Charting educational futures:
Building on 20 years of research
In 2015, we celebrate 20 years of the School of Education’s Postgraduate Research Conference. This year also marks 70 years of Education at The University of Queensland.
The conference is free of charge and Research Higher Degree students in Education and associated areas from UQ and other Higher Education Institutions are welcome to participate.
This year there will also be workshops on the Sunday following the conference. Details will be available closer to the event.
Keynote Address
Theorising the contemporary space as a Cultural Interface
Professor Martin Nakata, Director Nura Gili, University of New South Wales
Professor Nakata will speak on inscriptions of 'people of difference' in a Western order of things and how they come to place limitations on the way we theorise the contemporary space. He will draw on work he has undertaken over many years to shift allegiances away from positions of difference and their grand narratives in Indigenous education to demonstrate what is possible when theoretical standpoints afford a more local view to the characteristics of students as learners. He hopes to encourage higher degree research students to look at the everyday world as problematic and to try approaches that extend beyond the wisdom of conventional approaches.
Professor Nakata is Director of the Nura Gili Indigenous Programs Unit at UNSW, and Professor of Indigenous Education. He is a Torres Strait Islander, and author of an Indigenous Standpoint theory that propositions the contemporary space of Indigenous people as a Cultural Interface. His current research work focuses on curriculum areas and the academic preparation of Indigenous students for higher education. His book, Disciplining the Savages-Savaging the Disciplines, has just been released in Spanish by Abya-Yala in Quito, Equador.
