Kate Galloway

Scholarship in the discipline and higher education: the need for a fusion epistemology focused on academic identity

The past decade has seen a significantly greater emphasis placed upon scholarly approaches to teaching and learning in Australian universities and internationally (Vardi, 2011; Hubball, Clarke & Poole, 2010; Brawley, Kelly & Timms, 2009). For many, this shift represents long overdue recognition of the centrality and importance of learning and teaching activities in higher education (Boyer, 1990; Chalmers, 2011). For individual academics however, opportunities to engage more fully in teaching and learning may also present challenges to their core identities as discipline scholars and practitioners, and may even involve an epistemological shift towards educational and even managerial orientations (Ramsden, 1998). These transitions and transformations are seldom easy and often present challenges not only to an academic’s own sense of identity, but to their relationships with colleagues and peers within and outside their disciplines.

Professional Transitions in the Academy: A Conversation

Journeys are funny things—they do not always take you were you were expecting them to, or even where you want to go. But if you are open to the experience, and committed to reflection, there are interesting lessons to be learned. What does it mean to shift from a practising professional (a lawyer–a social worker) to a discipline-based academic? Or to move beyond a narrow discipline to become a scholar of teaching and learning? What dangers lurk in the swamp of managerialism? How can we escape from the towers of solitude and isolation that characterise debates around academic identity and become true barrier breakers and boundary blenders? The key, for these two travellers, lies in recognising the transformative potential of epistemological fusion.

Indigenous issues: Grog or no grog?

That alcohol management plans pose a wicked problem is evidenced by the variety of views about the solution. The spectrum of views seems to hinge on a human rights framework dependent upon a ‘contest’ between individual and collective rights. This brief asks how can individual freedom (to drink) be assessed against the right of women and children (in particular) to be free from alcohol related violence.

Marriage and equality: What's love got to do with it?

The marriage traditionally recognised at law is hardly the liberating concept that forms the foundation for the global movement for marriage equality. As an institution, it has traditionally represented a site of inequality for women and the social norms associated with that inequality continue to resonate. Yet despite these foundations, the institution continues at law even as the legal consequences of marriage have changed significantly, promoting objectives of equality. Now there remain only traces of the legal status traditionally afforded by marriage - official forms for example, continue to ask for marital status.

Garma: Culture on country

A cultural exchange hosted by the Yothu Yindi Foundation, and celebrating the cultural inheritance of the Yolngu people in North East Arnhem Land, the Garma Festival is undoubtedly a leading cultural and intellectual event in Australia, if not internationally. A superb blend of culture, ideas, economics, politics, it provides the opportunity to re-orient our thinking with a focus on Yolngu experiences and priorities. This offers the chance to put into context so many issues presently on the political and policy agenda.