This paper explores growth patterns for British and Irish adolescents transported to Australia in the 19th century. During incarceration in Australia, the young convicts did not catch up with contemporary standards of potential stature—contrary to what we are led to expect by the existing literature and the high calorie convict diet. Rather, the experience of transportation stunted the adolescent male convicts. Variation between height on arrival and in later life confirms that teen convicts remained shorter than their shipmates transported after reaching maturity. We consider, but reject, agedependent selection as a potential explanation. We speculate that the origin of this unfortunate experience lies in the low economic value of young and unskilled males. While fewer data are available for female convicts, their colonial experiences appear to have differed, again consistent with their relative economic value in the colony.

The article discusses the impact of the Federation Drought (1895-1903) on the regions of Eversleigh, Uralla, and Narrabri in Australia, highlighting significant reductions in rainfall and the resulting hardships faced by local graziers. It emphasizes the correlation between rainfall patterns and the El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO). We contrast personal observations from Belfield's diaries, which do not explicitly mention drought, with newspaper reports that vividly describe the devastation and anxiety among farmers due to water shortages and failing pastures. Additionally, the article points out the economic strain on graziers during these dry periods, illustrating the broader social and environmental implications of prolonged drought conditions in southeastern Australia.

A synthesis review of 17 autoethnographic (AE) studies revealed experiences of 33 academic staff and graduate students in higher education, the majority of whom are women. These papers, from more than six countries, were found through a Google Scholar search. Most authors identified as marginalised and outsiders in their higher education contexts, whether because of gender, ethnicity, race, or intersectionality. Analysis of tacit and explicit themes in the papers resulted in creation of eight final superordinate themes. The themes represent experiences of fear and insecurity whereby personal vulnerability was exacerbated by lack of cultural and gender awareness in higher education, including obvious examples of White ignorance. Institutional diversity was claimed, but this contrasted with authors' experiences of exclusionary behaviour. Authors reported endemic racism and sexism, but that it was helpful when institutions provided support for these challenges. AE gives power, volume, and space to rarely heard minority voices. AE synthesis offers an overview of collective experience of similar phenomena or contexts. Such meta-studies are not common in the research literature, and this article provides both evidence of lived experiences of academic staff in 21st century higher education, and a purposeful guide to synthesizing AE research.

This thesis reports the findings of a textography undertaken to inform the teaching of English writing in a tertiary college in Oman. Textography was selected as the methodological approach because it provides a framework for integrating discourse analysis and ethnographic techniques in order to examine how and why texts written by students in this setting make the meanings they do. The framework included a World Englishes approach, which examines how English is used differently to meet the different needs of users across the globe, categorised according to whether they are Inner Circle, Outer Circle or Expanding Circle users of English. The underpinning theory chosen for text analysis was systemic functional linguistics, as it provides the tools for theorising the relationships between texts and contexts. The texts examined were authentic samples of student assessment writing. These were contextualised with reference to teacher interviews, college and Oman Ministry of Education documents as well as researcher observations recorded in notes and pictures.

The study demonstrated that textography was an approach particularly well-suited to the requirements of teacher researchers working in Gulf Cooperation Council countries such as Oman where English is used as a medium of instruction in tertiary institutions. A model was developed for use by teachers to manage analysis of the range of data they can collect in a textography. The findings bring into question the delivery of "contentless" English for academic purposes programs in English-medium instruction contexts and suggest that closer cooperation between English Departments and departments teaching other disciplines is required to align the types of texts students are taught in the English Program with those they will be required to engage with in their discipline studies.

A further finding is that contrary to many reports in the literature, the students in this study appeared to be supported by their Arabic literacy skills and were able to transfer these effectively to English writing. Those teachers who had Arabic language skills also used them to good effect in their teaching with no apparent negative effect on the English language learning of their students. As a result, one of the recommendations expressed in this thesis is that translanguaging should be leveraged in English-medium instruction environments and that further research should be conducted into supporting the use of translanguaging by students and teachers. It is hoped that this insight will contribute to the research field of student academic writing genres in tertiary contexts where English is used as a medium of instruction.

