Held on the 19th Aug 2019
at 6pm to
7:30pm
Emeritus Professor Bill Gammage
presents the
2019 Richard Jones Memorial Lecture
Who Made The Wilderness?
This talk takes sides in the debate about the notion of wilderness in Tasmania. To do so it focuses on Tasmanian rainforest. It argues that in 1803 (shorthand for when Europeans first reached various parts of Tasmania), Tasmanians were managing rainforest with fire and no fire, both equally important. What newcomers called, and some still call, rainforest was encompassed by the Tasmanian mind: it was not wild or unmanaged. That was done by Europeans later, with devastating consequences.
Bill Gammage is an Emeritus Professor in the Humanities Research Centre at the Australian National University (ANU), researching Aboriginal land management at the time of contact (1788).
Professor Gammage grew up in Wagga. A graduate of ANU, he taught history at the Universities of Papua New Guinea (1966, 1972-6) and Adelaide (1977-96). He wrote The Broken Years on Australian soldiers in the Great War (1974), An Australian in the First World War (1976), Narrandera Shire (1986), The Sky Travellers on the 1938-39 Hagen-Sepik Patrol in New Guinea (1998), and The Biggest Estate on Earth: How Aborigines made Australia (2011).
He served the National Museum of Australia for three years as Council member, Deputy Chair and Acting Chair. He was made a Freeman of the Shire of Narrandera in 1987, a fellow of the Australian Academy of Social Sciences in 1991, and a Member of the Order of Australia (AM) in 2005.
About the Lecture
The late Dr Richard (Dick) Jones made an outstanding contribution to environmental awareness in Australia and beyond. He played a pivotal role in the Lake Pedder Action Committee and in the formation of the United Tasmania Group (the world's first comprehensive Green party) in the early '70s, both of which provided the groundwork for the later successful national campaign to prevent the damming of the Franklin River.
Dr Jones was also instrumental in establishing the community-based Tasmanian Environment Centre (now Sustainable Living Tasmania) and he played a leading role in converting the Australian Conservation Foundation into one of the nation's most dynamic environmental organisations. Further, in establishing the postgraduate Centre for Environmental Studies at the University of Tasmania, Dr Jones did much to promote problem-oriented, interdisciplinary environmental research that has provided the community with valuable information and innovative ideas.
The Richard Jones Memorial Trust
Colleagues, students, graduates, and friends from the Centre for Environmental Studies at the University of Tasmania in conjunction with the Tasmanian Environment Centre established a trust (following a community appeal) administered by a volunteer committee of academics and community members.
You can contact the committee through Sustainable Living Tasmania
Refreshments from 5.30pm.
This event will be broadcast live through the University's Livestreamchannel - https://livestream.com/universityoftasmania. You can watch live or at a later date.
