Indigenous Women and the Transformation of Nature in Early Van Diemen's Land, c.1798–1840s

About the research project

The historiography of early colonial Van Diemen's Land has, for good reason, focused on dispossession, violence, and the demographic catastrophe inflicted on Tasmanian Aboriginal communities in the nineteenth century. That story remains essential and far from fully told. But it has tended to overshadow a quieter, equally consequential history: from the sealing era preceding formal settlement in 1803–04 onward, a significant number of Aboriginal women were taken — through abduction, coercion, and sometimes negotiated arrangement — into relationships with sealers and later settlers. Many of these women, and the families they raised, were absorbed into the margins of colonial society rather than removed from the island or confined to institutions such as Wybalenna. Their experience fits neither the narrative of extermination nor of "settlement," and has received far less scholarly attention.

This project asks a largely unexamined question: what did these women understand about the transformation of the land itself, and what record survives of that understanding? Early settlement brought sheep and cattle grazing, English agricultural techniques, and the destruction of shallow, fire-adapted turf soils across the Midlands and eastern grasslands; it altered the migratory and grazing patterns of kangaroo and wallaby populations central to Aboriginal subsistence and cosmology; and it accelerated the spread of woody shrub and forest into previously open, fire-managed country. Aboriginal women living through this transformation — as wives, mothers, workers, and knowledge-holders within mixed settler-Aboriginal households — occupied a distinctive vantage point from which to observe and narrate these ecological changes, though almost none of this testimony survives in conventional archival form.

The project's central problem is one of recovery under conditions of severe source scarcity. It proposes reconstructing this vantage point not through the official colonial record, which is largely silent on Aboriginal women's ecological knowledge, but through cross-disciplinary triangulation of fragmentary evidence: family oral tradition, surviving Tasmanian Aboriginal language material and place names, song and story fragments, the material and faunal record from historical archaeology and paleoecology, and the settler documentary record read against the grain.

The successful candidate will work across documentary, linguistic, archaeological, forensic and paleoecological sources, developing a defensible methodology for reading silence and fragment as evidence. Close consultation with the Tasmanian Aboriginal community is central to the research design. The project is based at the University of Tasmania, School of Humanities, Arts and Social Sciences, supervised by Dr Catherine Goetze (Politics and International Relations) and Dr Michael Guerzoni (Sociology and Criminology).

Alternate location

The project might require a longer stay at Cradle Coast campus for research.

Primary supervisor

Meet Doctor Catherine Goetze

Funding

Applicants will be considered for a Research Training Program (RTP) scholarship or Tasmania Graduate Research Scholarship (TGRS) which, if successful, provides:

• a living allowance stipend funded by University of Tasmania of $34,315 per annum for 3.5 years
• a relocation allowance of up to $2,000
• a tuition fees offset covering the cost of tuition fees for up to four years (domestic applicants only)

A tuition fee offset may be offered to eligible international applicants following competitive assessment 

As part of the application process you may indicate if you do not wish to be considered for scholarship funding.

Other funding opportunities and fees

For further information regarding other scholarships on offer, and the various fees for undertaking a research degree, please visit our Scholarships and fees on research degrees page.

Eligibility

Applicants should review the Higher Degree by Research minimum entry requirements.

Ensure your eligibility for the scholarship round by referring to our Key Dates.

Additional eligibility criteria specific to this project/scholarship:

Postgraduate qualification in humanities, social sciences, human geography

Selection criteria

The project is competitively assessed and awarded. Selection is based on academic merit and suitability to the project as determined by the College.

Additional essential selection criteria specific to this project:

•  A strong background in history, Indigenous studies, anthropology, or a cognate discipline, ideally with some exposure to environmental history or historical ecology;
• Demonstrated sensitivity to, and ideally prior experience working within, community protocols for research involving Aboriginal history and knowledge;
• Interest in or aptitude for interdisciplinary source work (linguistic, archaeological, oral-historical);
• Strong written communication skills and the capacity to construct careful argument from fragmentary evidence.

Additional desirable selection criteria specific to this project:

 Prior coursework or research experience relating to Tasmanian or Australian Aboriginal history is highly desirable but not a strict requirement.

Application process

1. Select your project, and check that you meet the eligibility and selection criteria, including citizenship;
2. Contact Doctor Catherine Goetze to discuss your suitability and the project's requirements; and
3. In your application:
   • Copy and paste the title of the project from this advertisement into your application. If you don’t correctly do this your application may be rejected.
   • Submit a signed supervisory support form, a CV including contact details of 2 referees and your project research proposal.
4. Apply prior to 1 October 2026.

Full details of the application process can be found under the ' How to apply ' section of the Research Degrees website.

Following the closing date applications will be assessed within the College. Applicants should expect to receive notification of the outcome by email by the advertised outcome date.

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