Pro Vice Chancellor of Health Professor Analise O’Donovan
The Northern NSW Academic Health Alliance, of which Griffith University is a founding member, unveiled a state-of-the-art training hub at the new $723-million Tweed Valley Hospital today.
Students are set to benefit from the custom-built learning environment, with the first Griffith students already using the new facilities.
The training hub also facilitates integrated research and collaborative projects between the Alliance’s four education institutions: Griffith University, Southern Cross University, Bond University, and TAFE NSW.
Griffith’s Pro Vice Chancellor of Health, Professor Analise O’Donovan, said medical students, completing their placements at Tweed Valley Hospital are enjoying using the new Hub for clinical-based learning and for self-study.
“Together, we can unite all of our resources and provide a much richer opportunity for our students who will get to learn in a world-class facility paving the way for the next generation of the workforce,” Professor O’Donovan said.
Pro Vice-Chancellor (Research and Education Impact) at Southern Cross University Mr Ben Roche said the Alliance was perfectly placed to undertake research of local and national significance.
“Being regionally located is a distinct advantage as we have direct access to our communities and what they need. We’re excited by the possibilities,” Mr Roche said.
Bond University’s Executive Dean of Health Sciences and Medicine, Professor Nick Zwar, said the advantages of being located in a new hospital were clear.
“Students will be undertaking placements with expert clinicians, working in a modern facility equipped with the latest medical technology. They’ll have access to the absolute best training experiences.”
Minister for Skills, TAFE, and Tertiary Education Steve Whan said TAFE NSW will bring its expertise in co-designing and co-delivering flexible education programs that integrate research-led learning with advanced technical and industry-based skills.
“This collaboration between education providers means the local community will benefit from a pipeline of skilled healthcare workers and increased capacity to provide quality, patient-centred care,” Mr Whan said.
The Tweed Valley Hospital opened to patients on 14 May 2024.
The discovery of thousands of stone artefacts and animal bones in a deep cave in Timor Island has led archaeologists to reassess the route that early humans took to reach Australia.
Researchers from Griffith University, The Australian National University (ANU), University of Wollongong, Flinders University, University College London (UCL) and the ARC Centre of Excellence for Australian Biodiversity and Heritage dated and analysed the artefacts and sediment at the Laili rock shelter in central-north Timor-Leste, north of Australia, to pinpoint the arrival of the colonists.
They detected a human “arrival signature” from about 44,000 years ago, suggesting there were no humans on the island prior to this time.
“The site of Laili is especially fascinating as it demonstrates a large human population settled on the island between 49-43,000 years ago,” Griffith University’s Dr Kasih Norman said, who was the geochronologist on the project.
Lead researcher Kasih Norman.
“The occupation of Laili therefore appears to be part of the large-scale migration of modern humans that took place across the globe between 70-40,000 years ago.
“Since there are sites to the east in Sumatra and west in Australia that are older than the evidence from Timor, we think Laili may indicate a new, possibly large-scale migration overwhelmed earlier populations living in the broader region.”
Dr Norman used optically stimulated luminescence dating of ~17,000 individual quartz minerals to ascertain the burial age of the sediments encasing the artefacts at Laili, and the sterile deposits below them.
This allowed the research team to date the age of the sterile sediments and pinpoint the first arrival of a large colonising group of people at the site.
Dr Shimona Kealy, from the ANU College of Asia and the Pacific said unlike other sites in the region, the Laili rock shelter preserved deep sediments dating between 59,000 and 54,000 years ago, which showed no clear signs of human occupation.
“When we analyse and compare markers of human occupation from other sites across Timor-Leste and nearby Flores Island, we can confidently say humans were also absent throughout the wider region of the southern Wallacean islands,” Dr Kealy said.
“This is significant as these islands were most likely a gateway crossing for ancient humans making the crossing to Australia.”
