Research methodologies in creative practice : literacy in the digital age of the twenty first century - learning from computer games

Literacy remains one of the central goals of schooling, but the ways in which it is understood are changing. The growth of the networked society, and the spread of Information and Communications Technologies (ICT), has brought about significant changes to traditional forms of literacy. Older, print based forms now take their place alongside a mix of newer multi-modal forms, where a wide range of elements such as image, sound, movement, light, colour and interactivity often supplant the printed word and contribute to the ways in which meaning is made. For young people to be fully literate in the twenty-first century, they need to have clear understandings about the ways in which these forms of literacy combine to persuade, present a point of view, argue a case or win the viewers’ sympathies. They need to know how to use them themselves, and to be aware of the ways in which others use them. They need to understand how digital texts organise and prioritise knowledge and information, and to recognise and be critically informed about the global context in which this occurs. That is, to be effective members of society, students need to become critical and capable users of both print and multimodal literacy, and be able to bring informed and analytic perspectives to bear on all texts, both print and digital, that they encounter in everyday life.

This is part of schools’ larger challenge to build robust connections between school and the world beyond, to meet the needs of all students, and to counter problems of alienation and marginalisation, particularly amongst students in the middle years. This means finding ways to be relevant and useful for all students, and to provide them with the skills and knowledge they will need in the ICT-based world of the Twentyfirst century. With respect to literacy education, engagement and technology, we urgently need more information as to how this might be best achieved.

Indigenous place-making in the city : dispossessions, occupations and implications for cultural architecture

This paper considers Indigenous place-making practices in light of an idea for a major Victorian Indigenous Cultural Knowledge and Education Centre in central Melbourne as championed by Traditional Owners in Victoria. With only eight Aboriginal architects in the country, collaboration with non-Indigenous architects will be inevitable. Two case studies from the recent past—the Tent Embassy in Canberra and a street corner in Collingwood—reveal that dominant cultures of place-making continue to marginalise Aboriginal people in urban Australia. This paper will contend that delivering spatial justice will require both an opportunity for Indigenous Victorians to build visibility in the centre of the city and a willingness within the dominant culture to be deterritorialised.

Insights into the biodiversity and social benchmarking components of the Northern Australian fire management and carbon abatement programmes

Much of northern Australia’s tropical savannas are subject to annual intense and extensive late dry season wildfires, much of this occurring on Aboriginal land. Based on the successful West Arnhem Land Fire Abatement (WALFA) model, which has resulted in significantly reduced greenhouse gas emissions, fire abatement programmes are planned for other significant regions of northern Australia. This study offers an introduction to the ideas behind a proposed environmental and social benchmarking project that aims to evaluate the potential benefits of expanding the fire abatement program in northern Australia, under the leadership of NAILSMA and its partners. Gaining a better understanding of the biodiversity, social and cultural outcomes of these fire abatement activities is an important component of demonstrating multiple benefits of these programmes. We emphasize the role of both biodiversity and cultural mapping to establish benchmarks and baseline states, with the involvement of Indigenous communities being a key element to optimize social and biodiversity benefits. Consultation with Traditional Owners and ranger groups to establish an agreed set of targets, indicators and sampling protocols and methodologies are critical component of this process. Examples of preliminary work to date are provided.

Raising the volume : Indigenous voices in news media and policy

This article explores Indigenous contributions to shaping public and policy agendas through their use of the news media. It reports on research conducted for the Australian News Media and Indigenous Policy-making 1988–2008 project that is investigating relationships between the representation of Indigenous peoples in public media and the development of Indigenous affairs policies. Interviews with Indigenous policy advocates, journalists and public servants identified the strategies that have been used by individuals and Indigenous organisations to penetrate policy debates and influence public policy. The article concludes that in the face of a neo-liberal policy agenda amplified through mainstream media, particular Indigenous voices nevertheless have had a significant impact, keeping alive debate about issues such as the importance of bilingual education programs and community involvement in the delivery of primary health care.

