Other people's country : law, water, entitlement

This issue of Settler Colonial Studies comes out of a long-term collaboration between the guest editors which began, in earnest, with a panel on the theme of ‘Other People’s Country: Law, Water, Entitlement’ at the Cultural Studies Association of Australasia conference held at the University of Sydney in December 2012. The panel’s topic was drawn from our own work on encounters between settler and indigenous ‘laws’ over specific waters, including Lake Omapere in the Hokianga district of Aotearoa/New Zealand, Lake Okanagan in British Columbia, Canada, Lake Cayuga in upper New York State, and the Wenlock, Archer, Stewart and Lockhart rivers in far north Queensland, Australia.1 Further, the conference’s provocative title (Materialities: Economies, Empiricism, & Things) corresponded to our own interest in thinking through the entangled objects of law – legislation, policies, institutions, treaties and so on – that ‘govern’ waters and that make bodies of water ‘lawful’ within these settler colonial sites today. Informed by the theoretical interventions of cosmopolitics and political ecology, each opening up new approaches to questions of politics and ‘the political’, we were interested in attempting to locate these insights within material settler colonial ‘places’ rather than abstract structures of domination. A claim to water is not simply a claim to a resource. It is a claim to knowledge and to the constitution of place and therefore, in the terms of Isabelle Stengers, to the continued constitution of the past, present and future of a ‘real world’.

Teaching climate change at the end of nature: post-colonial Australia, Indigenous realism and Alexis Wright's The Swan Book

Climate change is an enormous and increasingly urgent issue. This important book highlights how humanities disciplines can mobilize the creative and critical power of students, teachers, and communities to confront climate change.

Attitudes towards antidepressants among people living with inflammatory bowel disease: an online Australia-wide survey.

BACKGROUND AND AIMS: Little research has been conducted on antidepressants (ADs) in inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) despite their widespread use and evidence that they may improve immunoregulatory activity. The present study aimed 1) To explore the use and type(s) of ADs currently prescribed to people living with IBD and to collect evidence with respect to any observed effect of ADs on the course of IBD, and 2) To explore experiences and opinions regarding the effect of ADs on IBD course and attitudes towards future trials with ADs. METHODS: A cross-sectional exploratory Australia-wide online survey was conducted. Numerical results of the survey were summarised using descriptive statistics and open-ended questions using a simple content analysis. RESULTS: Overall, 98 IBD respondents participated in the survey, 50% with Crohn's disease, and 79% females. Sixty five (66%) participants reported current and 46 (47%) reported past AD use. Of the current AD users, 51 (79%) reported that the symptoms ADs were prescribed for improved. Psychological well-being improved in 87% of participants. The majority of respondents observed no change in IBD activity while on ADs, however, 16 (25%) believed that ADs improved their IBD. Most (84%) respondents would recommend ADs to other people living with IBD, and 81% reported willingness to participate in clinical trials with ADs. CONCLUSIONS: Future clinical trials on ADs are warranted and likely to be accepted by people living with IBD in need of mental health care; however, it is yet unknown whether ADs will have a specific impact on long-term IBD activity.