Uploaded February 2019 | Updated September 2026, 2 hours ago
Who gets to tell stories about their own lives and the lives of others? Is it okay that stories of Indigenous Australians have mostly been told by non-Indigenous writers, or that the best-known studies of life in India have been conducted mostly by academics living and working in Euro-America? What makes someone an expert? Should we be concerned that so much scholarly writing is written in language unintelligible to research participants and is read only by a small circle of academics?
In this seminar, we hear from two scholars who tackle these issues in their work. Dr Jeanine Leane is a Wiradjuri writer, poet and academic whose research explores settler representations of Aboriginal Australians and the growing impact of Aboriginal writing on Australian literary culture. Professor Richa Nagar’s research explores feminism, activism and NGOs in India. Collaboration and co-authorship are central to her approach, which blends academic, creative, and activist writing and community theatre in English, Hindi, and Awadhi.
Dr Leane and Professor Nagar will each give a brief presentation on their experiences challenging the ways knowledge is produced, deployed, and disseminated. This will be followed by a conversation about convergences and differences in the politics of knowledge production in India and Australia.
This is a partnered event organised with the School of Social and Political Sciences at the University of Melbourne.
Who gets to tell stories about their own lives and the lives of others? Is it okay that stories of Indigenous Australians have mostly been told by non-Indigenous writers, or that the best-known studies of life in India have been conducted mostly by academics living and working in Euro-America? What makes someone an expert? Should we be concerned that so much scholarly writing is written in language unintelligible to research participants and is read only by a small circle of academics?
In this seminar, we hear from two scholars who tackle these issues in their work. Dr Jeanine Leane is a Wiradjuri writer, poet and academic whose research explores settler representations of Aboriginal Australians and the growing impact of Aboriginal writing on Australian literary culture. Professor Richa Nagar’s research explores feminism, activism and NGOs in India. Collaboration and co-authorship are central to her approach, which blends academic, creative, and activist writing and community theatre in English, Hindi, and Awadhi.
Dr Leane and Professor Nagar will each give a brief presentation on their experiences challenging the ways knowledge is produced, deployed, and disseminated. This will be followed by a conversation about convergences and differences in the politics of knowledge production in India and Australia.
This is a partnered event organised with the School of Social and Political Sciences at the University of Melbourne.