Promoting fit bodies, healthy eating and physical activity among Indigenous Australian men : a study protocol

Background: Overall the physical health of Indigenous men is among the worst in Australia. Research has indicated that modifiable lifestyle factors, such as poor nutrition and physical inactivity, appear to contribute strongly to these poor health conditions. To effectively develop and implement strategies to improve the health of Australia’s Indigenous peoples, a greater understanding is needed of how Indigenous men perceive health, and how they view and care for their bodies. Further, a more systematic understanding of how sociocultural factors affect their health attitudes and behaviours is needed. This article presents the study protocol of a communitybased investigation into the factors surrounding the health and body image of Indigenous Australian men.
Methods and design: The study will be conducted in a collaborative manner with Indigenous Australian men using a participatory action research framework. Men will be recruited from three locations around Australia (metropolitan, regional, and rural) and interviewed to understand their experiences and perspectives on a number of issues related to health and health behaviour. The information that is collected will be analysed using modified grounded theory and thematic analysis. The results will then be used to develop and implement community events in each location to provide feedback on the findings to the community, promote health enhancing strategies, and determine future action and collaboration.
Discussion: This study will explore both risk and protective factors that affect the health of Indigenous Australian men. This knowledge will be disseminated to the wider Indigenous community and can be used to inform future health promotion strategies. The expected outcome of this study is therefore an increased understanding of health and health change in Indigenous Australian men, the development of strategies that promote healthy eating and positive patterns of physical activity and, in the longer term, more effective and culturally-appropriate interventions to improve health.

Enraged Aborigines at the Embassy Ball : media representations of indigenous Australia

Analyses current media representations of Indigenous Australia, including the Aboriginal Tent Embassy "riot", the  high profile columnist Andrew Bolt's breaching of the Anti-Discrimination Act, and the Liam Jurrah case, while historicising the way Aboriginal Australians have been portrayed in the media and relating this to ethics.

Using mobile phones as placed resources for literacy learning in a remote Indigenous community in Australia

Despite massive funding from the Australian government, the literacy achievement of Australian Indigenous children remains significantly lower than for non-Indigenous. With the aim of identifying innovative ways to improve Indigenous children's literacy achievement, this study explored the social practices surrounding everyday mobile phone use by Indigenous people in a remote Australian community. Informed by the notion of ‘placed resources’, which highlights the understanding that digital literacies are best considered as resources situated by social practices that have local effect, the study surveyed 95 people living in a remote Indigenous community about their mobile phone practices. The study also examined a video of a literacy event between a mother and her child around the use of a mobile phone. The findings revealed the strong relational aspects of phone use in remote communities. Integral to the concept of placed resources is a respect for the practices communities find important as they adopt artefacts for their everyday communication.

Creating an Indigenous Christian leadership in Papua

In eastern Papua, Christian missionaries found a social structure unparalleled in most areas of religious expansion in the world: it apparently lacked chiefs and any identifiable leadership. Nearly all the Massim societies of eastern Papua were matrilineal, and land was passed through females. Here, women enjoyed a higher status than elsewhere in what is now Papua New Guinea. By drawing on the records of missionary agents, both European and Polynesian, this paper shows how the Methodist, Anglican and Kwato (London Missionary Society) missions in eastern Papua all encountered difficulty in fostering a cadre of male leaders, but — as became evident after World War II — they experienced greater success in fostering women's leadership.

Strong population genetic structure and its management implications in the mud carp Cirrhinus molitorella, an indigenous freshwater species subject to an aquaculture and culture-based fishery

This study investigated population genetic structure and diversity of mud carp Cirrhinus molitorella, a species widely used in aquaculture and culture-based fisheries in China and Mekong River riparian countries. Seven newly developed and one published microsatellite DNA markers were used to analyse samples from six wild locations, four hatchery broodstocks and one farmed site from the Mekong, Red and Pearl Rivers. Significant genetic structure was detected in C. molitorella, with isolation-by-distance being a strong force in the Mekong. Pair-wise F_ST, Fisher's exact tests for population differentiation, permutation tests and individual-based structure analysis all support the recognition of a sample originating from Toul Krasaing Lake (Cambodia) and one between Kratie and Stung Treng (Cambodia) as distinct from the remainder of the sampled range. Samples from the main upper Mekong and the Nam Khan River were significantly differentiated, but on a time scale inferred to be short (i.e. by genetic drift, not sufficient for evolution of new microsatellite alleles). The Mekong stock of C. molitorella was strongly differentiated from those from the Red and Pearl Rivers, inferred to be on an evolutionary time scale. Finer-scale sampling is warranted to further improve the understanding of genetic interactions among fish from the Mekong and its tributaries. Detailed studies on the ecology of C. molitorella (e.g. migration pathways and preferred spawning habitats) would provide useful information to explain the patterns of genetic structure detected here, and deepen insights about evolutionary distinctiveness of the population units.

