Department of Anthropology and Development Studies
The Department of Anthropology and Development Studies is concerned with issues of social and cultural difference, inequality, vulnerability, risk, exclusion and social justice.
The study of Anthropology is concerned with fostering a better understanding social and cultural difference. Development Studies has emerged out of a concern to examine why some countries are less socially and economically developed than others or suffer from protracted periods of conflict and instability.
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Our teaching
The Department of Anthropology and Development Studies offer a range of programs, including a Bachelor of International Development as well as majors in Anthropology and International Development, as well as postgraduate and honours degree options.
Anthropology can be studied as a major, minor, or individual elective course.
International Development can be studied as an undergraduate degree, a major, minor or individual elective course.
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Our people
Name Role Dr Georgina Drew Head of Department
Senior LecturerDr Alison Dundon Senior Lecturer Professor John Gray Emeritus Professor Dr Susan Hemer Senior Lecturer Dr Dianne Rodger Senior Lecturer
Undergraduate Discipline Advisor, Anthropology
Honours Convenor, AnthropologyProfessor Andrew Skuse Professor
Undergraduate Program Coordinator, Bachelor of International DevelopmentDr Thomas Wanner Senior Lecturer
Undergraduate Discipline Advisor, International Development
Honours Convenor, International Development -
Our research
The Department of Anthropology and Development Studies work across a range of themes of relevance to our concern for highlighting social and cultural difference, as well as aspects of inequality, vulnerability and risk.
We are actively engaged in teaching and research that promotes greater understanding of the complex social and cultural worlds in which we engage.
Our research has been undertaken in a wide range of countries, including: Australia, Afghanistan, Bangladesh, China, Ethiopia, Fiji, India, Indonesia, Malawi, Nepal, Pakistan, Papua New Guinea, Rwanda, Samoa, Solomon Islands, South Africa, Sri Lanka, Tonga, Uganda, Vanuatu and Vietnam. We work with a wide range of national and international organisations, including: AusAID/DFAT, Australian Civil-Military Centre, Cardno Emerging Markets, Coffey International, European Union, Mott MacDonald, MTV EXIT, Nike Foundation, OECD, South Australian Government, UK Department for International Development, UNDP, UNESCO, UNICEF, UNRISD, World Bank.
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Our Publications
Barlow, M., & Drew, G. (2021). Slow infrastructures in times of crisis: unworking speed and convenience. Postcolonial Studies, 24(2), 212-233.
Drew, G. (2021). Coca-Cola and the Moral Economy of Rural Development in India. South Asia: Journal of South Asia Studies, 44(3), 1-21.
Drew, G. (2021). Nature can heal itself: Divine encounter, lived experience, and individual interpretations of climatic change. In D. L. Haberman (Ed.), Understanding Climate Change Through Religious Lifeworlds (pp. 72-90). Indiana University Press.
Drew, G. (2021). Will the water revolution be centralized? investigating the "downscale" and "upscale challenges of urban rainwater harvesting. In B. Thakur, R. R. Thakur, S. Chattopadhyay, & R. K. Abhay (Eds.), Resource Management, Sustainable Development and Governance Indian and International Perspectives (1st ed., pp. 143-158). Springer.
Drew, G., M. G., D., Jyotishi, A., & Suripeddi, S. (2021). Water insecurity and patchwork adaptability in Bangalore’s low-income neighbourhoods. Water International, 46(6), 900-918.
Dundon, A. (2021). Online dating profiles, shifting intimacies and the language of love in Papua New Guinea, The Australian Journal of Anthropology, 32(3), 229-242.
Hemer, S. (2021). Global health, tuberculosis and local health campaigns: Reinforcing and reshaping gender and health inequalities in Lihir, Papua New Guinea. In N. Bainton, D. McDougall, K. Alexeyeff, & J. Cox (Eds.), Unequal Lives: Gender, Race and Class in the Western Pacific (pp. 131-156). ANU Press.
Hoogenraad. H. & A. Dundon. (2021). Shifting states of love & intimacy, The Australian Journal of Anthropology, 32(3), 219-228.
Skinner, W. (2021). Making homemade wine, online. Ethnologie française, Vol. 51(3), 577-587.
