ANU Reporter
November 2003
Contents
$39 million for new research
Sustaining global heritage
Memo to Asian business: future leaders start here
Stromlo written history invaluable
Bushfires inspire young researchers
Life in the space between nations
Dancing to a Circadian Rhythm
Argentine scultptor creates monumental new work
The politics of the ‘fair go’
The Iceman cometh…from a nearby valley
Stand up and be an accountant
Our girl in Havana
Impressions
The last word
$39m for new research
by Tim Winkler
The ANU has again been recognised as Australia’s premier centre for fundamental research, receiving more than $30 million in Australian Research Council (ARC) Discovery grants in October — more than any other university.
The grants will support 95 new projects at ANU over the next five years.
The ARC also announced 13 Linkage grants and four Linkage–Infrastructure Equipment and Facilities grants, with the combined value of all 2004 ARC grants to ANU exceeding $36 million.
In a further boost, the National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC) this month announced it would provide more than $3.3 million worth of grants, giving the green light to a further 10 research projects.
“After scooping the pool of ARC grants last year, the announcement of such a large number of new grants for ANU is an outstanding result confirming our position as Australia’s leading research University,” ANU Vice-Chancellor Professor Ian Chubb said.
“As Australia’s only truly national university, ANU specialises in fundamental research which benefits Australians economically, socially, intellectually and culturally.
“These grants will allow well over 100 new projects to proceed from next year, further enriching our community.
“This performance recognises the outstanding research record of the Institute of Advanced Studies, our Faculties and Centres.”
The ARC projects cover a huge range of disciplines and include:
• Analysis of the impact of anti-terrorism laws enacted in the wake of September 11
• An ambitious experiment in galactic archaeology to unveil the history of the Milky Way
• An investigation of the existence and influence of political networks on the Internet
• Research into the economics of breastfeeding
• Examination of the factors slowing political reform in Indonesia
• Identification of the costs and benefits of economic growth and globalisation
• Psychological research into the cognitive methods involved in face recognition
• An investigation of factors causing child deaths among the poor in Asian cities.
The NHMRC funding will enable a wide range of projects to proceed, covering subjects including the link between health and wealth; a closer look at some of the causes of blindness and an investigation of why women with Hepatitis C have a low rate of using contraception.
ANU staff were also recognised individually, by the ARC with three Australian Professorial Fellowships, four Australian Research Fellowships, four Queen Elizabeth II Fellowships and 14 Australian Postdoctoral Fellowships awarded to staff.
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Sustaining global heritage
by Amanda Morgan
The ANU has launched a unique new program focusing on developing sustainable strategies to protect heritage. The program brings together leading international educators, trainers and professionals using both online and face-to-face learning.
Driven by the needs of the cultural and heritage industries, the Graduate Studies in Sustainable Heritage Development (GSSHD) program is a response to local, regional, national and international demands for applied research and training.
Students are given the option of performing their annual case study field trips of two-to-three weeks duration in Vietnam, India, Sri Lanka, Vanuatu, Italy, the Netherlands, USA or Australia.
The next trip, to Vietnam, takes place during December and travels to Hanoi, Ha Long, Hue, Hoi An and a number of UNESCO World Heritage sites, such as Ha Long Bay (pictured) and the My Son sanctuary.
Applied exercises include the finalisation of the conservation plan for a floating museum in Cua Van, one of the poorest villages of fishing communities on Ha Long Bay. The Vietnamese heritage agencies, women’s and youth unions and UNESCO are strategic partners.
“This is a unique [field] experience for graduates, giving them the opportunity to learn both online and in the field from an international faculty of leading practitioners. It is a chance to get their ‘fingers in the dirt’ working on real issues, conflicts and problems,” Director of Studies, Professor Amareswar Galla, said.
“This program is important both nationally and internationally as the 21st century demands new and innovative ways of balancing our commitment to two non-negotiable principles — heritage and environmental conservation; and community development and poverty alleviation in a rapidly globalising world,” Professor Galla said.
An important aspect of the course is the concept of intangible heritage — that which is of important cultural, artistic or environmental heritage, but cannot be touched, moved, or easily measured and quantified.
The launch of the GSSHD on 15 October included the unveiling of the Shanghai Charter of Museums, Intangible Heritage and Globalisation of October 2002, which encourages the acknowledgement and protection of intangible heritage.
As the Asia-Pacific President of the International Council of Museums, Professor Galla was instrumental in bringing one of only four original copies of the Charter in the world to the ANU Menzies Library — a gift from the Chinese Government.