Study co-author Professor Sue O’Connor, also from ANU, said Timor Island has long been considered a stepping stone island for the first human migration between mainland Southeast Asia and into Australia and New Guinea. But the new findings challenge this theory.
“The absence of humans on Timor Island earlier than at least 50,000 years ago is significant as it indicates that these early humans arrived on the island later than previously believed.”
“This provides further evidence to suggest early humans were making the crossing to Australia using the stepping stone island of New Guinea, rather than Timor Island as researchers had previously suggested.
“In addition to prompting a re-evaluation of the route and timing of earliest human migration through Wallacea and into Sahul, our findings highlight the fact that migration into the islands was ongoing with occupation of the southern islands occurring thousands of years after the initial settlement of Australia.”
Multifunctional stone artefacts from the Laili site.
The sediment from the site was analysed at the Flinders Microarchaeology Laboratory by co-author Associate Professor Mike Morley.
“The shift from pre-occupation to intensive human activity at the site was very clear in the sediments,” Associate Professor Morley said.
“As soon as people arrived on the scene, their use of the cave was very intensive, with clear evidence of burning and trampling of the shelter floor underfoot.”
The research team unearthed lots of small stone tools during the excavation, as well as charred fish bones.
“We know these people specialised in making tiny stone tools, but we’re not 100 per cent sure what they were used for,” Dr Kealy said.
“Because a lot of their diet was either shellfish or small animals, you don’t really need big knives to gather that sort of food. But having small, fine tools is useful for things like stripping leaves to then weave into baskets, but also for creating wooden tools.”
Based on the sheer number of artefacts unearthed at the site, the researchers say the migration to Timor Island was a “major” one. According to the researchers, these ancient humans likely made the crossing to Timor from nearby Flores Island and mainland Southeast Asia.
“The traditional view held by researchers is that early humans who were making these significant water crossings were stumbling upon these islands by mistake, largely because it was so long ago,” Dr Kealy said.
“Their arrival on Timor was no accident. This was a major colonisation effort, evident through the sheer number of people who were making the journey.”
“It’s a testament to these peoples’ level of maritime technology and the boats they created, but also their confidence and competence in braving maritime crossings.”
The research ‘Abrupt onset of intensive human occupation 44,000 years ago on the threshold of Sahul’ has been published in Nature Communications.
A new electronic medication management system at Tugun Satellite Hospital will allow nurses and doctors to do what they are passionate about – provide quality care to patients.
The Pyxis system is the first of its kind to be implemented in the Gold Coast Hospital and Health Service (GCHHS) and Griffith University alumnus and Senior Pharmacist Lisa Hill led the implementation.
“The digitisation and automation of medication management is making a massive impact on the way health professionals can provide care,” Mrs Hill said.
Griffith alumnus and Senior Pharmacist Lisa Hill.
“We’ve been training the Tugun Satellite Hospital staff to use the automated system and there’s a buzz of excitement.
“Usually, the process of medication management involves two staff members manually counting the entire stock of controlled medications multiple times a day as the staffing shift changes.
“Staff are also responsible for dispensing correct dosage, record keeping, and documentation.
“The Pyxis medication management system automates the distribution, management, and storage of medication within the hospital.
“Without so much manual management and paperwork to do, staff can concentrate on providing care to patients.
“The new system reduces medical errors, reduces wastage, and it reduces time spent managing controlled substances.
“Staff are excited about the big impact it will have on their workload.”
As a clinical educator at the GCHHS, Mrs Hill is passionate about improving pharmacy services by developing the workforce and implementing innovative solutions to improve care.
After completing a Bachelor of Pharmaceutical Science at Griffith University’s Gold Coast campus, Mrs Hill continued her education to complete a Master of Pharmacy, and then went on to complete a Master of Clinical Pharmacy at the University of Queensland.
The Tugun Satellite Hospital (Banyahrmabah) supports the GCHHS emergency departments at Gold Coast University Hospital and Robina by giving consumers the option to access urgent walk-in health care within their local community through a Minor Injury and Illness Clinic, seven days per week.