This research project deals with the important topic of palliative care services in regional New South Wales (NSW), Australia. There is an increasing emphasis on meeting the healthcare needs of culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD) communities in Australia. Negotiating the point of culturally appropriate care and the transition to palliative care requires effective communication and sensitivity to socio-cultural, religious, spiritual and linguistic needs. This can be a challenging process for clinicians, patients, and families.

Employing Leininger’s Trans-Cultural Theory, Engel’s biopsychosocial model and Fricker’s concept of “epistemic injustice” in context with healthcare for marginalised migrant groups, this exploratory empirical case study was undertaken in three towns of the Riverina region of NSW (Wagga Wagga, Griffith, and Albury). A burgeoning population group of Punjabi Indians residing in the Riverina region was chosen for this study. Group interviews were conducted with six locally based Punjabi Indian families that had experienced care services at their local residential aged care services. To complement and provide a more comprehensive picture, group interviews were also conducted with care staff (nurses and personal care assistants) of residential aged care facilities (RACFs) in the same towns.

In line with the exploratory nature of this research, a qualitative approach was adopted utilising an interpretive phenomenological methodology in the design, implementation and presentation of findings of the research. The informants in the research were selected through a non-random, purposeful selection process. Thematic analysis was used to determine the major findings of this study.

The study identified barriers to appropriate and equitable palliative care and services for regionally based Punjabi Indians, with important implications for the wider CALD population. The study argues that the dominant medical knowledge base in context to palliative care services does not adequately account for experiences of the CALD population. To build a stronger foundation for the quality of culturally appropriate care, the palliative care sector must undertake fundamental change. Central to this reenvisioned approach is respect for cultural and religious practices that one is required to follow at end of life. The study proposes strategies to strengthen palliative care delivery models in regional areas of NSW by providing insight from consumers’ and care providers’ perspectives on processes that continue to be recommended in state and national policies as best-practice palliative care for people from diverse backgrounds. The study recommends a human rights framework where stronger ethics of care and cultural respect is demonstrated through the palliative care service delivery model.

Hazaras, a persecuted minority from Afghanistan, number among those seeking asylum in Australia since 1999. Australia’s national histories and its debate over boat arrivals often exclude refugee voices. This thesis makes a significant contribution to knowledge by using oral history to record, present and analyse experiences of loss and hope among Hazara refugees through six in-depth case studies. Exploring the content and subjectivity of their narratives, it shows that Hazaras are fulfilling hopes and building successful lives within Australia when given the opportunity, but the legacy of persecution, loss, trauma, family separations and uncertainty can create prolonged crises or haunt them for decades.

The thesis also builds methodological knowledge by sharing my process of becoming more adaptive when interviewing within cross-cultural and crisis settings. It demonstrates that deep connection to the narrator, recognition of the multiple ways in which they recount, and empathetic imagining of their experiences, alongside the interviewer’s own self-reflection, are key elements of gathering stories of trauma and bereavement. Being flexible during the fieldwork, yielding to the narrator’s cultural mores as needed, and being sensitive to their personal circumstances enable meaningful insights to be gleaned and ethical care to be upheld. Through this evolving practice, the voices of marginalised Hazaras have been recognised and amplified, enabling their memories to help shape, enrich, or unsettle Australia’s recent refugee historiography.

Neoliberalism has wrought fundamental changes in the world of work, leading to rising inequality, substantial weakening of organised labour and a decline in industrial relations as a field, especially in relation to teaching. Drawing on historical 'big data' this paper argues that examining the history of worker mobilisation provides a better understanding of these developments, including the importance of considering diverse forms of organisation and action as well as multi-pronged methods built around a key set of issues. It can also inform efforts to address challenges posed by neoliberalism. We conclude by arguing that an historical perspective can better equip the field of industrial relations to meet challenges extending beyond the world of work.