For more information, go to: http://rspas.anu.edu.au/heritage/
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Memo to Asian business: future leaders start here
A new course drawing together some of the region’s leading experts in Asia, economics and business is set to cultivate a new generation of business leaders for Asia.
The Bachelor of International Business (Asia) program has been developed to knit together the wealth of expertise at ANU in Asian culture, language, economics and commerce — in response to growing demand for graduates with rounded, business-ready skills.
Launching the course, Managing Director of the ASEAN Focus Group, Peter Church said: “If ever a degree like this was needed by Australian business, it is now.”
International business is a rapidly growing area of research and teaching, with strong demand from students seeking a career in businesses which are looking to expand across the region, the Dean of the ANU Economics and Commerce Faculty, Professor Keith Houghton said.
“This new degree equips graduates with tools for business and an understanding of Asia, so they can hit the ground running,” Professor Houghton said.
The Dean of Asian Studies, Professor Tony Milner, said the degree provided greater flexibility for students.
The new degree program offers an opportunity for students to undertake an optional Experience in Asia project, which encompasses a two-week intensive component in Asia.
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Stromlo written history invaluable
by Amanda Morgan
“The last thing that the authors of the present history would have wished was that their tale should come to a dramatic conclusion — but nature has left them no choice.”
So begins the epilogue of the history of the Mt Stromlo Observatory by historian and Anglican Bishop to the Australian Defence Force, Dr Tom Frame (pictured, right), and ANU astronomer Dr Don Faulkner (pictured, left), which was launched by Deputy Prime Minister, John Anderson (pictured, centre), at the Observatory on 7 October.
Dr Frame and Dr Faulkner had just completed the manuscript for Stromlo: An Australian Observatory, when the 18 January firestorm engulfed much of the site.
This tragic event then became another aspect of this definitive history, alongside the groundbreaking research, major astronomical discoveries and numerous personalities behind the Observatory’s 80-year existence.
Although Dr Frame has written and published a number of authoritative histories, including the bestselling Where Fate Calls: The HMAS Voyager Tragedy, Stromlo: An Australian Observatory is Dr Faulkner’s first.
After Dr Frame was made Bishop to the Australian Defence Force and found himself with significantly less time to write a book, he asked one of his Mt Stromlo history consultants, Dr Faulkner, if he would share authorship.
“I had been working on the book only here and there until Tom asked me actually to write it with him, and I thank my wife June for her support during the interruption this caused to our long-awaited retirement plans,” Dr Faulkner quipped at the launch.
Dr Faulkner spent most of his professional career at Mt Stromlo, until his retirement in 1998 as Associate Director of Education and Outreach.
Dr Frame told the 150-strong gathering that although it seemed ironic a member of the Church write a history of the discovery of the universe, he was “not afraid to have my faith challenged by new astronomical insights”.
“Indeed, it gives new meaning to my understanding of words such as infinite, eternal and transcendent.”
The daughter of the Observatory’s first director, W.G. Duffield, Miss Joan Duffield, attended the launch, along with many others who have had a connection with Mt Stromlo, both past and present.
Mr Anderson, whose electorate encompasses Mt Stromlo’s sister observatory at Siding Spring, told the launch the new book was an important record of astronomy in Australia, and the Observatory’s history, “from its origins as the Commonwealth Solar Observatory to the big science of today”.
“Tom and Don had just completed the book when the bushfire of January this year destroyed much of the Observatory and four years of work on the near-infrared integral field spectrograph for the Gemini North telescope in Hawaii,” Mr Anderson said.
“The Observatory will be rebuilt, however, with new telescopes here and at Siding Spring. I know it will continue to make scientific history as illustrious as the research that Tom and Don have documented.”
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Bushfires inspire young researchers
by Edward O’Daly
The effect of Canberra’s bushfires on the chemical composition of soil in the area has been analysed by a group of young scientists in an innovative science education program run by ANU, CSIRO and the ACT Department of Education.
The group of Year 11 chemistry students from Canberra College has for the past three months been experiencing the excitement of quality scientific research first hand as part of the Research with Scientists Project.
The project involves taking a piece of research right from an initial concept, through designing an experiment, to carrying the experiment out, evaluating the results and finally presenting them.
“This is the ultimate form of inquiry-based learning,” said John Field from the ANU School of Resources, Environment and Society (SRES), who is running the course. “We talked about an issue, designed an experiment and looked at our results. It’s education with a capital E.”
