Maureen Fuary

Understanding Climate, Adapting to Change: Indigenous Cultural Values and Climate Change Impacts in North Queensland

Many authors have suggested that Indigenous communities are especially vulnerable to the direct and indirect impacts of climate change, yet there remains a paucity of fine-grained geographic data on the particular impacts of climate change on specific places and on local communities, especially Australian Indigenous communities. While there are some recent studies being undertaken with Australias Torres Strait Island people, our research takes up the issues of vulnerability and resilience with two Indigenous communities from different environments on the mainland in North Queensland. They are the Aboriginal peoples of the rainforest and reef environments of the Wet Tropics and the Aboriginal people of the discontiguous rainforest, grasslands, dry forests and marine environments of Cape York. The results demonstrate variability in their understandings of climate change and in their capacities to anticipate and manage its impacts, while at the same time illustrating some common held themes about environmental and cultural values, observed environmental change, attributions of cause and effect, and of climate in general.

Book review of "Unfinished dreams: community healing and the reality of aboriginal self-government" by Wayne Warry, University of Toronto Press, Toronto

Anthropology explored: The best of 80-strong Department of Anthropology at the Smithsonian Institution, one erstwhile Smithsonian AnthroNotes, edited by Ruth Osterweis Selig and Marilyn R. London. Smithsonian staffer now living in Kenya, and others representing departments from Smithsonian Institution Press, Washington and London, 1998, xviii, 348pp., maps, around the USA. Not surprisingly, the essays are geographically biased towards cartoons, list of contributors, bibliographical references, index. ISBN 1± 56098 ± 763 ± 4 the USA. This limitation is compounded by the structure of the book, which (hardback). re ̄ ects continental differences in the makeup of anthropology courses. Like MOYA SMITH traditional American introductory anthroAnthropology Department pology courses that encompass the four Western Australian Museum ® elds of physical anthropology, archaeology, cultural or social anthropology and linguistics, the essays are organised in three AnthroNotes, a series of short and accessible publications documenting the results of sections: human origins, archaeology and ethnoarchaeology, and cultural anthro® eldwork and research in anthropology, has been produced by the Smithsonian pology (encompassing linguistics). The human origins section comprises Institution (the US National Museum of Natural History) for over 20 years. It has eight essays, of which two authors, Kathleen Gordon and Alison Brooks, wrote acted as a published forerunner of the Internet lines that many professionals curor contributed to ® ve. The ® rst two essays, Àpe-ing language ’ (Gordon) and `Politics rently access for up-to-date information in their ® eld. Recent editions of AnthroNotes and problems of gorilla and chimp conservation’ (Brooks et al.), stress the links are currently accessible on-line (http:// www.nmnh.si.edu/anthro/outreach/ between humans and other primates; one discusses what constitutes language, and anthnote/Winter98/anthnote.html). Anthropology explored is an anthology of the other examines the impact of ecotourism on primate populations. Other 29 essays selected from previous issues of AnthroNotes in the period 1983 ± 97. Some essays consider topics that have inspired widespread debate, such as the implicainclude updates summarising relevant recent research, which are a valuable source tions for the political present of African origins of hominids in `Modern human of information and extend the `life’ of the original essays they accompany. The essays origins’ (Brooks); and stereotypes in public representation of human ancestors in `The are given added vitality by accompanying cartoons. The Foreword suggests that this real Flintstones’ (Gifford-Gonzales). Several of the essays (for example, the overview of volume targets a wide-ranging audience, including `students, teachers, anthropolohuman evolution, `5 to 1 million years ago’, by Brooks) are quite useful reviews for gists, and members of the general public’ (p. xii), with an organisation and writing museum practitioners responsible for curating human skeletal collections and displaystyle intended, respectively, to indicate the breadth of anthropology as a discipline and ing the story of human evolution. Gordon’s article, `What bones teach us’, is a succinct to disseminate information in a publicly accessible language. overview of the information palaeopathologists can derive from examining bones, The authors include members of the