awareness; the use of enforced waiting to exert power over the disadvantaged; and its obverse, the choice by the more powerful to ‘wait upon’ another’s needs and priorities. We use stories from our own fieldwork experience to suggest that in the particular context of ethnographic or community-based research, the choice to ‘wait upon’ others is a form of researcher reflexivity that can partially redress historical or current power imbalances.
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ABSTRACT ABSTRACTThe Great Barrier Reef is one of the world's premier tourist destinations. It is promoted and marketed to tourists as part of an idealised Pacific island paradise. While the gardens and decor of island resorts... more
ABSTRACT ABSTRACTThe Great Barrier Reef is one of the world's premier tourist destinations. It is promoted and marketed to tourists as part of an idealised Pacific island paradise. While the gardens and decor of island resorts mimic those of resorts elsewhere in the Pacific, the way in which Indigenous people are represented is markedly different. This paper presents an analysis of historic tourist ephemera to suggest that Australian Aboriginal people are largely invisible at the Great Barrier Reef, despite their role in establishing the tourism industry. It suggests that ambiguities of Aboriginal presence, in labour and performance, are a product of tourism ideals and colonial race relations.
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In the past, visitors to the islands and reefs enjoyed embodied encounters: touch, sound, sight, smell, and taste combined in an oriented experience that created a strong sense of place. Now human encounters are shaped by media and... more
In the past, visitors to the islands and reefs enjoyed embodied encounters: touch, sound, sight, smell, and taste combined in an oriented experience that created a strong sense of place. Now human encounters are shaped by media and technology, distancing visitors from unique Reef environments. Despite unprecedented access to the underwater, tourists today are more likely to experience the Reef through secondary visual representations, such as photographs and films. These enhanced and brilliant images create a hyper-reality in which the copies appear more wondrous than the real thing.
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For more than 1,200 miles along the northeast coast of Australia stretches a string of islands, cays, shoals and reefs that are home to a multitude of living organisms. In spite the vast scale of the region and a complexity of geographic... more
For more than 1,200 miles along the northeast coast of Australia stretches a string of islands, cays, shoals and reefs that are home to a multitude of living organisms. In spite the vast scale of the region and a complexity of geographic and biological features, it is known to us as a single entity - the Great Barrier Reef. A reconstruction of visitors' experiences of the region, however, suggests that the way in which it has been constructed and understood as a place during the twentieth century has changed considerably. In this paper I examine the role of motion film in recording visitor experiences of the Reef, and consider how such technologies affect human understanding of place and space.
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From the air a scattering of brilliant white sandy cays and sand fringed islands dotted in an array of navy-black, brilliant aqua and turquoise waters stretches for more than 2,000 kilometres along the northeast coast of Australia. Up... more
From the air a scattering of brilliant white sandy cays and sand fringed islands dotted in an array of navy-black, brilliant aqua and turquoise waters stretches for more than 2,000 kilometres along the northeast coast of Australia. Up close the waters are crystal clear, the islands are green, and underwater life displays colours and forms unimaginable to those who have never seen it. This is the Great Barrier Reef- simultaneously of enonnous scale and comprised of myriads of minute life forms. It defies the human imagination, but satellite and aerial imagery, underwater cameras, colour emulsion, digital technology and motion film make it possible to capture and communicate many of these visual qualities. Images of the Reef are reproduced in their thousands each year; in popular science magazines, documentary films, coffee table books, internet sites, tourist brochures, advertisements and postcards. The visual qualities transmitted through these media are an integral part of the region's standing as a World Heritage site and as Australia's premier tourist destination. While the tourism industry is often attributed with creating and promulgating particular images of tourist destinations, analysis of historic images of the Reef suggests that this relationship is a much more complex one. [Introduction extract]
Research Interests: Geography and Photography
The wonders of the Great Barrier Reef described in popular and accessible publications like National Geographic and Walkabout Magazine arguably underpin the significance of the region today. Holidaymakers in the 1920s and 1930s were... more
The wonders of the Great Barrier Reef described in popular and accessible publications like National Geographic and Walkabout Magazine arguably underpin the significance of the region today. Holidaymakers in the 1920s and 1930s were inspired by fictional tropical island adventures, and Reef islands promised them the possibility of finding paradise on earth (Pocock 2006). But the Reef also offered visitors the opportunity to engage in scientific discovery. Early expeditions to the Reef were more about learning, and less about luxurious relaxation. While romantic literature drove visitors to imagine a Pacific idyll, writing from and about the islands gave the reading public an understanding of marine life, life sciences and natural history. Early scientific discovery was shared directly with holidaymakers, and brought into homes around Australia (and elsewhere in the world) through the popular writings of holidaymakers, journalists, authors and scientists. Scientist Maurice Yonge published a popular book 'A Year on the Great Barrier Reef' that provided an account of the British Expedition to Low Isles in 1928-29. His is an account of science, while journalist E.J. Banfield shared his life on Dunk Island with avid readers in 'Confessions of a Beachcomber'. Banfield's writing details the island flora and fauna, and Yonge describes marine life. Together with popular magazine articles, this body of literature contributed to an accessible natural history of the Great Barrier Reef. In contrast with dry and technical language of scientific publications, such popular accounts brought a scientific knowledge and appreciation of the Reef to the middlebrow. They reflect the state of scientific knowledge at the time, and some outdated knowledge became mythologised. Nevertheless public engagement with this earlier scientific worldview continues to play a significant role in how the region is celebrated in the present.