The course involved collecting soil samples in the field, before testing them in the lab and learning the techniques of statistical analysis necessary to evaluate their results.
The program helped the students see the practical applications of their studies and also to learn about what practising scientific researchers do.
Dr Field said that many of the students were surprised by the depth of chemical knowledge environmental scientists need and by the rigorousness of their research. He added that the commitment shown by the students was very impressive.
“They all wanted to be there and while they may not all be enrolled at the highest level of college chemistry, they were really enthusiastic and there is nothing more satisfying than working with someone who is enthusiastic about what they are doing.
“I’m a born teacher and it’s exciting to work with a group of bright young people who are thinking about what they might do and where they might go in their lives.”
In addition to giving the students a unique opportunity to be part of a world-class research environment, using the ANU Geology Department’s state-of-the-art analytical facilities, the program also helped answer general questions about campus life.
“This course demonstrates the reasons why they are studying chemistry and the reason why they are at school and as a result, a number of them may choose to study chemistry or may choose to come to ANU or may choose to do environmental science,” explained Dr Field.
“Over the past ten years I’ve done this kind of thing with 100 to 150 students. Only a few have come to SRES, but about half have come to ANU and they have come with much more enthusiasm and understanding than they might otherwise have had. It’s a pretty difficult transition from school to university, but this is a very participatory way to get to know about university. I think I’ve answered more questions about university life than I’ve answered about the specifics of what we are doing.”
Three colleges are participating across the ACT, each in one of three areas: physics, chemistry and biology. Finding a chemistry course was most difficult because of the safety issues around using chemicals, until ANU Forestry stepped in.
“The ANU course was most intensive in terms of participation by scientists. I think John Field should be knighted,” said Margaret Stephenson, the CSIRO officer in charge of the program.
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Life in the space between nations
by Jessica Jeeves
Diplomacy can appear to many of us a closed world, a lofty political realm that exists somewhere in the space between nations.
Glimpses offered into this world, of tired officials briefing journalists after hours of debate and of handshakes artificially prolonged for the cameras, rarely afford us any real insight into what diplomacy is really about. Director of the ANU Asia-Pacific College of Diplomacy, Professor William Maley (pictured), speaks about the aims of the College and the nature of diplomacy in contemporary politics.
Are diplomatic processes constantly changing?
Yes. One of the things that we find striking when we look at activities of professional diplomats these days is how often they find themselves entangled in activities which historically would have been seen as quite inappropriate for diplomats to address. For example at the moment a senior Australian diplomat is involved in internal governance issues in the Solomon Islands, traversing issues that historically would have been seen as the internal affairs of the state and therefore the sovereign responsibility only of its government. So, demanding that diplomats play a constructive role in that kind of process is in effect demanding that they undertake activities which would typically not have been part of a diplomatic career. Different kinds of skills may be required, skills of conflict resolution and negotiation, diagnosis of what state failure and state collapse may involve, looking at political science literature for solutions to those kinds of problems.
I suppose one could argue that one of the failures of the US in Iraq was the failure to address the issue of internal reconstruction, would you agree?
In September 2002 I published an article in Security Dialogue called “Twelve Theses on the Impact of Humanitarian Intervention”, and virtually all those theses related to the kinds of problems that could emerge in the aftermath of what looked like a successful intervention. Problems of holding coalitions together, resourcing activities in the post-intervention period, coping with spoilers, dealing with new political actors emerging with new demands: all these challenges that have subsequently emerged in Iraq are the kinds of problems political scientists were discussing with some detail in recent years. It is mind-boggling that these were not properly taken into account before the intervention.
So do you think in that sense that there is a gap between academia and political science and what’s happening in government?
Yes, but it’s a gap that’s being bridged. It’s something we can also do at the College through some of our activities. As well as running a high level Masters program we’ll be engaging in short course activities. We are putting together a ‘Transnational Policy Forum’ in which we’ll seek to identify key emerging issues and to bring together specialists both from academia and from states in the Asia-Pacific region in order to talk about how these issues might be addressed. We also plan to have a visiting fellows program. We hope to serve as a bridge between practising diplomats, on the one hand and academic specialists on the other.
What skills do you want students leaving the college to possess?
Our challenge is to ensure students emerge with the skills to interact at the highest level with representatives of governments, private organisations and NGOs in a way that significantly advances the objectives of the organisations with whom they’re employed. So we’re concerned with subtlety and dexterity and sensitivity as skills that mark a truly professional diplomat, an ability to mix in many different spheres and function effectively in all of them.