A new study led by Griffith University predicts that future climate change impacts could disrupt the krill-heavy diet that humpback whales in the southern hemisphere consume.
Dr Jasmin Groß, who conducted the study as a PhD candidate at Griffith’s Centre for Planetary Health and Food Security analysed fatty acids and stable isotopes from blubber and skin samples of five different humpback whale populations around the southern hemisphere.
These levels were then compared to those of their primary prey item, Antarctic krill.
The team found that although there were distinct differences in the biochemical profiles, the diet of all tested humpback whale populations was Antarctic krill, which provides a high fat content diet ideal for the migratory lifestyle of these populations, Dr Groß said.
“The migratory lifestyle of humpback whales requires predictable ecosystem productivity, and so, we can expect that populations feeding in areas that are subject to the strongest climate change impacts are more likely to show the first signs of a departure from their high-fidelity krill diet,” she said.
“At present, there is no evidence of a divergence from a high-fidelity krill diet, but the characteristic isotopic signal we discovered of whales feeding in productive upwelling areas or in the marginal sea-ice zone, implies that future reductions in sea-ice extent and duration, and rising ocean temperatures could impact their feeding ecology.”
Humpback whale blubber and skin biopsies were collected in August and September 2019 in or near their respective breeding grounds off Brazil, Western and Eastern Australia, New Caledonia and Colombia.
Krill samples were collected from feeding grounds onboard three different vessels between January and March 2019.
Dr Groß said the importance of this study in confirming that each population followed a high-fidelity Antarctic krill diet could be used as baseline knowledge to assess the extent of climate change impacts in the feeding grounds in future studies.
Dr. Groß’s PhD research was conducted as part of the Humpback Whale Sentinel Programme, a key surveillance initiative of the Antarctic Monitoring and Assessment Programme (AnMAP).
AnMAP is a joint initiative between the Scientific Committee for Antarctic Research (SCAR), the Arctic Monitoring and Assessment Programme (AMAP), United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), and Griffith University.
The study ‘No distinct local cuisines among humpback whales: A population diet comparison in the Southern Hemisphere’ has been published in Science of the Total Environment.
The chemical industry is a cornerstone of global development, driving innovation, and providing essential products that support our modern way of life.
However, its reliance on unsustainable fossil resources has posed significant threats to global ecosystems through climate change and chemical pollution.
A new commentary published in Cell Press’ OneEarth co-authored by Griffith University researchers puts forth a transformative solution: catalysis to leverage sustainable waste resources, ushering the industry from a linear to a circular economy.
“If we look at recent statistics, the chemical industry contributes a staggering US$5.7 trillion to the global economy and sustains 150 million jobs worldwide, excluding refined fossil fuels,” said Professor Karen Wilson, one of the lead authors and Director of Griffith’s Centre for Catalysis and Clean Energy.
“But it remains the largest industrial energy consumer and the third-largest emitter of direct CO2 emissions globally.”
Catalysis is the increase in rate of a chemical reaction due to an added substance, known as a catalyst.
In 2022, the industry emitted 935 million metric tons of CO2 during primary chemicals production. Moreover, its operations have led to significant water contamination and the release of toxic chemicals into the environment, perpetuating a cycle of ecological harm.
Co-lead author Professor Adam Lee, also based at Griffith, said: “Catalytic processes could minimise reliance on finite fossil fuels and curb CO2 emissions significantly by harnessing agricultural, municipal, and plastic waste as feedstocks.
“This feedstock transition not only mitigates environmental damage but also addresses vulnerabilities in the industry’s supply chain, which are susceptible to geopolitical and natural disruptions.”
Professor Wilson added: “Catalysis has historically played a key role in transforming fossil resources into essential fuels and products, and now offers a beacon of hope for revolutionising the chemical industry and promoting a circular economy.”
