Melbourne Law School Rare Books Lecture

Venue: G08, Melbourne Law School

Presenters: Professor Mark Lunney

'A very Australian story: Political Libels and the Conscription Referendums of the First World War'

In 1945, the Anti-Conscription League published a pamphlet ostensibly about the recently deceased Maurice Blackburn's opposition to conscription for the purpose of overseas military service. The polemic that infused the pamphlet - a discussion of the introduction of conscription in the Second World War - is testament to the continued strong feelings the issue aroused, and is directly related to the highly-charged debates during the 1916 and 1917 referendums on the issue. While law and private law in particular, was largely peripheral to the mainstream debate during the First World War, the law of defamation was used by various of the leading participants to discomfort opponents and to score political points. This lecture considers a number of the most high-profile of these defamation cases, cases which raised a mixture of innovative doctrinal questions together with wider concerns about the limitations of the defamation action to mediate what were essentially political disputes. In dealing with these questions, Australian courts applied a law of 'political libels' that had a distinctive Australian flavour.

Mark Lunney is a Professor in the School of Law at the University of New England, Armidale, Australia.

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https://events.unimelb.edu.au/events/6581-melbourne-law-school-rare-books-lecture

Navigating uncertainty: Everyday youth strategies and generational change in rural Gujarat, India

Venue: Seminar Room, Australia India Institute, The University of Melbourne

Presenters: Viresh Patel

How do the aspirations of rural youth in contemporary India differ from older generations? To what extent are they able to live out their hopes for the future? This talk will focus on the everyday strategies of young men and women in India's westernmost state of Gujarat, paying particular attention to the fields of education, work, and marriage. With 356 million young people aged between 10-24 years, India's youth population is the world's greatest. The liberalisation of higher education across the country has engendered a wave of first-generation college goers from rural, lower caste, and lower class backgrounds. Yet paradoxically, whilst access to education in India among formerly marginalised communities has increased, the economic value of education has diminished. Thus young people living rurally find themselves navigating a precarious social and economic landscape, one that is markedly different to that of their parents' generation. In this talk I draw on 11 months of ethnographic research in order to interrogate the nature of social and generational change in rural India. Using a series of vignettes, I highlight the socially differentiated ways in which contemporary Indian youth are negotiating varying levels of personal, familial, and societal hopes and expectations.

Viresh Patel is a final year PhD Candidate in Human Geography at the University of Oxford.

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https://events.unimelb.edu.au/events/6550-navigating-uncertainty-everyday-youth-strategies-and-generational-change-in-rural

Aboriginal Agriculture

Venue: Davis Auditorium, Walter and Eliza Hall Institute

Presenters: Mr Bruce Pascoe

Bruce Pascoe writes about the past to suggest solutions for the future. Forensic in his research, he is compelled to agree that most history about Indigenous Australians has been substantially distorted.

Bruce asks the question that may hearten many farmers about to abandon their farm, or who are depressed about farming, and may not know they are farming against the grain of this country’s soil and climate – that by copying successful Aboriginal farming methods they can return to profits.

Bruce Pascoe is an award-winning Australian writer, editor and anthologist.

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https://events.unimelb.edu.au/events/6554-aboriginal-agriculture

When Accounting Collides with Botany

Venue: Royal Botanic Gardens, Outside Visitors Centre (near Observatory precinct)

Presenters: Professor Ian Woodrow, Associate Professor Brad Potter

Join the University of Melbourne’s Associate Professor Brad Potter, Professor Naomi Soderstrom from the Department of Accounting and Professor Ian Woodrow from the School of Botany for a walk-and-talk in the Royal Botanic Gardens as they explain how trees and the study of carbon emissions can help modern business operate in a more environmentally sustainable way.

For Associate Professor Brad Potter and Professor Ian Woodrow the collaboration between accounting and botany means finding a way to more accurately measure carbon emissions, allowing a more thorough examination of how this information might be meaningfully reported. The relative lack of reliability of environmental disclosures has been a hurdle for their usefulness in the past. Part of Brad and Ian’s plan is to test, primarily by way of experiment, whether or not giving people more information about how environmental impact is measured, and its reliability, will change the decisions they’re likely to make.

