Welcome to 2015

As we begin the new year, ICS looks forward to an exciting future ahead under the leadership of our new Director, Professor Paul James, and we welcome our newest member, Professor Gay Hawkins to the Institute.

Professor James commenced as ICS Director on 1 January, replacing Founding Director Professor Ien Ang as she stepped down from the position at the end of last year. Professor James joined ICS as a member in 2014. His research focuses on three overlapping areas: globalisation and its impact upon social relations, from national community to local community; social change and the human condition, including the impact of modernisation on customary and traditional ways of being; and sustainability with an emphasis on sustainable urbanisation. 

Professor Hawkins comes to ICS from the University of Queensland, where she was Director of the Centre for Critical and Cultural Studies. She has published widely on cultural engagements with the environment, practices of everyday life, media policy and institutions, and theories of materiality and political processes. She brings an innovative interdisciplinary approach that is concerned with the intersections between cultural and material practices and forms of rule. 

ICS also looks forward to the arrival of two Endeavour Fellowship Recipients in the next few months: Dr Nuala Morse and Dr Pablo Fuentenebro Alonso. The prestigious six-month long fellowships are awarded to high achieving applicants to conduct post-doctoral research. Dr Morse (PhD, Durham University, UK) will work with community engagement practitioners in museums and heritage sites in Sydney to provide a close examination of the practice of engagement in Australia. Nuala will work closely with Associate Professor Emma Waterton. Dr Fuentenebro Alonso (PhD, UCLA) will work with Professor Donald McNeill on a comparative study of arts philanthropy and urban redevelopment in Sydney and Los Angeles.

7 January 2015