However, the authors acknowledge that this vision demands concerted innovation in catalyst formulation and process integration.
“Prioritising Earth-abundant elements over precious metals will unlock sustainable catalytic systems for the efficient conversion of organic waste into benign and recyclable products,” Professor Wilson said.
“Already, pioneering initiatives such as the co-location of different industries in Kalundborg, Denmark to foster symbiosis have demonstrated new collaborative models to improve resource efficiency and waste reduction.”
“Catalysis offers a pathway towards sustainability, enabling us to transform waste into valuable resources and pave the way for a circular economy,” Professor Lee added.
In the OneEarth commentary, the team explored sources of catalysis for sustainable and circular chemical processes through the following lenses:
A Griffith University initiative is helping Australian organisations become more accessible by providing crucial insights about how users with disability are able to navigate physical spaces, online spaces, products and services.
Inclusive Voices is a group of people with lived experience of disability supported by researchers to provide first-hand perspectives and innovative solutions that improve an organisation’s inclusion and accessibility.
With more than 18 per cent of the population living with disability, and even more people living with chronic disabling conditions, communities, government, and corporations are looking for ways to foster accessibility for a more inclusive society.
Inclusive Futures: Reimagining Disability Director Professor Elizabeth Kendall.
“Disability is not a limitation – it allows us to be creative, resilient and inspires innovative solutions,” Professor Kendall said.
“It is important to ensure organisations are meeting the diverse needs of all individuals, and Inclusive Voices provides fresh perspectives from our vibrant and unique community.
“Our lived experience experts provide consultation, research, accessibility checks, design advice, presentations and workshops to foster new perspectives.”
A great example of making organisations more accessible includes an Inclusive Voices service called ‘Easy Read’ which transforms complex documents into an accessible, easy-to-read and easy-to-comprehend source of information.
Inclusive Futures Reimaging Disability Graphic Designer Joe-Anne Kek-Pamenter said the Easy Read service is fully tested by the Inclusive Voices community before receiving the Inclusive Futures stamp of approval.
“People experience different barriers to accessing print and digital content, this may be as a result of disability, cultural and linguistic diversity and education level,” Ms Kek-Pamenter said.
“Our community also includes D/deaf and hard of hearing people who test videos with captions and Auslan interpreting.”
Strategic Development Manager, Dr Maretta Mann.
Strategic Development Manager, Dr Maretta Mann said Inclusive Voices allows organisations to experience the benefit of collaborating with people with disability.
“We consistently see the benefit of collaborating with people with disability in our own research, and it may seem obvious, but it is amazing how much quicker you can reach a desirable solution when you have the person you are designing for in the room,” Dr Mann said.
“Through the Inclusive Voices initiative people with disability are being valued for their lived experience.
“They are also gaining valuable career development and training opportunities, and we view this as an important step towards addressing inequities in the workplace.”
Griffith University has ranked 35th in the 2024 Times Higher Education Young University Rankings, improving by 11 places from 46th in 2023.
The global ranking includes institutions founded between 1974 and today, and applies the same methodology as the World University Rankings to assess research-intensive universities across core missions of teaching, research, knowledge transfer, and international outlook.
Weightings are recalibrated to reflect the profile of young universities.
The 18 performance indicators are grouped into five areas:
Teaching (the learning environment)
Research Environment (volume, income and reputation)
Research Quality (citation impact, research strength, research excellence and research influence)
International Outlook (staff, students and research)
Industry (income and patents)
These rankings recognise the exceptional learning, teaching and research opportunities Griffith provides, and reinforces the University’s impact in creating a brighter future for all.
Eliminating violence against women is one of the major challenges of the 21st century. Awareness of the problem has grown exponentially, and solutions towards its elimination is the focus of a new ARC funded Centre.