The setting for this project is the Royal Botanic Gardens, whose trees have accumulated carbon that has been recorded for the last 25 years, which is where you are invited to join them on a walk-and-talk through the greenery. They will explain how their methods of measuring and extrapolation of data are unique, and how this particular study of carbon emissions is relevant to modern workplaces. After the walk, continue the conversation over morning tea at Jardin Tan in the Gardens.

Talk will be conducted at an inside onsite venue in the Gardens if inclement weather.

This event is part of Melbourne Knowledge Week, 2 – 8 May 2016, proudly presented by the City of Melbourne.

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https://events.unimelb.edu.au/events/6564-when-accounting-collides-with-botany

Mid-point of the 5G Journey: are we on track to provide 5G solutions?

Venue: Brown Theatre, Electrical Engineering Brown Theatre

Presenters: Dr Chih-Lin I

5G networks are anticipated to be soft, green, and super-fast. They are expected to deploy in the 2020s to satisfy the challenging demands of mobile communication.

After several years of worldwide pursuit of 5G solutions, the campaign on 5G standards has just begun.

Characterised by a mixed set of KPIs like data rates, latency, mobility, energy efficiency, and traffic density, 5G services demand a fundamental revolution on the end-to-end network architecture and key technologies design.

At this mid-point of the 5G journey, we need to ask: are we on the right track to provide 5G solutions?

Our speaker is Dr Chih-Lin I, who has over 30 years experience in wireless communications and is currently Chief Scientist of Wireless Technologies at the China Mobile Research Institute.

Dr I will give a comprehensive overview of China Mobile’s 5G solutions, including an end-to-end network architecture with User Centric Network and Soft Defined Air Interface and the corresponding enabling technologies like C-RAN, NGFI, MCD etc presented as imperative solutions for diversified set of usage scenarios.

She will also talk to China Mobile's views on standardisation timeline and work scope, spectrum strategy, prototyping and field trial plans.

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https://events.unimelb.edu.au/events/6561-mid-point-of-the-5g-journey-are-we-on-track-to

Understanding children’s outcomes: the role of big data

Venue: Ian Potter Auditorium, Kenneth Myer Building

Presenters: Professor Judith Masson

Internationally, attention is turning towards the outcomes for children of state intervention in child welfare as a basis for improving care for children and young people. Traditionally, administrative data have been collected to facilitate the management of systems, and the focus in child protection research has been the operation of processes and the orders made, leaving establishing the consequences for children to small evaluative studies, which are resource intensive. Big data and data linkage provide opportunities better to understand outcomes for all children exposed to the care system and the relationships between processes, services and outcomes.

This Miegunyah Lecture provides an accessible consideration of insights from and the challenges of using big data to understand children’s experiences following child protection proceedings. It draws upon Professor Judith Masson’s important study Establishing outcomes of care proceedings for children before and after care proceedings reform, which provides an innovative use of administrative data to investigate the effects of contemporary policy and practice in child protection.

Judith Masson is Professor of Socio-legal Studies School of Law at the University of Bristol. She has a long and distinguished career in socio-legal studies and has held senior academic positions in the UK. Her research is at the forefront of international interest across the fields of child welfare law and practice. She has achieved national and international recognition through her research and scholarship and has acted as a specialist consultant to the Council of Europe, the EU, and the UK Parliament. She was academic member of the Family Justice Council and the Judicial Studies Board for England and Wales, and in 2013 she was appointed as a fellow of the Academy of Social Sciences.

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https://events.unimelb.edu.au/events/6563-understanding-children-s-outcomes-the-role-of-big-data

That good "F" word: the beauty and necessity of failure

Venue: Yasuko Hiraoka Myer Room, level 1 , Sidney Myer Asia Centre

According to Albert Einstein: ‘A person who never made a mistake never tried anything new’.

Join this dynamic and interactive evening with our ‘failure panel’ - leaders and entrepreneurs from business, arts, research and the community to understand and celebrate the beauty and necessity of failure and its role in innovation.

Bar opens at 5.30pm.

The Carlton Connect Initiative (CCI) is creating Australia's premier innovation precinct, anchored by the University of Melbourne. CCI brings together people from diverse disciplines in business, government and academia to tackle pressing challenges in water, food, energy and urbanisation. CCI leads a culture of innovation and entrepreneurship, especially in science and technology.

The University of Melbourne is proud to present this event as part of Melbourne Knowledge Week, an initiative of the City of Melbourne.

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https://events.unimelb.edu.au/events/6537-that-good-f-word-the-beauty-and-necessity-of-failure

What makes a place age-friendly?

