MISCELLANEOUS
ISLA: A Journal of Micronesian Studies
'ISLA: A Journal of Micronesian Studies is a refereed biannual publication featuring original research, analytical essays, policy analyses, book reviews, and other articles about Micronesia. Multidisciplinary in scope and ranging in time from prehistory to the present, ISLA focuses on Micronesian cultures, societies, histories, economies, and the political, educational and health statuses and systems of the region.' Info: ISLA Editorial Office, Graduate School & Research UOG Station, Mangilao, Guam 96923.
Archaeological Dialogues
Archaeological Dialogues is a new English-language periodical in formation. The editors wish to promote new research themes going beyond traditional archaeological issues and introducing fresh perspectives from the social sciences, history and philosophy.
Archaeological Dialogues will be published twice a year (the first is due to appear in January 1994). For information contact Peter van Dommelen, Dept. of Archaeology, Leiden University, P.O. Box 9515, 2300 RA Leiden, The Netherlands.
Indigo
Indigo: Tijdschrift over inheemse volken is a new Dutch magazine on indigenous peoples. It is published ten times a year by The Netherlands' Centre for Indigenous Peoples (NCIV). For information write to NCIV, P.O. Box 4098, 1009 AB Amsterdam, The Netherlands.
De Tweede Ronde
The Dutch literary journal De Tweede Ronde published a special issue on Australia and Australian literature (vol.14, number 1, Spring 1993. It included contributions by Frank Moorhouse, Malou Nozeman, Ad Borsboom and Klazien Laansma (essays); Murray Bail, Mudrooroo, Patrick White and Tim Winton (translated prose); Kevin Hart, Kate Llewellyn, Bobbi Sykes and John Tranter (translated poetry).
Dirk Hartog Foundation
Since 1987 the Dirk Hartog Foundation (Stichting Dirk Hartog) has been promoting cultural exchange between Australia and the Netherlands. The foundation publishes a quarterly (bilingual) newsletter. For information contact Stichting Dirk Hartog, P.O. Box 685, 1000 AR Amsterdam, The Netherlands.
Asian languages in Australian schools
'A national Asian studies program in Australian schools will be given top priority by the Australian Federal and State Governments (...) Core Asian languages to be taught are Japanese, Chinese and Indonesian'. (Australia News- Australian Embassy, 18.12.1992).
Guide to the Trust Territory Archives
The Micronesian Area Research Center at the University of Guam published The Practical User's Guide to the Trust Territory Archives by Sam McPhetres (1992). The Trust Territory Archives Collection (TT Archives) contains most of the records of the Trust Territory of the Pacific Islands' administration headquarters on Saipan and previously on Guam and Honolulu(...) Two master sets of microfilm exist, i.e., one in the Hamilton Library's Pacific Collection at the University of Hawaii and one at the National Archives in Washington D.C. (...) This manual is designed to help persons wishing to retrieve documents and other materials from the TT Archives.' Info: Ms. Rosita D. Tosco, Publications Program, Micronesian Area Research Center, University of Guam, UOG Station, Mangilao, Guam 96923.
Social justice for Aboriginal people a primary goal
(Mabo Case)
'Removal of the stain of dispossession and social justice attached to the relationship between indigenous and non- indigenous Australians is a primary goal of the Australian Government in the 1990s.
The Prime Minister, Mr. Keating, set out his government's policy in the H.V. Evatt lecture to the Evatt Foundation in Sydney.
Mr. Keating said that some Australians insisted on devaluing the cause of reconciliation by calling it the product of guilt, but it was not guilt, rather responsibility which motivated his government in the matter.
"The legacy of injustice towards the indigenous people of Australia shames us in the eyes of the world. Not merely our reputation, but our self-esteem depends on our finding answers to the prejudice, injustice and despair which Aboriginal Australians continue to face," Mr. Keating said.
He said that last year's High Court decision in the Mabo Case, which overturned the long-standing legal conventions of terra nullius that held that Australia had no owners when it was colonised by the British in 1788, presented Australia with an opportunity to resolve land issues.
"Mabo presents us with a more substantial and binding basis for reconciliation.
"It should mean - indeed it has to mean - that we will enter the 21st century with the fundamental relationship between the nation and its indigenous people reconstructed on a just foundation."
Mr. Keating said be believed a cultural shifty was occurring
in Australia which would enable the necessary changes to be
made to resolve the problems between indigenous and non-
indigenous Australians, and that the Aboriginal communities
were determined to raise themselves from the social trap in
which they had for so long been contained.
Australia News (Australian Embassy) July 1993
Scandinavian Association for Pacific Research
The Scandinavian Association for Pacific Research is a network of researchers from the Nordic countries with a common interest in Pacific societies. Information, research results and work in progress are circulated and discussed in meetings and workshops.
The network was formally established at the workshop "The Global Anthropology of Oceania" held at the University of Lund, October 1991, with international participation: Nicolas Thomas, James Carrier, Christine Jourdan, Roger Keesing and Matthew Spriggs. The Network has been created on grants from NOS-S and Danida.
The researchers connected in the SAPR network represent different ways of approaching the theme of the creation of the contemporary societies in the Pacific, and the network unites the efforts to understand transformations from pre- colonial times in a historical and global context.
We are planning a broad based cooperative research project involving comprehensive survey and analyses of the articulation of local and global processes in the formation of the modern social and cultural forms in the Pacific region. It includes at least one 1993 workshop in which researchers from other parts of the world, with whom we network, will be invited.