In 2024 the ARC Centre of Excellence for the Elimination of Violence Against Women (CEVAW) was established. With headquarters at Monash University, CEVAW comprises 13 chief investigators at six Australian institutions, 14 partner investigators worldwide, and 35 partner organisations. This Centre is the first of its kind and aims to transform our understanding of the problem by examining the structural drivers that cause and compound violence against women, and pioneering new, evidence-based approaches to radically improve policy and practice across Australia and the Indo-Pacific.
CEVAW Research Fellow and Moderator for the May Webinar, Dr Freya McLachlan
The Centre’s research is guided by a three-tiered approach: Interdisciplinary, Indigenous-centred, and Indo-Pacific engaged, to build much-needed evidence to inform and mobilise industry, sector, community and government partnerships to deliver scalable approaches to eliminate violence against women across the diverse communities in Australia and the Indo-Pacific.
On Thursday 30 May, the Centre will host the first in a series of public webinars bringing together two of the Centre’s workstreams, the Harnessing of Technology for VAW Prevention workstream led by Associate Professor Asher Flynn, and the Engaging Perpetrators and Bystanders workstream led by Professor Patrick O’Leary. This date has been selected in recognition of Domestic Violence month in Australia.
The webinar titled ‘Technology-facilitated gender-based violence (TFGBV): Insights from across the Indo-Pacific’ explores how technologies and online spaces have become powerful tools for perpetrators, but also for creative responses to prevent, address and intervene in violent behaviours.
CEVAW Research Fellow and Moderator for this Webinar, Dr Freya McLachlan says,
“Now more than ever, we must recognise the pivotal role technology plays not only in enabling violence against women but also in shaping our responses. In addressing the dual role technology plays, we should consider how integral technology is in connecting with our communities and support networks and the impact technology-facilitated gender-based violence can have on these connections.”
With the aim to further understand the opportunities and challenges associated with TFGBV, this webinar will reflect on lessons learnt in the digital industry, first responder, research and civil society sectors across the Indo-Pacific. The panel includes representatives from Meta, Black Rainbow, eSafety Australia, the University of South Pacific, DV Connect and UNFPA who will share their reflections on TFGBV, and what the future might bring in responding to TFGBV across the Indo-Pacific region.
Deputy Director of the Centre, Professor Sara Davies
Deputy Director of the Centre, Professor Sara Davies says “These combined engagements on issues of deep concern to researchers, service providers, industry sector and policy makers, is indicative of how the Centre intends to support discussions on meaningful violence against women prevention and responses that consider the specific and broader Australian, Indigenous and regional contexts.“
The second webinar event in the series ‘Conflict-Related Sexual Violence in the Indo-Pacific: What is a survivor-centred approach in context? ’ will be held on Wednesday 19 June. The Webinar will focus on the Indo-Pacific region as a site of conflict-related sexual and gender-based violence. Attendees will hear experiences from actors engaged in reporting, advocacy, and justice across five locations in the Indo-Pacific region: Afghanistan, Myanmar, Papua New Guinea, and the Philippines, and discuss priorities for realising a survivor-centred response across different contexts within the region.
If you are interested in registering for this and future CEVAW Webinars and events please contact: [email protected]
Griffith University Masters of Business Administration (MBA) student and Women in Sports Leadership MBA Scholarship recipient Kim Crane has been announced as Paddle Australia’s next CEO and will drive the organisation’s preparations in the lead up to the 2032 Olympic and Paralympic Games in Brisbane.
Paddle Australia’s next CEO and Griffith University Women in Sports Leadership MBA Scholarship recipient Kim Crane.
As the governing body for paddle sports in Australia, Paddle Australia manage, coordinate, and promote Olympic and non-Olympic disciplines, and also deliver paddling safety, education, training, and recreation.
Serving as the organisation’s National Performance Director for nearly three years, Ms Crane has been studying the MBA program to support her progression and elevation in the sport industry.
“I’ve been thoroughly enjoying my MBA program and the college has supported me to manage my study with my work commitments and international travel,” Ms Crane said.