Venue: Ian Potter Museum of Art, Swanston Street between Faraday and Elgin Streets

Presenters: Lena Gan, Dr Heather Gaunt, Professor Ray Green

Ideas inspired across the generations fuel this multidisciplinary event. A team of academics and older guests will encourage an audience to generate big ideas on making a place 'age-friendly'.

Experts in design, art, population and global health lead a discussion on what makes a place open to all.​

​​Themes under discussion will include economics, business, technology, ethics, health, arts and design, personal stories, and community visions, and their contributions to what makes a place 'age-friendly'. ​​​

The University of Melbourne is proud to present this event as part of Melbourne Knowledge Week, an initiative of the City of Melbourne.

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https://events.unimelb.edu.au/events/6531-what-makes-a-place-age-friendly

When accounting collides with botany

Venue: Royal Botanic Gardens, outside Visitors Centre (at Observatory Precinct)

Presenters: Associate Professor Brad Potter, Professor Ian Woodrow

What happens when accountants and botanists join forces to measure and report carbon emissions?

Join the University of Melbourne’s Brad Potter, Naomi Soderstrom and Ian Woodrow for a walk-and-talk in the Royal Botanic Gardens as they explain how trees and the study of carbon emissions can help modern business operate in a more environmentally sustainable way. Join us for morning tea at Jardin Tan at 11am after the talk.

For Associate Professor Brad Potter and Professor Ian Woodrow (both from The University of Melbourne), the collaboration between accounting and botany means finding a way to more accurately measure carbon emissions, allowing a more thorough examination of how this information might be meaningfully reported. The relative lack of reliability of environmental disclosures has been a hurdle for their usefulness in the past. Part of Brad and Ian’s plan is to test, primarily by way of experiment, whether or not giving people more information about how environmental impact is measured, and its reliability, will change the decisions they’re likely to make.

The setting for this project is the Royal Botanic Gardens, whose trees have accumulated carbon that has been recorded for the last 25 years, which is where you are invited to join them on a walk-and-talk through the greenery. They will explain how their methods of measuring and extrapolation of data are unique, and how this particular study of carbon emissions is relevant to modern workplaces. After the walk, continue the conversation over morning tea at Jardin Tan in the Gardens.

The University of Melbourne is proud to present this event as part of Melbourne Knowledge Week, an initiative of the City of Melbourne.

from
https://events.unimelb.edu.au/events/6535-when-accounting-collides-with-botany

Women entrepreneurs: defining success

Venue: Ormond College, 49 College Crescent

Presenters: Melanie Gleeson, Amanda Gome, Sam Cobb, Cyan Ta'eed

Meet some of Victoria’s leading women entrepreneurs. Learn from four outstanding female entrepreneurs on a keynote panel and stay to network with other significant innovators and founders. This event will leave you inspired, connected and ready to change your world and change the world.

The University of Melbourne is proud to present this event as part of Melbourne Knowledge Week, an initiative of the City of Melbourne.

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https://events.unimelb.edu.au/events/6533-women-entrepreneurs-defining-success

Bitcoin and beyond

Venue: Melbourne Business School, 200 Leicester Street

Will the future be sweet for cryptocurrencies and the block chain (or shared public ledger) technology behind them? Explore how the digital home could be virtually unhackable, how money is grown on PCs and how chocolate can explain the code that underpins it all.

The University of Melbourne is proud to present this event as part of Melbourne Knowledge Week, an initiative of the City of Melbourne.

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https://events.unimelb.edu.au/events/6532-bitcoin-and-beyond

Managing disaster: technologies for a safer city

Venue: Woodward Conference Centre, 10th Floor, Law Building

Presenters: Professor Abbas Rajabifard

How would we prepare for, respond to and protect ourselves against disaster in Melbourne? Hear from an expert panel from the University of Melbourne on the latest research around safer cities and resilient infrastructure. This event is held in collaboration with the Centre for Disaster Management and Public Safety.

Natural and human-instigated disasters cause devastating loss of life, property and livelihood. Hear the latest research around the technologies being developed to enhance disaster management practice, and take the opportunity to speak with the experts.

Themes include ocean engineering and extreme events, crowd management and integrated transport infrastructure management, resilient buildings and flood management.