Skuse, A. and Dowling, M. (2021) 'Refugees, Media Representation and Counter-Narrative: An Analysis of TEDxKakumaCamp'. In S. Borden (Ed.) The Routledge Companion to Media and Poverty. Routledge.
Skuse, A., Rodger, D., Wilmore, M., Humphreys, S., Dalton, J., & Clifton, V. (2021). Solving 'wicked problems' in the app co-design process. Convergence, 27(2), 539-553.
Wanner, T. (2021). Foreign aid, the soft power of sport, and the Sustainable Development Goals: An analysis of Australia's sport for development in the Pacific program. In Siefken, K., Varela, A.R., Waquanivalu, T. & Schulenkorf, N. (Eds.). Physical Activity in Low- and Middle-Income Countries (Chapter 7). Routledge.
Wanner, T., Palmer, E., & Palmer, D. (2021). Flexible assessment and student empowerment: advantages and disadvantages–research from an Australian university. Teaching in Higher Education, 1-17.
Drew, G. R. (2020). Political ecologies of water capture in an Indian 'smart city'. Ethnos, 85(3), 435-153.
Dundon, A. (2020). Introduction. In A. Dundon, & R. Vokes (Eds.), Shifting States: New Perspectives on Security, Infrastructure and Political Affect. Routledge.
Dundon, A. (2020). 'Looking for a nice face': Shifting states of marriage and intimate citizenship in Papua New Guinea. In A. Dundon, & R. Vokes (Eds.), Shifting States: New Perspectives on Security, Infrastructure and Political Affect. Routledge.
Dundon, A. (2020). 'Looking for a nice face': Shifting states of marriage and intimate citizenship in Papua New Guinea. In A. Dundon, & R. Vokes (Eds.), Shifting States: New Perspectives on Security, Infrastructure and Political Affect. Routledge.
Dundon, A., & Vokes, R. (Eds.) (2020). Shifting States New Perspectives on Security, Infrastructure, and Political Affect. Routledge.
Fratini, A., & Hemer, S. R. (2020). Broadcasting Your Death Through Livestreaming: Understanding Cybersuicide Through Concepts of Performance. Cult Med Psychiatry, 44(4), 524-543.
Harris, C., Hemer, S. R., & Chur-Hansen, A. (2020). Emotion as Motivator: Parents, Professionals and Diagnosing Childhood Deafness. Medical Anthropology, 40(3), 1-14.
Harris, C., Hemer, S., & Chur-Hansen, A. (2020). "It's an emotional rollercoaster" the spatial and temporal structuring of affect in diagnosing childhood hearing loss. Emotion, Space and Society, 37, 7 pages.
Hemer, S. (2020). Crouch, Elizabeth (Betty) 1917-1996. In M. Allbrook (Ed.), Australian Dictionary of Biography. Australian National University.
Hemer, S. R. (2020). Shock, anger and bad deaths in Lihir: A reanalysis of grieving in Papua New Guinea. Death Studies, 45(1), 1-23.
Hutchings, S., & Rodger, D. L. (2020). A.B.Original, Reclaim Australia. In J. Stratton, J. Dale, & T. Mitchell (Eds.), An Anthology of Australian Albums: Critical Engagements (1 ed., pp. 211-223). Bloomsbury Academic.
Lord, A., Drew, G., & Gergan, M. D. (2020). Timescapes of Himalayan hydropower: promises, project life cycles, and precarities. WIREs Water, 7(6), e1469-1-e1469-15.
Rodger, D. L. (2020). Defining Authenticity in the Mid-2000s Australian Hip-Hop Scene: Constructing and Maintaining ‘Underground’ Status at a Time of Increasing Popularity. The Asia Pacific Journal of Anthropology, 21(2), 159-177.
Silverman, G. S., Baroiller, A., & Hemer, S. R. (2020). Culture and grief: Ethnographic perspectives on ritual, relationships and remembering. Death Studies, 45(1), 1-7.
Skinner, W. W. (2020). Liberty and order: wine and the South Australian project. In P. Howland, & J. Dutton (Eds.), Wine, Terroir, Utopia: Making New Worlds (pp. 58-74). Routledge.