Representing the Australian Women’s Hockey team, the Hockeyroos in 1989 -1993, high performance sport has dominated her career for 30 years, and she has been supporting athletes to reach their goals over that period.
Serving in executive leadership and management roles for organisations such as New South Wales Institute of Sport, Surfing Australia, Hockey Australia, Queensland Academy of Sport, and the Australian Institute of Sport, Ms Crane has a natural connection with athletes and coaches and deep empathy for the challenges of an athlete’s journey.
“As a point of difference, Paddle Australia is people-focussed and we support athletes to become the world’s best paddlers and people in a way that feels authentic and purposeful,” she said.
Manager Sports Engagement and Lead in the Griffith Women in Sport Strategy, Naomi McCarthy OAM.
“The Griffith MBA program supports me to reflect on my leadership philosophy and principles, and to strive for best practice and the sustainability of the organisation and the broader sports industry.”
The MBA Scholarship for Women in Sport Leadership was created by the Griffith Business School (GBS) to provide support to current and emerging female leaders in the sporting industry to increase diversity in sport leadership, support the next generation of female leaders, and increase the diversity in sports leadership within the system.
Manager Sports Engagement and Lead in the Griffith Women in Sport Strategy, Naomi McCarthy OAM, has worked closely with Ms Crane to provide support through her MBA, and support preparing Paddle Australia elite athletes for the Paris Olympics and Paralympics this year.
“MBA scholarships were established to support more talented women to move into these key leadership and decision-making positions within Australian sport which is so crucial for the industry and importantly, the athletes within it,” Ms McCarthy said.
Griffith Business School MBA Director Professor Naomi Birdthistle.
“Women are incredibly underrepresented in executive roles within sport and this has a negative flow on effect for women and girls participating in sport at all levels, so it’s very pleasing to be able to celebrate Kim’s appointment.”
Griffith Business School MBA Director Professor Naomi Birdthistle said the MBA Women in Sports Leadership Scholarship helps to promote gender equality and diversity in sports, aligning with Griffith’s efforts to empower women in all areas of society.
“We are immensely proud of Kim’s accomplishments and through the Women in Sports Leadership Scholarship we believe we can inspire the next generation of female athletes and leaders, and encourage them to pursue their sporting ambitions with confidence,” Professor Birdthistle said.
In Gladstone/Yallarm/Koongoo, a gateway to the Southern Great Barrier Reef and home to the deep-water channels of all day, peak hour shipping traffic, I hear the almost audible groan of the Australian climate cultural cringe.
This groan is heard aboard the resort catamaran as we leave Gladstone Habour for Heron Island Resort and the University of Queensland Research Station. We travel via the same harbour where ships arrive to transport fossil fuels.
One of my fellow travellers– clearly a Gladstone local – points to smelters as we pass, explaining to her Reef excited children, ‘THIS whole town exists because of THAT’.
And herein, epitomises the ‘cringe’.
The Australian climate cultural cringe translates as a nation whose local and global identity has at once prided itself on a wealth of natural resources and simultaneously, our spectacular nature.
The recognition that the removal of one is destroying the other is an Australian’s jagged pill, manifest in Gladstone and in conflicts throughout the nation.
Deep in our national psyche, we struggle to reconcile this cultural dissonance between pride in our beautiful Reef and our once prized but now Reef killing fossil fuels.
It’s a lot.
Back on our catamaran, as we chug along toward the bluest open waters, ginormous red rusted rectangles appear like an orderly queue of extraction.
While our boat rocks and rolls with the swell, these ‘big boys’ – one of my fellow travellers unexpectedly observes their masculinity – sit motionless, immovable.
Tanker traffic dwarfs tourism and research station traffic from this city. The universally reliable source of local insight, my cab driver, tells me that only around a third of Gladstone workers earn the ‘big money’ in the resources industry.