The panel will be moderated by Professor Abbas Rajabifard, Director of the Centre for Disaster Management and Public Safety (CDMPS). The CDMPS was established at the University of Melbourne to conduct multi-disciplinary research and training on disaster management and public safety, both nationally and internationally. Professor Abbas Rajabifard is also Head of the Department of Infrastructure Engineering and Associate Dean (International) at the University of Melbourne. Prof Rajabifard is immediate Past-President of Global Spatial Data Infrastructure Association and is an Executive Board member of this Association. He is also a member of the Joint Board of Geospatial Information Societies and was Vice Chair, Spatially Enabled Government Working Group of the UN Global Geospatial Information Management in Asia-Pacific, and member of the Victorian Spatial Council. Prof Rajabifard research interests lie in the areas of spatial data infrastructure, disaster management, land administration, 3D data platforms and virtual jurisdictions.

The University of Melbourne is proud to present this event as part of Melbourne Knowledge Week, an initiative of the City of Melbourne.

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https://events.unimelb.edu.au/events/6536-managing-disaster-technologies-for-a-safer-city

Poor Great Powers and the Remaking of International Order - Half Baked Seminar

Venue: Seminar Room, Australia India Institute, The University of Melbourne

Presenters: Professor Nick Bisley

Historically, great powers have played a distinctive role in the production and management of international order. In return for special privileges and rights they have responsibility to manage order and ensure the stability of the system over the longer run. This is the underlying logic of the special role grant to the permanent members of the UN Security Council. One of the features of the current period is that the order established in the ashes of WWII is beginning to fray. There are many reasons for this, however, one of the most interesting features of the current period are the number of very significant states who have global ambitions, are growing rapidly but which are, even under optimistic forecasts, likely to remain in per capita terms relatively less well off members of international society.

This talk will explore the implications of the somewhat contradictory notion of ‘poor great powers’ and what kind of impact this phenomenon is having on the evolution of international order. The talk will focus on India as a case in point, however, it is by no means the only example of this trend.

Lunch is provided and therefore registration is essential for all guests

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https://events.unimelb.edu.au/events/6518-poor-great-powers-and-the-remaking-of-international-order

ThoughtLAB-14: To Kill Time

Venue: Seminar space, LAB-14, The Carlton Connect Initiative

Presenters: Dr Renee Beale

The discovery of hyper-time should have changed everything. But somehow, even though we can access an additional time dimension, allowing us to add an extra twelve hours to each day, the same old problems remain.

We still struggle with a changing climate, water security, and a global economy teetering on the brink of recession. We still have the vexing problem of poverty and starvation on one hand, and obesity on the other.

The one world government has decided that something productive should be done, and is looking to mandate the way in which people are permitted to spend their additional time. Being a merciful government, they are taking submissions.

The business council is advocating for the 80-hour working week. The health council is pushing for compulsory exercise. Environmental groups are urging sustainable living initiatives. Disparate activist groups are petitioning for the freedom for people to choose.

You are on the parliamentary committee entrusted with this decision. Somehow, you must balance the pleas from representatives of the business, health, environment and activist groups. How will you choose to keep the citizens of the world from just killing time?

To Kill Time is a ThoughtLAB-14 event where we invite a guest panel to interact with the audience to collaborate on ideas, analyse evidence and dream alternative futures.

Event facilitated by Dr Renee Beale, Creative Community Animator, Carlton Connect Initiative.

Panel members:

Dr Stephen Haley – artist and Senior Lecturer at the Victorian College of the Arts

Weston Lewis – Sustainability Consultant, Umow Lai

Jacob Workman – Manager Education and Programs, the Centre for Workplace Leadership

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https://events.unimelb.edu.au/events/6520-thoughtlab-14-to-kill-time

Maximising the Impact of Teaching Assistants: Lessons from the UK

Venue: Theatre Q230, Level 2, Kwong Lee Dow Building

Presenters: Professor Peter Blatchford

Melbourne Graduate School of Education Dean's Lecture presented by Peter Blatchford, UCL Institute of Education.

Over the last 15 years, teaching assistants/aides have become a central part of United Kingdom schools, and now comprise a quarter of the schooling workforce. Assistants often provide one-on-one and small group support for low attaining pupils and those with special educational needs. However, results from the large-scale five-year Deployment and Impact of Support Staff project directed by Professor Blatchford, showed that pupils who received the most teaching assistant support consistently made less progress than similar pupils who received less support.