The recent establishment of a minimum age estimate of 39.9 ka for the origin of rock art in Sulawesi has challenged claims that Western Europe was the locus for the production of the world’s earliest art assemblages. Tantalising excavated evidence found across northern Australian suggests that Australia too contains a wealth of ancient art. However, the dating of rock art itself remains the greatest obstacle to be addressed if the significance of Australian assemblages are to be recognised on the world stage. A recent archaeological project in the northwest Kimberley trialled three dating techniques in order to establish chronological markers for the proposed, regional, relative stylistic sequence. Applications using optically-stimulated luminescence (OSL) provided nine minimum age estimates for fossilised mudwasp nests overlying a range of rock art styles, while Accelerator Mass Spectrometry radiocarbon (AMS ¹⁴C) results provided an additional four. Results confirm that at least one phase of the northwest Kimberley rock art assemblage is Pleistocene in origin. A complete motif located on the ceiling of a rockshelter returned a minimum age estimate of 16 ± 1 ka. Further, our results demonstrate the inherent problems in relying solely on stylistic classifications to order rock art assemblages into temporal sequences. An earlier than expected minimum age estimate for one style and a maximum age estimate for another together illustrate that the Holocene Kimberley rock art sequence is likely to be far more complex than generally accepted with different styles produced contemporaneously well into the last few millennia. It is evident that reliance on techniques that produce minimum age estimates means that many more dating programs will need to be undertaken before the stylistic sequence can be securely dated.

This chapter focuses on literacy and linguistic diversity in Australia. Literacy educators in Australian schools face challenges, including cultural and linguistic diversity among students, communities, and workplaces; variable support from governments in fiscally unstable times; and continual professional and public debates over curriculum, pedagogy, and assessment, and over the role of research and policy. But Australian educators also encounter distinctive, and some at least distinctively inflected historical, cultural, and economic features that have a bearing on their literacy efforts. To background our discussion of those efforts, the chapter opens with a selection of Australia's demographic and administrative characteristics. This is followed by a discussion of the challenges and opportunities presented to research, practice, and policy by educational engagements with Aboriginal and migrant communities. Implications for the close relationship of literacy to community languages, to pedagogy, to policy formation and maintenance, and to research are also highlighted. Finally, international perspectives on Australian literacy education are presented, including those based on national and international assessment programs.

Professor Mike Smith was one of the first cohort of Australian-trained field archaeologists, the generation that completed the primary archaeological exploration of the continent, and the last to have the privilege of working with Aboriginal people who had grown up in the bush without significant outside modification of their societies. In this sense, it was Mike’s cohort that picked up the baton from Rhys Jones and John Mulvaney and identified and initiated research priorities through the 1980s and 1990s. He was also one of John Mulvaney’s first Australian National University students – enrolling in 1974.

The changing nature of Australia’s population has resulted in increased linguistic intermarriage over the last few decades. This case study investigates heritage language (HL) maintenance within linguistic intermarriage families, where one parent is an immigrant with a heritage language (HL) as their first language, and the other is of Anglo Australian origin and/or a speaker of English as a first language. It reports on the use of HLs in regional Australia at home and in school, in particular in Languages classrooms. It also reports on how parents, children and teachers of Languages experience plurilingualism for themselves as well as within their families and in educational settings. In addition, it examines plurilingual children’s perspectives of their HL ability and use, as well as their perceived identities as plurilinguals. Collating parents’, children’s and Languages teachers’ perspectives on HL transmission and maintenance at home and in schools reveals multiple perspectives on plurilingualism in regional Australia.