Understanding coastal urban and peri‐urban indigenous people’s vulnerability and adaptive capacity to climate change

This brief presentation will commence to address a number of emerging questions that are underpinned by the current NCCARF research project: Understanding Urban and Peri‐urban Indigenous People’s vulnerability and adaptive capacity to Climate Change. In terms of climate change adaptation barriers, options and priorities, what are the major considerations for indigenous communities residing in coastal peri-urban and urban places that may differ from those of their non-indigenous counterparts and possibly from Indigenous communities living away from the coasts? It will speculate on whether these considerations can be addressed through existing planning and management frameworks.

Indigenous climate change adaptation perspectives : understanding urban and peri‐urban indigenous people’s vulnerability and adaptive capacity to climate change

The National Climate change Adaptation Research Plan: Indigenous Communities (2011) highlighted that research on Indigenous communities and climate change, including the variables of impacts, vulnerability and adaptive capacity and adaptation has been limited. While most research has focused on identifying the biophysical impacts of climate change, a minority of studies have considered the Indigenous knowledge and peoples whom continue to reside in Australia and care for; ‘country’;. The report concluded that “there is a need for research that expands knowledge about these and other dimensions of Indigenous adaptation to climate change.“ This paper reviews work in progress on a NCCARF funded research project that is seeking to investigate select coastal urban and per-urban Indigenous community vulnerability to, and capacity for climate change adaptation. Working collaboratively with Indigenous communities resident in Adelaide, Heywood/Portland, Mornington Peninsula, Stradbroke Island and Brisbane, it seeks to explore and articulate strategies that enhance Indigenous capacity to climate change including possible protocols, frameworks, processes and procedures that may lead directly to a more informed appreciation of what is transpiring around Australia’s coastal per-urban regions for their Indigenous communities who still hold strong bonds and responsibilities to their ‘country’.

Indigenous climate change adaption in the Port Philip Bay region : a longitudinal investigation into the physical and cultural transformation of the bay from an indigenous and landscape architectural perspective

Currently there is a dearth of research into Australian Indigenous knowledge and their understanding of climate change especially in regard to how it fits into their world view. Recent discussions by the National Climate Change Adaptation Research facility (NCCARF) have highlighted this deficiency but also the need to source relevant research projects that may address this knowledge and perspective, and enable the incorporation of Traditional ecological Knowledge into the planning climate change adaptions strategies in the Port Phillip Bay region thereby increasing their engagement in this discussion. Within this context, this paper examines the use and understanding of landscape, both urban and regional, surrounding Port Phillip Bay and the risks and opportunities climate change adaptation brings to the local Indigenous communities. It synthesises focused interviews with the (Wurundjeri (Yarra Valley), Wathaurong Geelong-Bellarine Peninsular) & Boon Wurrung (Mornington Peninsula)) to elicit a contemporary and local response to issues raised by NCCARF but importantly to articulate a possible Indigenous position about the formation, change and direction that Port Phillip Bay and its environs should take from their perspectives. Research draws upon how these communities have adapted to climate change physically, mentally and spiritually over their long habitation of a shared geological asset and their perceptions of climate change in respect to forecasting and adapting to climate change for this century. The project looks to uncover a longitudinal perspective of change and adaptation focused upon Indigenous views of ‘country’ and traditional custodial obligations to ‘country’ including accumulated cultural and environmental histories.

Introduction : making Indigenous place in the Australian city

This introductory essay situates this special issue's concerns in the context of Indigenous cultural centre design in settler-colonial Australia. Given the very small number of Indigenous architects in Australia, architectural facilities for Indigenous communities are routinely designed by non-indigenous architects. The implications of this are significant. Given the often complex social, historical and political ambitions that are invested in the construction of Indigenous cultural centres, and their frequent intention to represent a broad Indigenous constituency, can non-indigenous architectural and spatial practice ever realize these? As a way into this question, the essay surveys postcolonial and architectural scholarship that explores the spatialization of setter-colonial politics and the distinct place-making traditions of Indigenous and non-indigenous Australians. The making of place in the Australian city is an ongoing force of conflict, assertion, exclusion and forgetting, but it is also central to the realization of a possible post-colonial state in which no one ‘centre’ can ever stabilize and resolve questions of legitimacy and power. Instead, such a centre might hold these questions in tension and as questions in common, which would mean a new foundation for the making of place.