He’s not far wrong with ABS data in 2021 finding around one in five Gladstone workers are ‘Technicians and Trades Workers’ and another quarter employed as ‘Labourers’ and ‘Machinery Drivers and Operators’.
I guess many of these workers keep the ships and their cargo moving and their cargo in return – this week at least – keeps worker’s families and communities afloat. According to the Gladstone Ports Corporation in 2022, moving en masse 120 million tonnes of throughput per annum, around 80 per cent of which were exports.
So I begin tanker counting. The child sitting across from me tells his family, ’33! There’s 33!’. And before I can do my own recount (I reckon he’s missed a few), someone yells, ‘Dolphins!’ and we all lose interest in the ship count.
We are easily distracted by marine life, drawn away from the extraordinary behemoth that is the industrial complex of Gladstone where coal, LNG and aluminium top the most shipped list.
We are on our way to visit the Great Barrier Reef.
Originally coined by AA Phillips in 1950 writing in the literary journal Meanjin, the ‘cultural cringe’ was targeted at Australian writers and their ‘inability to escape needless comparisons’, especially to their English counterparts.
In contemporary vernacular, the cultural cringe signals a sense of cultural inferiority and simultaneously, a search for Australian identity and pride therein. The idea signals a nation, unsure of itself, seeking the approval of others.
There hasn’t been much approval of late.
“How can we not cringe? Day after day, we fail our own pub test, naked to the world as hypocrites and again, not as good as the others…whoever they might be, but they’re not from here.”
The daily, increasingly heated (that’s intentional) brawls of fossil fuels and carbon emissions THIS, and the Great Barrier Reef and mass coral bleaching THAT, belts Australians making them collective repository of both fossil fuel shame and ecological collapse.
How can we not cringe? Day after day, we fail our own pub test, naked to the world as hypocrites and again, not as good as the others…whoever they might be, but they’re not from here.
We jump to defend ourselves, we point fingers and we hang our heads. My cab driver tells me that Australia will never stop mining and in the very next breath, how hopeless he and his Gladstone community feel about the recent mass coral bleaching.
Exasperated, he asks, ‘What can we do about it?’.
As was Phillip’s retort to the weight of English opinion in 1950, ‘[T]he nightingale does not sing under Australian skies’. We have our own ‘birds’.
To be ‘unself-consciously ourselves’ at this critical moment is to know that it is not ‘coal vs coral’ but rather ‘coal and coral’ that beleaguers Australian communities and stymies homegrown climate action. We’ve loved both.
It has been politically fruitful to enflame this tension between two great Australian loves, particularly during state and federal elections in regional Queensland and other places similarly positioned.
‘Coal vs Coral’ becomes wedge politics of ‘regional vs urban’, ‘conservative vs progressive’, ‘left vs right’, men vs women’, ‘old versus young’ and the pinnacle, ‘jobs vs environment’.
But like dolphins spotted on a tourist boat in Gladstone harbour, these are distractions. They mean we can’t see the proverbial Reef for the corals.
Phillip’s thought the cringe a greater enemy to cultural development than Australia’s isolation from the rest of the world. He suggested instead, not a ‘strut’ of likely the arrogant kind but rather a ‘relaxed erectness of carriage’.
Similarly, the Australian climate cultural cringe is a greater threat to our progress on climate action than the wrath from the rest of the world.
Indeed, the cringe comes not from the recognition of who we are to the rest of the world, but the acknowledgment and acceptance of who we are to ourselves.
Australia is both coal and coral – not enemies but rather part of larger story of people and communities that we know best.
The Australian climate cultural cringe and the unhelpfulness of its conflicts feed national uncertainty and stall meaningful action.
Realising that we are different boats the in same harbour – and indeed that both coral and coal share states of decline – could lead to more productive conversations and support for the urgency of change.
Dr Kerrie Foxwell-Norton is an Associate Professor of Environmental Communication at Griffith University. Her work focuses on ways to engage and inspire Australian communities to act on environmental and climate change challenges.