An interpretivist approach was adopted for this study in recognition of multiple linguistic and cultural realities that the research participants are likely to represent. The interpretivist research paradigm assumes that reality is constructed through socially developed meanings and experiences, and that multiple realities exist. The methodological approach, in the form of a qualitative case study, is based on the principles of suitability in relation to the potential of the embedded single case study and the value of the method in educational research. The language acquisition and maintenance theories, discussed in the literature and the proposed research questions, produced themes to help understand HL use and maintenance, the ecologies of the plurilingual families and reasons for sharing and maintaining HLs. The key ideas from these theories, for example Fishman’s reversing language shift and Cummins’ BICS and CALP models, accommodate different views of plurilingualism, language learning and language maintenance. Four central themes emerged from the literature and data as organising principles for analysis: reasons and motivations for heritage language maintenance as perceived by the participants, family language practices, Languages in education and language repertoire. These themes, like the embedded units/groups, are permeable throughout the study to allow a holistic view on the plurilingual experiences of all participants and across different contexts and of all participants.

Online questionnaires and in-depth interviews were used with all participant groups to understand plurilingual experiences at home and in school. The findings identified that the maintenance of HLs in regional Australia is largely limited to the home domain. Parents perceive the development and maintenance of HLs as their responsibility but acknowledged that potential input from educational settings could be beneficial for HL maintenance. Parental, as well as child participants’ reasons for HL maintenance concentrate on communication between family members, identity building, academic and cognitive benefits, and various social and life choices. Children experience their plurilingualism as an advantage in different contexts and generally feel well supported despite the remote location and lack of large language communities. The findings further identified that there is tension between Languages teachers’ approaches towards plurilingual students in their classrooms and the plurilingual orientation recommended in the Australian Curriculum: Languages.

The application of the three perspectives on plurilingualism in regional Australia revealed a gap in relation to language development and maintenance between the two sets of participants, namely teachers of Languages and schools and members of multilingual families. The findings encourage the promotion of plurilingualism as part of the Languages teacher’s role; it is recommended that this is initiated in professional learning and development for teachers of Languages to support linguistic intermarriage families in regional Australia.

A century on, as young children in Montessori classrooms around the world continue to engage with Sandpaper Letters, Metal Insets, Moveable Alphabets, and Reading Command cards, an accumulation of studies into how children learn to read from across a range of disciplines has generated an influential body of research evidence that has been dubbed the science of reading. The science of reading is currently being used to shape education policy and mandated curriculum documents, especially in the English-speaking world. For this reason, the comparative analysis of the Montessori approach and the science of reading presented in Powerful Literacy in the Montessori Classroom: Aligning Reading Research and Practice will be welcomed by many Montessori educators.

Puntutjarpa Rockshelter was the first archaeological site excavated in the Australian desert. Dug between 1967 and 1970, the archaeological sequence was originally interpreted as a continuous record spanning the last 10,000 years BP. With a new series of radiocarbon and OSL dates we show that Puntutjarpa primarily contains a mid-Holocene deposit with a veneer of last millennium material and a thin underlay of terminal Pleistocene evidence. We show that over the last 12.0 kyr, there were three discrete phases of site-use at Puntutjarpa – 12.0–9.7 kyr, 8.3–6.2 kyr and ~1.1–0 kyr – each with differences in the nature and intensity of occupation. This removes key field evidence for the ‘Australian Desert Culture’, a concept that has increasingly become an anomaly since the 1980s.

Critical pedagogy has its origins in the work of Brazilian educator Paulo Freire, with an underpinning imperative that classroom work will interrogate societal structures, attitudes, and tropes that oppress and silence. In this chapter we present meanings of the term queer, and consider the process of queering in relation to music therapy education. The need for the term queer, and our intentional use of it, reflects the view that heteronormativity is entrenched in every aspect of culture including all education which in turn includes health practitioner education in colleges and universities. By using the term queer, and its verb queering, we indicate the need to embrace a wider range of experiences and identities than those that are often hidden within the normative realm. By using the term queer alongside anti-oppressive practice, we acknowledge the shifts and developments in queer studies, and appreciate that queer’s vague positioning and resistance to precise definition is part of its attraction as a means to interrogate contemporary music therapy training. We offer suggestions for queering music therapy class interactions, by challenging the inherent heteronormativity in curriculum for health and social care workers.