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The purpose of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander heritage conservation in Ask First is unusual because it does not simply focus on the place and its values. Rather, it states that the primary purpose is to sustain the relationship... more
The purpose of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander heritage conservation in Ask First is unusual because it does not simply focus on the place and its values. Rather, it states that the primary purpose is to sustain the relationship between Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people and their heritage places. This definition attempts to encapsulate the obligation that traditional owners have to care for their country, and that sustaining this relationship is fundamental to the conservation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander heritage.
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Henry George Lamond is no longer a household name, but he was once popular and widely known in Australia and overseas. An extremely prolific writer, he published fifteen books of fiction and non-fiction, and more than 900 essays and... more
Henry George Lamond is no longer a household name, but he was once popular and widely known in Australia and overseas. An extremely prolific writer, he published fifteen books of fiction and non-fiction, and more than 900 essays and magazine articles in his lifetime. His essays and articles include writing in a wide range of subjects and genres, from romantic fiction to practical agricultural advice. He was perhaps best known for his animal-based books, including Horns and Hooves (1931), An Aviary on the Plains (1934a), Dingo (1945), Brindle Royalist (1946) and Big Red (1953a). These titles were popular in the United States, England and Australia. Some were translated into other languages, including German and French, and they even formed part of school curricula. His tales are set in the Australian landscape and are ‘littered with bush colloquialisms’ (Bonnin 2000).
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Heritage conservation and heritage tourism are frequently characterised as oppositional practices. This polarisation not only suggests that tourism practices run counter to conservation aspirations, but it allows heritage professionals to... more
Heritage conservation and heritage tourism are frequently characterised as oppositional practices. This polarisation not only suggests that tourism practices run counter to conservation aspirations, but it allows heritage professionals to imagine tourism as morally separate and even inferior to conservation. However, tourism is increasingly regarded as an important source of financial revenue to achieve the aims of heritage conservation. Thus tourism is regarded as something of a 'necessary evil' - necessary because it can provide resources for cultural heritage management and conservation, but 'evil' because it simultaneously undermines conservation efforts.
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ABSTRACT Despite a growing recognition that intangible heritage forms an important part of the significance of heritage sites, and that intangible values are intertwined with material resources and spaces, many procedures for the... more
ABSTRACT Despite a growing recognition that intangible heritage forms an important part of the significance of heritage sites, and that intangible values are intertwined with material resources and spaces, many procedures for the identification and management of heritage sites remain unchanged and fail to integrate these two sets of values. The conservation of heritage sites continues to be dominated by a process that first identifies a material site and then identifies the associated values that comprise its significance. This paper suggests that rather than identifying the physical expression of heritage as the initial point of heritage assessment, the stories (or intangible values) of a region or national history can form the primary mechanism for identifying physical heritage sites. Using the example of Australian government policies of Aboriginal segregation and assimilation, we suggest how national stories – or intangible values – might be used to identify representative sites. Free download: http://www.tandfonline.com/eprint/wCVkegqujY6ZDSSUSGHS/full
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In a time when political conservatism appears to be growing globally and in Australia, and the media is held to account for a number of these trends, Alan McKee’s introduction to the public sphere provides a refreshingly positive... more
In a time when political conservatism appears to be growing globally and in Australia, and the media is held to account for a number of these trends, Alan McKee’s introduction to the public sphere provides a refreshingly positive perspective. It tackles politically charged issues such as feminism, class struggles, race relations, gay and lesbian rights, and youth in contemporary society, through the clever use and subversion of the topics ‘trivialisation’, ‘commercialisation’, ‘spectacle’, ‘fragmentation’ and ‘apathy’. In doing so McKee demonstrates himself to be, as he identifies, an optimistic postmodernist.