Skinner, W. W. (2020). Wine, geology mapping and the value of place in McLaren Vale. The Australian Journal of Anthropology, 31(1), 85-100.
Skuse, A. J. (2020). Claiming the State: the political economy of social welfare access in rural South Africa. In H. Ware, & J. I. Lahai (Eds.), Governance and Societal Adaptation in Fragile States (pp. 189-209). Palgrave MacMillan.
Tually, S., Skinner, W., Faulkner, D., & Goodwin-Smith, I. (2020). (Re)building home and community within and through the social housing sector: lessons from a South Australian approach. Social Inclusion, 8(3), 88-101.
Vokes, R., & Dundon, A. (2020). A Thrice-Told Crisis: Rethinking the Anthropology of the State. In A. Dundon, & R. Vokes (Eds.), Shifting States: New Perspectives on Security, Infrastructure and Political Affect (4-37). Routledge.
Williams, S., & Drew, G. (2020). ‘Co-creating meeting spaces’: feminist ethnographic fieldwork in Bangladesh. Gender, Place and Culture, 27(6), 831-853.
Cattelino, J., Drew, G. R., & Morgan, R. A. (2019). Water flourishing in the Anthropocene. Cultural Studies Review, 25(2), 135-152.
Drew, G. (2019) Magnesium. In 'An Anthropogenic Table of Elements'. Cultural Anthropology.
Drew, G. (2019). Pushing back Delhi’s ‘day zero’ centralised efforts needed for rainwater harvesting. Economic and Political Weekly, 54(43), 41-48.
Hemer, S. R. (2019). Sexuality, family planning and religion in Papua New Guinea: Reproductive Governance and Catholicism in the Lihir Islands. The Asia Pacific Journal of Anthropology, 20(4), 295-311.
Nursey-Bray, M., Palmer, R., Meyer-Mclean, B., Wanner, T., & Birzer, C. (2019). The fear of not flying: Achieving sustainable academic plane travel in higher education based on insights from South Australia. Sustainability (Switzerland), 11(9), 22 pages.
Rodger, D. (2019). Forging Traditions: Continuity and Change in the Mid 2000s Australian Hip-Hop Scene. Ethnomusicology Forum, 217-240.
Skinner, W. W. (2019). ‘A gift from God’: autochthonous grapes and wine heritage on the island of Hvar, Croatia. Journal of Wine Research, 30(4), 294-311.
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Our HDR's
Name Topic Degree Bridie Meyer-McLean Grassroots Social Resistance Movements: The Influence of Conflict Narratives in Relation to Mining Policy Development in Australia and the United Kingdom PhD Briony Erin Lynette Kate Morrison The F... is Goth Anyway: Classification, Dynamic Practice and Goth in Adelaide PhD Bronwyn Jayne Hall Becoming well in Kerala: marked and unmarked spacetimes of everyday Ayurveda PhD Derrick Martin Adjei Sowa Exploring the Nexus Between Corporate Environmental Responsibility and Regulatory Oversight in Ghana's Upstream Petroleum Industry PhD Gail Yvonne Wright To Make Their Journey Back to Nature: Zoo Captivity and Post / Humanism PhD Hanna Jagtenberg Out of South Africa and Into Australia: The Afrikaners' Quest for Belonging in a Post-apartheid World PhD Jerome Jeffison Yaw Ofori Mining, Power and Sustainable Development: Micro-Politics of Benefits Sharing in Ghana PhD Johnny Damien Karanicolas Art and Crisis on the Streets of Athens PhD Meagan Rosaghna Magnusson State Power and Environmental NGOs in South Australia: Moving Towards a Sustainable Society? MPhil Paul Henry Chambers People, Platforms, Practice: The Social Mediation of Electronic Music Production PhD Rachel Massey The Anthropology of Folk Festivals PhD Rahwa Gebremedhine Kidane Smallholder Farmers' Perceptions of Climate Change, Vulnerability and Adaptation in the Context of Multiple Factors in the Tigray region of Ethiopia PhD Terese Geraghty Built for Extraction: Dependence, Sovereignty and Development in Timor-Leste PhD
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