Good diplomats are good at two things. One is analysis — identifying what is the exact character of the problem to be solved. The other is listening — good diplomats are often good listeners, people who are attuned to the subtleties of the conversations in which they’re involved so they don’t rush headlong into crafting policies that may not be equal to dealing with the complexities of what may be complex situations.
Finally, do you think there’s a ‘golden rule’ in diplomacy?
To know how to keep one’s mouth shut. A former Australian foreign minister once said that in diplomacy, words are bullets — once a word has slipped out there’s no way of getting it back.
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Dancing to a Circadian Rhythm
by Edward O’Daly
Fusing two musical genres is a daunting prospect for any composer. The results can be stunning, but balancing styles that do not traditionally go together is risky — if you get it right you can compose something with mass appeal, if not, you can produce something that nobody likes.
By bringing together a classical string ensemble, a techno DJ and a dance troupe for an experimental mix of Scottish folk songs, mouth music, Irish fiddle tunes, electronic music, and techno beats for Circadian Rhythm, Dr Ruth Lee Martin from the ANU School of Music had a large group of music fans to either enchant or alienate. Thankfully, the 150 people who attended Circadian Rhythm at ANU in October were very positive.
“We got really positive feedback. People are asking when we are doing it again, ABC radio has been playing the music — and because of the techno influences the event appealed to a younger audience.”
The inspiration for this innovative collision of styles is the Fusion Festival being run throughout the year by the ANU Centre for Cross-Cultural Research.
“I was interested in fusion in the theoretical sense, the creative sense and on a practical level. I thought that this would be a nice way to bring a creative component to what was going on, so I thought about fusion in relation to the way we construct our musical identity,” she said.
“In this day and age we are brought up with different musical influences and we have to try and make sense of them as they seep into our subconscious.”
A Scottish-born folk musician and former pop band member, with classical training, a PhD in musicology and a “secret love” of contemporary dance music beats, there is clearly a diverse range of influence at work in Dr Lee Martin’s latest composition. More importantly this eclectic background gave her the experience of and passion for each of the styles she added to her musical melting pot.
“Some people will just write in one style, but I’m never comfortable in one niche. But having such diverse influences, I can never be bored compositionally speaking.”
Combining musical styles and writing for dance for the first time was not a broad or exciting enough conceptual fusion for Dr Lee Martin, who looked to science to inspire the theme of her performance.
Circadian rhythms are the natural rhythms that control our body clock. They operate on a 24-hour cycle, telling us when to sleep and when to wake. After an international flight, circadian rhythms are to blame when you are up all night or nod off over lunch.
The sell-out, one-night-only performance was divided into six sections devoted to different phases in the daily cycle of our circadian rhythms. Two of these stages employed the rhythmic talents of Canberra DJ and ANU graduate Boomsticks, who like all the musicians, was visible on stage, elevating the music to equal visual status with the dance.
A CD of Circadian Rhythm is available and Dr Lee Martin is hoping to secure funding for further performances next year.
For more information email Dr Lee Martin:
ruth.martin@anu.edu.au
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Argentine sculptor creates monumental new work
by Amanda Morgan
Canberra is a long way from Buenos Aires, the beloved birthplace of renowned Argentine sculptor Lucia Pacenza (right). But distance proved no object for her to imagine a monumental white Carrara marble work for the ANU International Sculpture Park — with a little help from modern technology.
Pacenza, 62, chose the site and created her sculpture, Arch of the Sun, using photographs sent by email by the Director of the School of Art, Professor David Williams and staff of the Argentine embassy. Pacenza selected a site with a view of Lake Burley Griffin.
“I look for values that are universal, unquestionable, primitive, that I appreciate and respect,” Pacenza explained in a lunchtime lecture at the School of Art during her visit. “Where do I find them? In nature.”
The ebb and flow of the lake, the rays of the sun, the outdoor location and human nature inspired Arch of the Sun, which, like all of her works, she developed as a maquette before heading to Australia to create the real thing.
The sculpture of two reinforced concrete columns with marble edging and the apex of the arch, also Italian marble, stands nearly three metres high, making it visible from the Lake and roadway opposite.
“Because it was located in a large park, it needed to be big and visual to draw the eye in from all the other natural forms surrounding it,” Pacenza said. “The sun will stream through the centre of the columns underneath the Arch, which I think always symbolises friendship, or a union, or the sun — really it is [a sculpture] for everybody.”