Visitor Encounters with the Great Barrier Reef explores how visitor encounters have shaped the history and heritage of the Reef. Moving beyond the visual aesthetic significance, the book highlights the importance of multi-sensuous... more
Visitor Encounters with the Great Barrier Reef explores how visitor encounters have shaped the history and heritage of the Reef. Moving beyond the visual aesthetic significance, the book highlights the importance of multi-sensuous experiences in understanding the region as a UNESCO World Heritage Site.
Drawing on archival and ethnographic research, the book describes how visitors have experienced the Great Barrier Reef through personal embodied encounters and the mechanisms they have used to understand, access and share these experiences with others. Illustrating how such experiences contribute to a knowledge of place, Pocock also explores the vital role of reproduction and photography in sharing experiences with those who have never been there. The second part of the book analyses visitor experiences and demonstrates how they underpin three key frames through which the Reef is understood and valued: the islands as paradise, the underwater coral gardens, and the singular Great Barrier Reef. Acknowledging that these constructs are increasingly removed from human experience, Pocock demonstrates that they are nevertheless integral to recognition of the region as a World Heritage Site.
Demonstrating how experiences of the Reef have changed over time, Visitor Encounters with the Great Barrier Reef should be of interest to academics and students working in the fields of heritage studies, history and tourism. It should also be of interest to heritage practitioners working around the globe.
Drawing on archival and ethnographic research, the book describes how visitors have experienced the Great Barrier Reef through personal embodied encounters and the mechanisms they have used to understand, access and share these experiences with others. Illustrating how such experiences contribute to a knowledge of place, Pocock also explores the vital role of reproduction and photography in sharing experiences with those who have never been there. The second part of the book analyses visitor experiences and demonstrates how they underpin three key frames through which the Reef is understood and valued: the islands as paradise, the underwater coral gardens, and the singular Great Barrier Reef. Acknowledging that these constructs are increasingly removed from human experience, Pocock demonstrates that they are nevertheless integral to recognition of the region as a World Heritage Site.
Demonstrating how experiences of the Reef have changed over time, Visitor Encounters with the Great Barrier Reef should be of interest to academics and students working in the fields of heritage studies, history and tourism. It should also be of interest to heritage practitioners working around the globe.
Research Interests: Tourism Studies, Heritage Studies, Environmental History, History of the Senses, Everyday Aesthetics, and 13 moreCoral Reefs, Sense of Place, Nature Culture, Australian History, Anthropology of the Senses, History of photography, Phenomenology of Space and Place, Underwater Cultural Heritage Management, Islands, Great Barrier Reef, Critical Heritage Studies, Michael Taussig, and UNESCO world heritage
Environmental anthropology is an expanding field in Australia. Extensive research on Aboriginal relationships to land and natural resources has provided the foundation for growing anthropological interest in the interactions of other... more
Environmental anthropology is an expanding field in Australia. Extensive research on Aboriginal relationships to land and natural resources has provided the foundation for growing anthropological interest in the interactions of other Australians with the biophysical environments they inhabit. Australian-based anthropologists also continue to contribute to research on environmental beliefs and practices in other parts of the world. This paper provides a brief overview of previously explored themes in this field as a precursor to introducing new research and proposing additional areas of research. It is suggested that these could be usefully developed to enhance anthropological contributions to debates about environmental change in Australia and surrounding regions. We argue that there are roles for anthropologists as 'cultural translators' in cross-disciplinary engagements with environmental scientists and natural resource managers; as cultural theorists skilled at documenting and interpreting changing environmental attitudes; and as environmental advocates pursuing the knowledge needed to create more ecologically sustainable human communities. We also suggest that Australian anthropologies of the environment can make valuable theoretical and ethnographic contributions to this important international field of study. [PUBLICATION ABSTRACT]
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An annotated bibliography of nineteenth century travel writing held in the Tasmania Collection of the State Library of Tasmania.
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This paper explores an emerging paradox that just as World Heritage management agencies and institutions have started to accommodate Indigenous and other non-Western interests and approaches, Indigenous people have vigorously criticised... more
This paper explores an emerging paradox that just as World Heritage management agencies and institutions have started to accommodate Indigenous and other non-Western interests and approaches, Indigenous people have vigorously criticised such moves as oppressive and neo-colonial. Indigenous people are asserting their rights to be included at the very core of World Heritage processes, but on their own terms. The situation is fast approaching an impasse as Indigenous demands exceed the capacity of the current World Heritage system to respond effectively.