Professor Blatchford will detail the project's results, which will have had a big impact on the deployment of teaching assistants in the United Kingdom and shown the need to fundamentally rethink their role and maximise their impact. He will raise clear implications for policies of inclusion for school leaders, and issues about the role of classroom talk in scaffolding learning.

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https://events.unimelb.edu.au/events/6517-maximising-the-impact-of-teaching-assistants-lessons-from-the-uk

“More English than the English” - ThreeTreasure House Libraries: Waddesdon Manor, Anglesey Abbey & Wormsley House

Venue: The Oratory, Newman College, The University of Melbourne

Presenters: Mr Shane Carmody

For the aristocracy and the gentry the English country house was the proof of social status. Often palatial in scale these great houses were decorated with extraordinary collections of art and antiquities. Many also had great libraries. For outsiders wishing to join this elite a country house was a must and in this lecture Shane Carmody will tell the stories of Baron Ferdinand Rothschild; Huttleston Rogers, First Baron Fairhaven; and Sir Paul Getty, the libraries they created and some of the extraordinary books that they contain.

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https://events.unimelb.edu.au/events/6492-more-english-than-the-english-threetreasure-house-libraries-waddesdon

At the speed limit and at the boundaries of the measurable

Venue: Theatre A, Elisabeth Murdoch Building

Presenters: Professor Ursula Keller

Whether at her coffee machine in the morning, on her way to work in the car or at her computer in the office – Ursula Keller keeps seeing items in her daily life that were produced with the aid of laser processing.

Nowadays, these powerful light sources are used in many places to shape surfaces or cut materials to the right size, and Keller has had a major hand in this. As a professor of experimental physics over 20 years ago, she developed SESAM technology that enables powerful laser light to be focused into ultra-short pulses. And it is these same, short, high-energy pulses that make it possible to process materials in a gentle, precise way. The further development of the lasers, however, is only part of Ursula Keller’s work. For her group also uses them to study ultrafast processes. Her cutting edge laser technology enabled for example the world’s most accurate clocks – the optical clock and the attoclock.

With the optical clock we can measure a few centimeters of height differences as predicted by Einstein’s general relativity theory or can help to discover new planets. With the attoclock we can study the tunnel effect, a quantum-mechanical phenomenon that was previously impossible to investigate experimentally because it takes place at an inconceivable speed. In concrete terms, it concerns how quickly an electron excited with light can be transported away from an atom which can take place in the space of attoseconds, i.e. a billionth of a billionth of a second.

This talk will give a general introduction on how we can access a new regime of measurements in our “ultrafast world” which has a big impact on our everyday lives. For without these extremely speedy processes there would be no photosynthesis, no breathing and no eyesight.

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https://events.unimelb.edu.au/events/6498-at-the-speed-limit-and-at-the-boundaries-of-the

A Third Wave in the Economics of Climate Change

Venue: Seminar Room, Lab 14, Carlton Connect, 290

Presenters: Mr Alexander Teytelboym

In this seminar Alexander Teytelboym will present on his recent paper 'A Third Wave in the Economics of Climate Change'

Modelling the economics of climate change is daunting. Many existing methodologies from social and physical sciences need to be deployed, and new modelling techniques and ideas still need to be developed. Existing bread-and-butter micro- and macroeconomic tools, such as the expected utility framework, market equilibrium concepts and representative agent assumptions, are far from adequate.

Four key issues—along with several others—remain inadequately addressed by economic models of climate change, namely: (1) uncertainty, (2) aggregation, heterogeneity and distributional implications (3) technological change, and most of all, (4) realistic damage functions for the economic impact of the physical consequences of climate change.

Alex will speak to this paper and its assessment of the main shortcomings of two generations of climate-energy-economic models and its proposal that a new wave of models need to be developed to tackle these four challenges.

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https://events.unimelb.edu.au/events/6499-a-third-wave-in-the-economics-of-climate-change

The 'Connected Citizen'- in a Globalised Landscape

Venue: Theatre D, Old Arts Building

Presenters: Yuezhi Zhao, Ms Linda Caruso, Nick Couldry, Gerard Goggin, Koichi Iwabuchi, Jack Qiu, Clemencia Rodriguez, Herman Wasserman

This lecture/panel discussion chaired by Ingrid Volkmer (University of Melbourne) is part of a three-day workshop of the International Panel on Social Progress (IPSP).