Pacenza arrived in Australia in late September, and after a short delay waiting for the marble to arrive, began work on Arch of the Sun at the ANU School of Art Sculpture workshop, with the help of staff and students.
Pacenza began her artistic career as a painter in the workshop of Argentine artist Emilio Pettoruti. But after six years, “my paintings began to show a need to work in three dimensions” and she moved into sculpture, refining her technique in the workshop of Argentine sculptor Leo Vinci. She held her first personal exhibition in 1971.
At the time, Pacenza created her sculptures from a number of different materials — wood, cement, acrylic or cast bronze.
It was not until construction began on a new freeway in her neighbourhood at the turn of the 1980s, which required the demolition of Italian style houses in the area, that she started working with marble.
Her neighbours gave her the marble of their crushed staircases, and so began her series Fragments, “abstract works that allude to man in his environment”, which she continued to work on for the next decade.
For her next series, South, Pacenza continued to use marble, but her influence changed.
“My gaze and my energy turned toward nature, particularly in my homeland. I have visited valleys and mountains whose shapes have had such an impact on me that they have exercised an influence over my works.”
Pacenza’s works are well known in her home city — a 10-metre high sculpture of her own is a dominant focal point in the historic quarter, celebrating the fourth century of the city of Buenos Aires. Her work is held in various museums, in private collections and outdoor sites in Europe, the United States, Latin America and now Australia.
The marble for Arch of the Sun was specially imported from Italy to Sydney and arrived in Canberra in early October. A material which invokes connotations of romance and grandeur, there is also a practical reason behind Pacenza’s choice for the International Sculpture Park — it is one of the most resistant to the elements, weakening or corrosion.
Understandably, with such heavy objects that she has laboured over for many hours, Pacenza prefers not to be present when her sculptures are moved by truck and put into place.
When Arch for the Sun was transported to its place by the lake on 22 October “I was at the movies,” Pacenza says. “I am getting too old for my heart to stand it.”
But she was there for the unveiling of the striking sculpture (above) on 24 October, before leaving Canberra two days later. H.E. Mr Nestor Stancanelli, Ambassador of the Argentine Republic launched Arch of the Sun, which was attended by Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Education), Professor Malcolm Gillies and Director of the School of Art, Professor David Williams.
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The politics of the ‘fair go’
by Edward O’Daly
Few people could have been more suitable to launch Professor Marian Sawer’s latest book than ANU Chancellor, Professor Peter Baume.
Not only does The Ethical State? Social Liberalism in Australia, deal with a philosophy close to Professor Baume’s heart, but his political career and the political careers of his grandparents feature in the book.
“It is a pleasure to launch the book, to identify myself with its views of society, and of obligation, and to hope that many people will read it,” he said in his address to the launch of the book at ANU in October.
Social liberalism can be categorised as the politics of the ‘fair go’. It is the strand of liberal thought that aims to promote equality of opportunity within society, to give everyone the protection and opportunity they need to succeed, regardless of constraints such as social status, gender and race.
Professor Baume had harsh words for the current crop of ‘liberals’ who have rejected this philosophy in favour of a less interventionist approach and outlined some of the great advances in our modern society that were born out of social liberal thought including minimum wages, universal suffrage and free education.
A Professor of Political Science at ANU, Marian Sawer was compelled to write the book after hearing a prominent Liberal (the party) politician say that Governments should be judged on “how lightly they touch the purse”.
“I was particularly struck by this statement,” she said. “It was very different from the social-liberal view I was familiar with: that governments should be judged on the extent to which they provide equal opportunity.”
This statement signified to Sawer a worrying change of direction in Australia’s political philosophy and the need to highlight, record and revive its own traditions of liberalism.
“Things that were distinctive about our political traditions, things that seemed worth keeping in our political heritage, were disappearing before they could even be placed on the endangered list,” she explained.
In her book she charts the history of social liberalism, which she sees as one of the foundations for the nation building that went on in the late nineteenth century.
As young Australia was forming its identity, the reforming social liberal teachings of English political thinker TH Green were built into its institutions. The politics of the ‘fair go’ were at the heart of this new nation and went on to form the basis for Australia’s political traditions.
Professor Baume’s grandfather, a prominent New Zealand MP and his grandmother, one of the first women to stand for election in New Zealand are used as examples of early social liberalism in the region. Professor Baume himself, whose social liberal principals left him no choice as a Senator but to resign from the front bench of the Coalition and cross the floor in 1987, is a more recent example.