Children's geographies research contributes to the intent of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child by comprehending children as cogent agents in the telling and creation of their lives.Voices of asylum-seeking and refugee children are under-represented in the research literature. Hence, reference to their needs in relevant national and international policy contexts is inadequately informed. A meta ethnography synthesised self-reported needs and experiences of 288 child refugees and asylum-seekers across eight interview-based studies, each of which included at least one child aged 13 or younger.The guiding question for the study is: How do children describe their experiences within the systems designed to support refugee and asylum-seekers? Results indicate that refugee and asylum-seeker children can and must speak for themselves. Adults and services must listen to ensure policies and services are adequately informed by children's perspectives and needs.

This thesis explores perceived long-term influences of in-country language (ICL) study abroad programs. It examines two long-running ICL programs conducted in regional Australia between 1995 and 2015 at high school and university levels. Perceptions of their long-term influences are explored through thematic analysis and complexity theory. The resulting themes relate to language learning, intercultural development and personal growth in individuals, and broader influences on families, institutions and communities.

Complexity theory provides a metatheoretical framework for understanding the elements, processes and agents involved in ICL programs at micro, meso and macro levels, and the changing influences of these experiences over time. Using a ‘complexity lens’ highlights the heterogeneity, dynamism, nonlinearity and emergence which characterise ICL programsystems, and allows the close study of both individual program iterations and general patterns of language study abroad.

The investigation presents a retrospective multiple case study from the perspectives of those involved, including students, host family members, teachers, administrative staff and institutional leaders. Through reflexive thematic analysis, qualitative data drawn from 86 surveys and 42 follow-up semi-structured interviews are used to develop the three themes which constitute the study’s research narrative. Within the themes, relationships are explored between a) goals and perceptions of program effectiveness, b) target language development and language use in immersive learning contexts, and c) in-country language-learning experiences, and personal and intercultural development. The study also examines the way participants perceived the influence of the ICL programs as extending beyond the temporal boundaries of the experience itself and beyond individual students to potentially affect the larger system.

The study shows that both the high school and university in-country language programs examined were perceived to have the potential to influence long-term target language learning, intercultural understanding and personal development in individuals, families, institutions and communities. Perceived national and international benefits related to multiculturalism, economic prosperity, globalisation and diplomacy. Arising from the application of a complexity understanding to the analysis, the study offers recommendations for the development of ICL programs. These recommendations are intended to harness the potential of in-country language-learning experiences and maximise benefit for those directly involved and for the communities in which the programs are enacted.

A substantial quantity of rock art was produced in central Australia in the period following contact between the Indigenous population and Europeans in the latter part of the nineteenth and early part of the twentieth centuries. An analysis of the post-contact rock art assemblage indicates that, despite the abrupt disruption to traditional hunter-gatherer lifestyles, the Indigenous response to the European invasion in this region was more positive, resilient and creative than early historians assumed. Significantly, many elements of the precontact assemblage continued to be produced or reworked whilst the range of production techniques expanded. Innovations emerged with a number of older forms of representation being replaced by newer forms, a range of new subject matter was introduced, and new means of flagging identity were created alongside the old. Analysis of the post-contact rock art assemblage has demonstrated that Aboriginal people in central Australia were active participants in change, mediating their interactions with the intruders in innovative ways.

Change in music therapy is often modeled linearly. In linear analysis, change is represented as the difference between the scores recorded before and after treatment, where changes in the input are proportional to the output. However, changes in complex systems are often not linear and depend on time. We propose Dynamic Systems Theory (DST) as a means to overcome the shortcomings of linear analysis and enrich the study of change in music therapy. This article aims to introduce and critically discuss the applications of DST in music therapy, focusing on its theoretical and methodological aspects. DST offers a meta-framework to model nonlinear change in music therapy, considering time as continuous. The application of DST can further enhance the understanding of how music therapy works, the shape of the change, and how the relevant therapeutic processes within music therapy support therapeutic change. An introduction to DST theory is provided along with its history, implications, assessment methods, statistical analyses, mathematical modeling, and implementation examples in music therapy research.