In today's advanced digital age of the 21st century, 'networked' civic communication is transforming all societies. New frameworks are needed to assess the national implications of such a new 'fluid' digital public sphere. This event will bring together key experts to engage in a much-needed international discussion to assess the new parameter of citizenship in globalised digital spheres.

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https://events.unimelb.edu.au/events/6486-the-connected-citizen-in-a-globalised-landscape

Terror at the GPO - The 1916 Easter Rising: Australasian Perspectives

Venue: Fritz Loewe Theatre, McCoy Building

Presenters: Dr Guy Beiner

Our understanding of the Easter Rising is, at least in part, a historical myth through which we interpret the past in light of our present concerns. With this in mind, a new interpretation of 1916 is suggested, which will take into account studies on the history of terrorism, proposing that the takeover of the GPO can be considered as an act of propaganda by deed. Such a thesis, of course, has implications for the memory of the event and how it is commemorated.

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https://events.unimelb.edu.au/events/6489-terror-at-the-gpo-the-1916-easter-rising-australasian

Arts, Culture and the Making of Global Cities

Venue: Theatre B, Old Arts Building

Presenters: Professor Lily Kong

While global cities have mostly been characterised as sites of intensive and extensive economic activity, the quest for global city status also increasingly rests on the creative production and consumption of culture and the arts. In this talk, Professor Kong will examine such ambitions and projects undertaken in three major cities in Asia: Beijing, Hong Kong, and Singapore. She will compare their urban imaging strategies and attempts to harness arts and culture, as well as more organically evolved arts activities and spaces, and analyse the relative successes and failures of these cities. The talk will offer some of the rich ethnographic detail drawn from extensive fieldwork, and challenge city strategies and existing urban theories, revealing the many complexities in the art of city-making.

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https://events.unimelb.edu.au/events/6487-arts-culture-and-the-making-of-global-cities

Einstein’s Gravity: Black Holes, Dark Matter and Gravitational Lensing

Venue: Theatre B117, Melbourne School of Design

Presenters: Professor Stuart Wyithe

The General Theory of Relativity describes how mass distorts how we observe space and time. Two spectacular examples of this are provided through gravitational lensing and the predictions of black holes. Gravitational lenses provide our strongest evidenced for Dark Matter in the Universe. The gravity waves announced in 2016 came from a violent merger between two black holes around one billion years ago. The signal provides compelling evidence for the existence of black holes with masses of 10s to 100s of times the mass of the sun. Even larger, Super-Massive Black-Holes, with masses as high as 10 billion times the Sun seem to be ubiquitous in the centres of galaxies and to have played a key role in shaping our Universe. Prof Wyithe presents some of the puzzling relationships between gravity, black holes, galaxy formation and the spectacular warping of images from distant objects.

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https://events.unimelb.edu.au/events/6471-einstein-s-gravity-black-holes-dark-matter-and-gravitational-lensing

Dark Matter and Gravity: Searching for missing mass in the Stawell gold mine

Venue: Lyle Theatre 101, Redmond Barry Building

Presenters: Professor Elisabetta Barberio

Einstein’s General Theory of relativity provides an exceptionally accurate theory for gravity and matter at the largest scales. But observations of the way stars move subject to gravity in the galaxies show there is more gravity that can be accounted for by the visible stars. Gravity from invisible dark matter is proposed to explain the discrepancies. Despite concerted searches, no other trace of this dark matter has yet been found. Prof Barbario introduces a new observatory being built at the bottom of a gold mine at Stawell in central Victoria. Working with international partners, this observatory may find clear signals from the missing matter.

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https://events.unimelb.edu.au/events/6470-dark-matter-and-gravity-searching-for-missing-mass-in-the

Pulsars: Nature's naturally-occurring gravitational laboratories

Venue: Theatre B117, Melbourne School of Design

Presenters: Professor Matthew Bailes

Pulsars are spinning dead stars that have long since consumed all their nuclear fuel and collapsed into super-dense remnants. Pulses of radiation from the spin can be used as extremely precise clocks with which to study extreme gravity. Astronomers have discovered over 2,000 of these bizarre objects including a remarkable binary pulsar that provided the first experimental evidence for the emission of gravitational waves leading to the 1993 Nobel Prize. Prof Bailes will explain his latest work with pulsars and will perform a live cross to a giant radio telescope to see a pulsar and explain how fast pulsars can discover gravitational waves from supermassive black hole binaries.

