Pacific Studies postgraduate courses
Faculty of Asian Studies, Australian National University
The following courses are available:
Contents |
PASI 8001 The Contemporary Pacific: Culture, Politics, Society and Development
Semester 2 2008 Intensive 6-week course
Coordinator: Dr Katerina Teaiwa
The South Pacific is a region of diverse and complex island states. Its post-colonial history has been characterized by both stability and turbulence at national, regional and local levels. Pacific leaders have recently taken stock of the situation, affirmed their commitment to maintain and strengthen cultural identities, and endorsed improved regional cooperation as a means toward effective governance, security and development. Australia¹s policy towards the countries of the South Pacific, long supportive of their independence and economic development, has moved to a more activist, interventionist approach in light of recent conflict in Fiji, the Solomon Islands, Tonga and elsewhere.
This course aims to enhance understanding of the challenges and prospects facing the contemporary Pacific Islands region. It particularly engages Pacific Island cultural approaches to the current challenges. It is designed for graduate students, development practitioners and policy-makers alike. Through a series of short lectures and seminars the course examines the following topics and issues:
- Peoples and cultures of Melanesia, Polynesia and Micronesia
- Historical roots of the contemporary Pacific
- Conflict, stability and development - cases from Papua New Guinea, Solomon Islands, Fiji, Kiribati, Nauru, Vanuatu, Tonga, and Samoa
- Regionalism and the interests of external powers
- Comparing Australia, Asia and New Zealand's 'engagement' with the Pacific
- Pacific Futures
PASI 8003 Spirit Islands: Indigenous religions and Christian conversion in the Pacific
Semester 2, 2008
Coordinator: Prof. Mark Mosko
One of the most distinctive aspects of the cultures of Pacific Islanders indigenously and throughout their varied engagements with Western forces has been an abiding interest in religion and related forms of spirituality such as magic, sorcery, witchcraft, and so on. So impressed have outside observers been with the subtlety, sophistication and pervasiveness of Oceanic religions that many key indigenous notions have come to enjoy wide currency in the west (e.g. mana, tabu/taboo, ³cargo cult²). Correspondingly, most Pacific Islanders have enthusiastically embraced one or another introduced Christian sect, reorienting their lives around the new religion and adapting it to their lives. This course will examine the place of religion in the social lives of Pacific Islanders in pre-colonial, colonial, and post-colonial settings and assess the contribution of both indigenous Pacific ritual systems and introduced Christianity to the course of cultural and social change that the people have experienced.
PASI 8006 Navigating the Pacific: Mapping the Study and Research Resources
Semester 1 2008 Intensive 2-week course
Coordinators: Mr Deveni Temu, Pacific Library Resources Officer; Ms Karina Taylor, Pacific Archivist; Mr Ewan Maidment, Pacific Manuscript Bureau Executive Officer
This course will provide students with the essential skills for studying and researching Pacific Island topics as well as an introduction to the production and preservation of digital and analogue research materials. Students will expand their existing information literacy skills for using primary and secondary sources for Pacific research including formats such as material culture and art works, library and archive holdings, manuscripts, rare publications, ephemeral publications, oral histories, photograph collections, audio visual and micrographic materials, on-line and other digital materials. Students will develop a cultural awareness of related protocols and an understanding and appreciation of engaging culturally sensitive Pacific resources. The course will be complimented by field trips to local institutions where students will gain an understanding of the wide range of Pacific resources available in Australia and the region.
PASI 8007 Ideas and Issues in Pacific Politics
Semester 2 2008 Intensive 2-week course
Coordinator: Dr. Peter Larmour
This course provides students with an introduction to some current political issues in the Pacific Islands, and to the way concepts from Political Science, such as power, democracy, and the state, can help understand them. The normative and contested character of political concepts is emphasized. The course will concentrate on issues where ANU researchers are engaged, for example in governance, electoral engineering, regionalism and corruption. The course will also consider the politics of doing research, and related consultancy work, in the region.