In recent years this philosophy, which Sawer, a former equal opportunity practitioner, had thought was a fundamental part of Australian politics, has been dismissed by those in power as an ‘elite’ agenda. Something that is all very well for those promoting equality and human rights from the comfort of their public sector jobs, but an ideal that is ultimately irrelevant to the average taxpayer.
“I argue that this is still a viable political philosophy. If we do believe that all individuals are morally equal, and that is, after all, the basis of democracy, it should be the duty of governments to ensure equality of opportunity for all.
“We don’t seem to be going that way at the moment, with educational and employment opportunity being so unequally distributed, but I believe it can be revived — it’s not dead and buried.”
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The Iceman cometh…from a nearby valley
by Tim Winkler
The home ‘town’ of a man who died approximately 5,200 years ago has been traced through isotope-geochemical analysis of his teeth, bones and intestine.
The well-preserved human mummy, known popularly as the Iceman, was found in a glacier on the Italian-Austrian border in 1991. The Iceman was approximately 46 years old and his well-preserved remains, together with the equipment found with him, provided unprecedented insights into early civilisation in central Europe.
However, the man’s origins — and the European culture the Iceman belonged to — have remained a mystery, until recent research led by ANU researcher Dr Wolfgang Müller revealed that he came from one of a few valleys within approximately 60 kilometres southeast of the discovery site.
This finding, published recently in Science, demonstrates that the Alpine valleys of central Europe were permanently inhabited during the terminal Neolithic period, more than 5,000 years ago.
“By pinning down the origins of the Iceman, we can conclusively say that he died in his local area — that is, he had settled in the valleys on what is now the South Tyrol/ Alto Adige region in northern Italy, near the border with Austria — and it stands to reason that many others had settled as well,” Dr Müller said.
“This provides a fresh insight into part of the history of humanity — and it is one of the last big secrets of the Iceman that we can expect to unlock.”
Dr Müller started his research on the Iceman with Professor Alex Halliday at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (ETH) in Zurich.
“The Iceman and the information he provides on the development of European civilisation goes right to the heart of the issue of origins — why we are here and where we come from,” Dr Halliday said.
Dr Müller moved from ETH to the ANU from where he has led an international research team which has compared the isotopic composition of the Iceman’s teeth, bones and intestine to local geology and hydrology to determine his habitat and the range of his travels from childhood to adult life.
Teeth are an archive of early childhood, whereas bones provide insights into adult life of the Iceman — because bones continuously remineralise and hence compositionally average the last 10 to 20 years of life.
The comparison of isotopic analyses of tooth enamel, bone and intestine samples shows that the Iceman migrated during his life. The research for the first time has allowed an analysis of the childhood of the Iceman. Both the rock types and water compositions further south are incompatible with the ones found in the Iceman’s teeth and bones.
As a result, the research team was able to deduce that the Iceman probably migrated between alpine valleys in the local area.
“We can reconstruct the composition of the soil and rock upon which his food was grown from two types of isotopes, Sr and Pb, which we analysed in the Iceman’s biominerals. This is important as there are several, isotopically different rock types (limestones, gneisses, volcanic rocks) found in the area,” Dr Müller said.
“Furthermore, oxygen isotopes allow a reconstruction of the composition of water ingested by the Iceman. Because the oxygen isotopic composition of rainwater varies depending on source area and how far a cloud travels inland before it drops rain, the isotopes of rainfall north and south of the discovery site are systematically different and we were able to deduce that the Iceman had lived south of the Alps for his entire life.”
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Stand up and be an accountant
by Edward O’Daly
If the clichés are to be believed, accountancy and excitement are far from synonymous. Study leave for an accounting lecturer would therefore be a time to hang up the pinstripe suit, find a quiet desk, dust off the calculator and get down to some serious number-crunching.
Jacqueline Birt (left) is on study leave. She is working on her PhD; has just returned from two months teaching and research in New Zealand; is in the middle of a study on cultural differences between New Zealand and Australian accounting students; is convenor of a program that brings elite high school students to ANU to study in their final year; is working on a project to add audio to PowerPoint lectures so students can study in their own time, developing an introduction to a finance course for science students; is in the middle of renovating her house; and has just become an aunt for the second time.
“You can really get so much more done on leave,” she says.
Who said accountants were boring?
With so much happening in her life, it is hardly surprising that it has taken almost three months to catch up with Ms Birt to discuss the award she was given in July, which named her Australia’s best accounting/finance lecturer.