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https://events.unimelb.edu.au/events/6469-pulsars-nature-s-naturally-occurring-gravitational-laboratories

The Discovery of Gravity Waves: The Breakthrough by LIGO

Venue: Theatre B117, Melbourne School of Design

Presenters: Professor Andrew Melatos

The 2016 announcement of the experimental observation of gravity waves from space is the latest confirmation of Einstein’s General Theory and comes after decades of work developing the incredibly sophisticated observatory. Member of the international Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory (LIGO) consortium, Prof Melatos presents the work that led to the observation and the implications of our new ability to listen to the tempo of ripples in the fabric of space and time.

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https://events.unimelb.edu.au/events/6468-the-discovery-of-gravity-waves-the-breakthrough-by-ligo

Celebrating 100 years of Einstein’s General Theory of Relativity: Lost planets, Australian Eclipses and warped space

Venue: Theatre B117, Melbourne School of Design

Presenters: Professor David Jamieson

Over the years 1915 and 1916 Albert Einstein presented his magnificent General Theory of Relativity. The product of years of toil, it took expeditions to observe total solar eclipses visible from northern Australia in 1922 to confirm the theory. Before then it had already abolished the speculative planet Vulcan proposed to account for anomalies in the orbit of the planet Mercury. The warping of space and time predicted by the theory explained all that. This lecture reviews the origins of the theory and some more of its astounding consequences.

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https://events.unimelb.edu.au/events/6467-celebrating-100-years-of-einstein-s-general-theory-of-relativity-lost

The Great Leaders Masterclass

Venue: Yasuko Hiraoka Myer Room, Sidney Myer Asia Centre

Presenters: Professor Glyn Davis AC

Great leaders inspire us. They impact culture, business, government and importantly, individuals. Great leaders give us models to look up to and knowing how to apply the lessons they teach can support us to become great leaders ourselves.

Who influences the influencers? Who leads the leaders? And how do you adopt and adapt the learnings from people you admire to grow your own skills?

In this series the Centre for Workplace Leadership has invited five prominent leaders to speak about an individual who has inspired them as a leader. It could be a modern or historical figure; someone with significant public profile, or someone lesser known.

In our second event of the series, Professor Glyn Davis AC will speak about an individual who has inspired him as a leader and will share reflections on how this leader has inspired him, what was learned through their example and how this has influenced how he leads today.

Part lecture, part discussion these free sessions will provide unique insights into the characteristics of great leadership.

Professor Glyn Davis AC is Professor of Political Science, Vice-Chancellor and Principal, of the University of Melbourne, and immediate past Chair of Universities Australia.

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https://events.unimelb.edu.au/events/6445-the-great-leaders-masterclass

Engineering Limbs: Helping Amputees Walk in Vietnam

Venue: Level 10, Woodward Conference Centre

Presenters: Professor Peter Lee

Over 25 million people in the world need prosthetic orthotic devices, many of whom come from developing countries where access to specialised personnel and services is a major challenge. Demand for artificial limbs is even more urgent in countries where land mines from wars are still prevalent.

Professor Peter Lee from the Department of Mechanical Engineering at the University of Melbourne, will discuss his bio-mechanical engineering research in developing low–cost artificial limbs, using the Pressure Cast (PCAST) technique, a portable and easy to use prosthetic socket fitting system that requires less technical skill and labour to administer. He will also share his experience working with patients and clinics in Vietnam to implement PCAST.

Peter (Vee Sin) Lee is a Professor in the Department of Mechanical Engineering at the University of Melbourne.

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https://events.unimelb.edu.au/events/6440-engineering-limbs-helping-amputees-walk-in-vietnam

From the Millennium Development Goals to the Sustainable Development Goals

Venue: Theatre A, Elisabeth Murdoch

Presenters: Professor David Hulme

This lecture explores the processes underpinning the negotiation of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and asks whether they can be seen as a transformation from the more limited Millennium Development Goals. In the context of a dramatically changed global environment – with the rise of China and the BRICs and the relative decline of the US – the lecture analyses the ways in which changes in material capabilities, dominant ideas and powerful institutions explain the SDGs broadening to include the eradication of extreme poverty, reduced inequality, environmental stability and improved governance. Are the SDGs merely a continuation of the evolving UN ‘Global Goals’ process, or do they demonstrate that the idea of ‘development’ has been fundamentally transformed?