Connections have been established with a large number of associates from all over the world and with, among others, the Centre for Pacific Studies in Nijmegen, The Netherlands, Centre for South Pacific Studies, University of New South Wales, and Center for Pacific Islands Studies, University of Hawaii.
For further information and registration as member or associate in the SAPR network (it is free), please send your name, contact address, region and topic of interest and research, to:
- Jonathan Friedman, Dep.of Social Anthropology, University of Lund, Box 114, S-22100 Lund, Sweden. Tel.: +46-46- 108848; Fax: +46-46-104794.
- Ulla Hasager, Institute of Anthropology, University of Copenhagen, Frederiksholms Kanal 4, DK-1220 Copenhagen K- Denmark. Tel.: +46-33-121716; Fax: +46-33-935575.
- Jukka Siikala, University of Helsinki, Department of Anthropology, Meritullinkatu 1 D, SF-00170 Helsinki- Finland. Tel.: 358-8-1911; Fax: 358-0-1917033
Network on Human Rights and Indigenous Peoples
EASA - European Association of Social Anthropologists
The focus of the Network is on indigenous peoples and human rights from an anthropological and interdisciplinary point of view.
The members will:
- encourage the development of an anthropologically informed understanding of different issues relating to indigenous peoples.
- participate in the scholarly debate on matters relating to indigenous peoples and human rights, e.g. ethnicity, nationalism or cultural complexity.
- contribute to the wider debate within anthropology as well as other disciplines.
- influence public and official perspectives on indigenous peoples.
The organizational structure is the simplest possible. The network is a collection of individuals organized around common goals. The minimum of administration and coordination necessary is taken care of by a Coordination Committee consisting of maximum six persons. The Coordination Committee nominates a Coordinator. The Coordination Committee has the overall responsibility for the work of the network based on the Network Declaration.
The main tasks of the Coordination Committee are: 1) organizing activities, 2) publishing a newsletter, and 3) maintaining a membership register.
Activities of the members on behalf of the network are of academic as well as applied character. Activities include:
- Research, collection, exchange, and dissemination of information. These most basic activities are aimed primarily at members, but also at the anthropological milieu and the general public. The Newsletter, Member Register as well as a bibliography on members' writings on indigenous peoples and human rights are important means and tasks in this connection.
- Teaching and establishing facilities to teach indigenous human rights to students of anthropology. This activity includes imparting information to anthropology departments on how to incorporate human rights in the curicula.
- Applied work, including e.g. publishing conferences, statements, as well as cooperation with indigenous and non- indigenous organizations.
The Network on Human Rights and Indigenous Peoples was founded at the 1st EASA conference in Coimbra in 1990; and formally established as an EASA Network at the 2nd EASA conference in Prague, 1992.
Adopted at Prague, August 29, 1992.
Signed on behalf of the Coordination Committee,
Lars T. Softestad, Coordinator.
AIDS in Oceania
In 1992 there were 1600 patients suffering from AIDS in Oceania, according to figures presented by the Global AIDS Policy Coalition of Harvard University. The World Health Organization has declared that much more money needs to be spent for the prevention of the disease. At the same time spokespersons of the WHO say the attention for AIDS tends to distract attention from other diseases, such as malaria and tuberculosis, of which many more people die. Malaria and tuberculosis are on the increase in recent years. In Asia malaria is related to AIDS in a rather morbid way: as a result of the increase in demand for condoms new employees with little resistance to malaria are put to work on rubber plantations in areas where they had not been before, and many die of malaria (NRC Handelsblad, February 17, 1993). An informal session on "HIV and AIDS in the Pacific" was announced, to take place during the 1993 Annual Meeting of the Association for Social Anthropology on Oceania (Hawaii, March 23-28). The organizers of this session are David Lewis and Bob Franco (ASAO Newsletter, January 1993). From April 19-23, the Australian Foundation for the peoples of the South Pacific is holding a conference on "Health in Countries of the Pacific and Pacific Rim" in Sydney. Contact person: Mr. Harold Webber, Executive Director, AFSP, P.O. Box 162, Narrabeen, NSW 2101, Australia. Fax: 979-7732, Tel. 99-4236 (ASAO Newsletter, January 1993).
European Society for Oceanists (ESO)
This is to announce the foundation of the "European Society for Oceanists" (ESO). The new society addresses itself to researchers with a regional interest in Oceania. "Oceania" is defined as including the South Pacific Islands, Papua New Guinea, Irian Jaya, Australia and New Zealand.
The society was established on the occasion of the First European Colloquium on Pacific Studies, which was organized by the Centre for Pacific Studies in Nijmegen from 17 to 19 December 1992.
The board of ESO consists of representatives from European countries where research in Oceania has a firmly established tradition, i.e. Scandinavia, Great Britain, France, the Netherlands, Germany, Switzerland, Austria and Spain/ Portugal.
The ESO wants to be seen as an interdisciplinary organization; membership is open to anthropologists, linguists, historians, geographers, psychologists and other researchers in the social sciences and humanities.
In the context of an increasingly integrated Europe (politically, economically and scientifically) this new society is intended to enhance intellectual exchange and cooperation between individual researchers and between institutions (universities, museums), both within and outside Europe. This goal is to be achieved by publishing a newsletter, by establishing an information network, and by organizing biennial conferences.
The next conference will be held in Basel, Switzerland, from 15 to 17 December 1994.
For information and suggestions please contact:
Jürg Wassmann (chair), Verena Keck (deputy)
Institute of Anthropology, University of Basel, Münsterplatz
19, CH-4051 Basel, tel. (41)(61)2612638; FAX
(41)(61)2665605