Uploaded November 2024 | Updated September 2026, 2 hours ago
The 2024 ANU Archives Annual Lecture was 'Islands, Archives and Ancestors' by Katerina Teaiwa. It was held on 14 November, hosted by the ANU Archives and Friends of the Noel Butlin Archives Centre.
About the lecture:
Professor Katerina Teaiwa will reflect on her process of exploring several archives and collections connected to Australia’s long history of phosphate mining in the central Pacific. Over two decades she used creative methods to transform her research into textual, choreographic, visual and material forms that challenged colonial and extractive histories and narratives. Her interdisciplinary methods and activism are focused on repairing and safeguarding her ancestral island of Banaba in what is now Kiribati. 22 million tonnes of Banaban phosphate was extracted over 80 years for Australian and New Zealand fertiliser production and farming transforming the island into an industrial wasteland.
About the speaker:
Professor Katerina Teaiwa is an interdisciplinary scholar, artist and award-winning teacher of Banaban, I-Kiribati and African American heritage born and raised in Fiji. She is Professor of Pacific Studies in the School of Culture, History and Language (CHL), College of Asia and the Pacific at ANU.
Katerina was founder and convener of the first Pacific Studies teaching program at ANU. She is currently Vice President of the Australian Association for Pacific Studies, Co-chair of the Oceania Working Party of the Australian Dictionary of Biography and Editor of The Contemporary Pacific journal. She has led CHL's Flagship project on Decolonial Possibilities combining workshops, film production, education resources, and early career researcher support.
Her research-based exhibition Project Banaba focuses on the environmental, political and cultural impacts of historical phosphate mining and has been shown in Australia, New Zealand and the United States.
The 2024 ANU Archives Annual Lecture was 'Islands, Archives and Ancestors' by Katerina Teaiwa. It was held on 14 November, hosted by the ANU Archives and Friends of the Noel Butlin Archives Centre.
About the lecture:
Professor Katerina Teaiwa will reflect on her process of exploring several archives and collections connected to Australia’s long history of phosphate mining in the central Pacific. Over two decades she used creative methods to transform her research into textual, choreographic, visual and material forms that challenged colonial and extractive histories and narratives. Her interdisciplinary methods and activism are focused on repairing and safeguarding her ancestral island of Banaba in what is now Kiribati. 22 million tonnes of Banaban phosphate was extracted over 80 years for Australian and New Zealand fertiliser production and farming transforming the island into an industrial wasteland.
About the speaker:
Professor Katerina Teaiwa is an interdisciplinary scholar, artist and award-winning teacher of Banaban, I-Kiribati and African American heritage born and raised in Fiji. She is Professor of Pacific Studies in the School of Culture, History and Language (CHL), College of Asia and the Pacific at ANU.
Katerina was founder and convener of the first Pacific Studies teaching program at ANU. She is currently Vice President of the Australian Association for Pacific Studies, Co-chair of the Oceania Working Party of the Australian Dictionary of Biography and Editor of The Contemporary Pacific journal. She has led CHL's Flagship project on Decolonial Possibilities combining workshops, film production, education resources, and early career researcher support.
Her research-based exhibition Project Banaba focuses on the environmental, political and cultural impacts of historical phosphate mining and has been shown in Australia, New Zealand and the United States.
