Our seminar for the 2nd June 2021 will be given by Alfred Deakin Postdoctoral Research Fellow N.A.J. Taylor. This event is co-sponsored by the Climate Change Communication and Narratives Network.

Locating Australia’s nuclear archive: politics, culture, philosophy
Australia is a both home to the world’s oldest continuous cultures as well as one third of all known uranium. Yet in the recent surge in applied and conceptual research activity in radioactivity as a form of future cultural and environmental heritage internationally, Australia—as a site of study as well as a source of perspectives—is largely absent. Put simply, my work at Deakin remedies that neglect, such that the empirical innovation of foregrounding Australia’s nuclear archive is met by the conceptual innovation of addressing contemporary concerns with interdisciplinary methods and theories. In order to introduce myself to the members of CHRG and CCCNN, as well as show points of connection with colleagues across Deakin., this talk locates Australia’s nuclear heritage in three otherwise distinct archives: (1) the narrative politics of visual-autoethnography; (2) the visual cultures of First Nations and settler community arts; and (3) what I am calling the Antipodean philosophy of the pioneering environmental philosopher, Richard Routley/Sylvan.

Dr. N.A.J. Taylor is an Alfred Deakin Postdoctoral Research Fellow, whose project approaches the Australian nuclear fuel cycle as future cultural and environmental heritage. Specifically, the project evaluates international best practice in marking deep geological nuclear waste repositories within the Australian context so as to inform policy and practice. For more info on past and current projects: www.nuclearhumanities.org

The seminar will be delivered by by Zoom, with limited space available to attend in person at Waurn Ponds and Burwood. Please contact Anna Kent for more details.