Ms Birt conforms to the accountant stereotype as far as wearing a black pinstripe suit to her lectures, but beyond her sartorial choices, she completely rejects the ‘boring’ cliché, insisting these are exciting times for accounting.
“All the negative things going on, like high-profile company collapses, have really enriched what we can teach,” she explains.
“There are lots of new issues for accounting with corporate governance, business ethics and auditing getting exposure.
“Students might come in thinking accounting is totally conservative, but when we look at what real accountants are actually doing, they soon see this is not the case.”
Her prize, Australian Accounting and Finance Lecturer of the Year, was in recognition of an innovative (and far from boring) style of teaching that highlights all that is exciting and relevant about accounting.
Ms Birt’s Business Reporting and Analysis course at ANU introduces first-year students, many from a range of disciplines as well as accounting majors, to accountancy. The thorough judging process looked at a range of criteria including lesson plans and student evaluations.
Using a range of different tools including the Internet, the media and video to get her message across, Ms Birt was praised by the competition judges for her “innovative” style.
She explains that with the huge amount of current information available on the web, it is a valuable resource.
“Students come in and I ask them what the big story was, then we go online. For example, when Qantas cut jobs, we had a look at the effect on the share price.
“We can do a lot of stuff with actual company data.
“I do this right from the start in the first year so they can see there is much more to it than debits and credits or bookkeeping.”
It is the level of reality and relevance that she builds into the course that Ms Birt feels is its strength. Not only does this make the course more interesting for students, but it makes it clear how the skills learned in the lecture theatre transfer to the real world.
“One student came to me at the end of the course and said, ‘Now I know why dad lost all his money’.”
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Our girl in Havana
by Edward O’Daly
Writing a book about the adventure of touring Cuba on a folding bicycle is not part of the typical career path of an ANU Computer Science graduate, but Lynette Chiang (pictured) is far from typical.
One time creative director of Saatchi and Saatchi’s Costa Rica office, a self-confessed failed waitress, former chef, former hotel manager, former copy writer, round-the-world cyclist and currently a ‘customer evangelist’ and author, she has somehow managed to fit in ten years of computing since graduating from the ANU in 1986.
It was in her role as author of The Handsomest Man in Cuba, an account of her travels on Castro’s island that she returned to Canberra and memories of her time at the ANU came flooding back.
“It took me five and a half years to complete a three-year-degree,” she said.
“When it became clear that I wasn’t going to be able to get into medicine by doing science, my father stopped supporting me, so I became a part-time student.
“My first job was as a technical assistant junior — not even an assistant, but an assistant junior — at the CSIRO Division of Computing Research where I minced around in my singlet and shorts letting the plotter paper run out, much to the consternation of the beslippered boffins.”
When she graduated with a good degree, got a good job and started driving a “fastish” car, Lynette’s life seemed to be on a very predictable path. The turning point came six years ago when she bought a bike.
“Most bikes are designed for men and I couldn’t find one to fit me, but folding bikes are custom fitted.”
It was on her bike that she went on the first big adventure: Land’s End to John O’Groats, the southernmost point in England to the northernmost point in Scotland.
“I just looked at a map and thought, ‘I can do that’.”
From then on she gave up living to work and started working to live, or more specifically, working to cycle. She tried her hand at various jobs (“I’d never been a waitress before, so I thought I’d give it a try”) and eventually found herself in Costa Rica, working occasionally for Saatchi and Saatchi, between South American folding bicycle odysseys. In 2000, the lure of Cuba, only a short hop away, overcame her.
She spent three months on the island staying illegally in locals’ homes, sailing with the world’s worst sailor, smuggling her folding bicycle onto trains, meeting the island’s handsomest man and having a variety of adventures, catalogued in her new book.
This was not a typical holiday to the Caribbean island and in true Chiang style, the book was not written in typical circumstances. She typed up her escapade in the Costa Rican hotel, where she was manager, on a laptop computer lent by an editor of The New York Times, who had read an account of one of the episodes of her trip in her local paper, The Tico Times and flown down desperate to hear the rest of the story.
Ms Chiang currently lives in the US where she is a customer evangelist, a position that involves encouraging satisfied customers to spread the word for Bike Friday, the firm that manufactured the bike she took around the world.
For more information on Lynette Chiang, her bike and her book visit: www.bikefriday.com/lynette
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Impressions
Stories behind important ANU photographs
The Great Wall of China, an ancient shoreline, tens of thousands of years old in the Lake Mungo National Park, NSW is slowly being worn away by weather, burrowing rabbits and tourists’ feet.