The issues of contention between Indigenous people and World Heritage managers are unlikely to be solved while these groups lack understanding of each other’s perspectives on the benefits and costs of World Heritage listing. These issues are prominent in the Australian context where World Heritage Areas may be recognised for natural values, but fail to recognise the full range of Aboriginal associations, aspirations and concerns. We argue that this problem can only be alleviated by reconceptualising core heritage questions and integrating, where possible, divergent Indigenous and non-Indigenous approaches to the definition, conservation and presentation of natural and cultural heritage values. This is a crucial issue because generally Indigenous people do not distinguish between nature and culture in the way Western heritage managers do. This means Indigenous people and heritage managers frequently talk past one another while ostensibly focussed on shared goals (Lilley 2012).
The issues of contention between Indigenous people and World Heritage managers are unlikely to be solved while these groups lack understanding of each other’s perspectives on the benefits and costs of World Heritage listing. These issues are prominent in the Australian context where World Heritage Areas may be recognised for natural values, but fail to recognise the full range of Aboriginal associations, aspirations and concerns. We argue that this problem can only be alleviated by reconceptualising core heritage questions and integrating, where possible, divergent Indigenous and non-Indigenous approaches to the definition, conservation and presentation of natural and cultural heritage values. This is a crucial issue because generally Indigenous people do not distinguish between nature and culture in the way Western heritage managers do. This means Indigenous people and heritage managers frequently talk past one another while ostensibly focussed on shared goals (Lilley 2012).
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Indigenous histories are notoriously obscured in official and documentary records. Recovering past indigenous perspectives depends on finding and reading fragmentary and incidental evidence. Photographic images are one such source and can... more
Indigenous histories are notoriously obscured in official and documentary records. Recovering past indigenous perspectives depends on finding and reading fragmentary and incidental evidence. Photographic images are one such source and can potentially provide rich insights into Indigenous histories. However, the ways in which we read Indigenous people into these images, especially in settler societies such as Australia, is largely through physical differences. Such analyses often heavily on observed differences in skin colour.
The problems and social consequences of racial classification based on skin colour are well known within anthropology, and increasingly the discipline seeks to reject or find alternative means to discuss difference. However, in the context of reading the past through imagery, we rely on the identification of physical characteristics. This raises issues for what or who can be read as Indigenous when individuals’ cultural identities might be obscured or misrepresented by skin colour. It also has implications for representations and recognition of Indigenous peoples today and in the future.
This paper discusses some of the challenges of reading Australian Aboriginal people in images, including where Aboriginal people have (or may have) been used to represent an ‘other’ that is not necessarily their own identity; and where skin colour is not a defining element of self- identity.
The problems and social consequences of racial classification based on skin colour are well known within anthropology, and increasingly the discipline seeks to reject or find alternative means to discuss difference. However, in the context of reading the past through imagery, we rely on the identification of physical characteristics. This raises issues for what or who can be read as Indigenous when individuals’ cultural identities might be obscured or misrepresented by skin colour. It also has implications for representations and recognition of Indigenous peoples today and in the future.
This paper discusses some of the challenges of reading Australian Aboriginal people in images, including where Aboriginal people have (or may have) been used to represent an ‘other’ that is not necessarily their own identity; and where skin colour is not a defining element of self- identity.
Research Interests:
Research Interests:
This report seeks to identify sites that illustrate the nationally significant history of Aboriginal segregation and assimilation in Australia. Government policies of segregation and assimilation policies have had a profound and lasting... more
This report seeks to identify sites that illustrate the nationally significant history of Aboriginal segregation and assimilation in Australia. Government policies of segregation and assimilation policies have had a profound and lasting impact on Aboriginal people, their families and cultures, and this report approaches the task by first identifying stories and themes that emerge from Aboriginal lived experiences of these policies.
The theme ‘From Segregation to Assimilation’ highlights the continuous process of colonial intervention in Aboriginal people’s lives from the earliest colonial settlements to the present day. The systematic application of segregation and assimilation policies led to increased levels of control over Aboriginal people through the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. The formal policies were abandoned in the later part of the twentieth century, but the legacies and scars of these practices remain central in Aboriginal stories and circumstances.
This highly significant theme encompasses the most painful episodes in Aboriginal history, and extends into every jurisdiction in Australia.
The theme ‘From Segregation to Assimilation’ highlights the continuous process of colonial intervention in Aboriginal people’s lives from the earliest colonial settlements to the present day. The systematic application of segregation and assimilation policies led to increased levels of control over Aboriginal people through the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. The formal policies were abandoned in the later part of the twentieth century, but the legacies and scars of these practices remain central in Aboriginal stories and circumstances.
This highly significant theme encompasses the most painful episodes in Aboriginal history, and extends into every jurisdiction in Australia.