This photograph was taken by Centre for Resource and Environmental Studies student, Ben Gilna, on his way back to Canberra from the Environment Institute of Australia and New Zealand’s Outback Summit in Broken Hill.
“With the westerly that was blowing that day, it should be renamed the Grit Wall of China,” said Mr Gilna.
“I believe it was somewhere here that the Mungo Man was discovered. What is certain is that this shoreline — now a ‘lunette’ of sand dune — is vanishing, thousand-year-old layer by thousand- year-old layer.”
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From the Earth’s ashes to the stars’ brightness
The Last Word
by Tom Frame
There is one extension of Commonwealth activity that no Australian should want to oppose: astronomical research. It is listed alongside protecting copyright, maintaining lighthouses and recording statistics as Federal responsibilities in s.51 of the Australian Constitution.
When Canberra was chosen as the national capital in 1910, astronomers immediately lobbied for an observatory and rejoiced when site testing began at Mt Stromlo. An observatory was eventually established after local and international astronomers reminded Canberra of its legal obligations. With the Observatory’s almost complete destruction in Canberra’s January 2003 bushfires, some commentators doubted the wisdom of its rebuilding on practical and philosophical grounds. The cost is plainly considerable. Astronomy is high-tech science. Telescopes are precision instruments. Some questioned astronomy’s continuing value to human civilisation. After all, it was asserted, the stars are so remote and have little apparent effect on everyday life. But there are three compelling arguments for rebuilding the Observatory and extending its research capability even further.
First, Mt Stromlo has gained a worldwide reputation for excellence in optical astronomy. Since gathering data on the sources of luminosity in the night sky during 1925, the observatory has assured Australia’s place among the leading international astronomical players. With the transfer of the observatory to The Australian National University in 1957 and the subsequent development of a sister observatory at Siding Spring near Coonabarabran in western NSW in the 1960s, these facilities have drawn astronomers from around the globe to Australia and given the astronomical community the ability to observe the entire southern sky in excellent conditions. Reciprocal arrangements with other notable observatories have given Australian astronomers a chance to participate in the most advanced research being undertaken anywhere in the world. Despite the recent destruction of Stromlo’s telescopes and domes, the workshops and the library, the observatory director, Professor Penny Sackett, is adamant that Stromlo’s “three most valuable assets remain intact — its people, its reputation and its spirit”. They must not be squandered.
Second, Mt Stromlo is at the forefront of scientific progress and intellectual advance in a number of fields. For a country that employs the Southern Cross in its national iconography, Australians know appallingly little about astronomy or the physical forces impacting upon life on Earth. As we acquire fresh insights into the smallest units of life through microbiology, astronomy is similarly well placed to help us understand the most fundamental laws at work in the universe, quite apart from the practical benefits of timekeeping, terrestrial navigation, tidal prediction and atmospheric communication. In addition to discovering exciting new astronomical phenomena, the Observatory’s instruments and staff have enlarged our understanding of the Milky Way (our galaxy), and the origins and behaviour of comets, supernovae and planetary nebulae. Recent attention has turned to the formation of ‘black holes’ and the existence of a mysterious invisible constituent of the Universe known as ‘dark matter’ or ‘missing mass’. These observations reflect a continuation of our quest for greater knowledge of the Universe. Curtailing this work would daunt the human spirit.
Third, there is a growing interest in cosmology at Mt Stromlo. Human beings have always wanted to know where the Universe originated. Physicists Stephen Hawking and Paul Davies argued that we live in a self-creating and self-contained Universe, and asked whether astronomy and physics had actually abolished God. Although science and religion have frequently argued over research methods and empirical data, Mt Stromlo’s staff are posing questions that have a direct bearing on metaphysics, philosophy and religion. They cannot be ignored. The observatory’s participation in projects with cosmological consequences demonstrates Australia’s willingness to examine the ‘spiritual’ component of human existence.
There is no doubt that astronomy is entering a new ‘golden age’ in which scientific ‘secrets’ seem to be tumbling out all at once. These insights have expanded our perspective on the Universe and our place with it. The ‘golden age’ will continue while there is investment in technology, thirst for knowledge and willingness to explore. These have been key elements in the Mt Stromlo story and the strongest case for its present existence and future development.
Dr Tom Frame is a Visiting Fellow at the ANU Research School of Astronomy and Astrophysics.
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