David Hulme is Professor of Development Studies and Executive Director of the Global Development Institute at the University of Manchester.

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https://events.unimelb.edu.au/events/6438-from-the-millennium-development-goals-to-the-sustainable-development-goals

Frank Jotzo - Brown coal exit: a market mechanism for regulated closure of highly emissions intensive power stations

Venue: Lab14 Seminar Room, 290

Presenters: Associate Professor Frank Jotzo

In this seminar Assoc. Prof. Frank Jotzo will present his recent paper on a market mechanism for a regulated exit of highly emissions intensive power stations from the electricity grid.

The starting point is that there is surplus capacity in coal fired power generation in Australia. In the absence of a carbon price signal, black coal generation capacity may leave the market instead of high emitting brown coal power stations.

The proposal could overcome adverse incentive effects for plants to stay in operation in anticipation of payment for closure and solve the political difficulties and problems of information asymmetry that plague government payments for closure and direct regulation for exit.

Exploring the theoretical issues with empirical illustrations suggests that closure of a brown coal fired power station in Australia could yield emissions savings at costs that are lower than the social benefits.

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https://events.unimelb.edu.au/events/6411-frank-jotzo-brown-coal-exit-a-market-mechanism-for

Live from….: Shakespeare and Livecast Cinema

Venue: 4th Floor Linkway, John Medley

Presenters: Professor Judith Buchanan

Livecast cinema is a relatively new area of theatrical, broadcast and cinematic practice. Through this new and global practice, audiences are changed, concepts of the ontology of theatre and cinema are challenged and definitions of liveness expanded. Through the prevalence of livecast cinema programming, a significant shift is underway in how we configure cinema and theatre, presence and absence and the idea of a shared audience experience. This is both a market and a medium on the move.

But it is a practice that as yet lacks a critical framework, or shared lexicon, within which it can be discussed. And it also lacks a history. Present practices and aspirations have not emerged from nowhere – either technologically or in terms of the cultural impulses that underlie them. Current practice is, in fact, trailing a history of filmed theatre and broadcast theatre. And, throughout this history, Shakespeare has been at the vanguard of creating the market appetite and inspiring the technology that has made this possible.

In this discussion, in the context of a broader consideration of livecast Shakespearean cinema, Judith Buchanan considers a high-profile Broadway stage production of Hamlet from 1964 starring Richard Burton, the film that was made of it and the synchronized screenings of this film that ambitiously attempted to evoke in a recorded medium something of the evanescent properties of theatre. What impulses were driving the trail-blazing mode of exhibition for this work of ‘theatrofilm’? What were its precedents and to what use has the production since been put?

Judith has recently embarked on a book project on Shakespeare and livecast cinema, jointly with John Wyver (Director of Screen Productions at the Royal Shakespeare Company). Following her presentation, she would be particularly interested to hear audience reports of the experience of attending live broadcasts of works of theatre.

Professor Judith Buchanan is Director of the Humanities Research Centre at the University of York and Professor of Film and Literature in the Department of English and Related Literature. She writes widely on Shakespearean performance histories and is the Director of ‘Silents Now’ (silents-now.co.uk). She is the author of Shakespeare on Silent Film: An Excellent Dumb Discourse (2009 & 2011), Shakespeare on Film (2005) and Shakespeare’s Late Plays (2001). She is editor of a special issue of Shakespeare (2007) and of The Writer on Film: Screening Literary Authorship (2013). She co-wrote, and is Shakespeare Advisor for, the forthcoming GSP feature film of Macbeth and is co-Director of the York International Shakespeare Festival.

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https://events.unimelb.edu.au/events/6437-live-from-shakespeare-and-livecast-cinema

Prince of Darkness: The Untold Story of Jeremiah Hamilton, Wall Street's First Black Millionaire

Venue: Theatre B117, Melbourne School of Design

Presenters: Mr Shane White

“On Wall Street, Jeremiah Hamilton was a Master of the Universe. For the rest of the day and night he was barely a second-class citizen.”

In mid 19th century Wall Street, blacks were expected to carry goods, not buy and sell them. But not Jeremiah Hamilton, a broker whose very existence flies in the face of our understanding of African American life in New York in the decades before and after the Civil War. Far from being some novice on the fringes of the financial world, Jeremiah Hamilton was a Wall Street celebrity; a skilled and, at times, ruthless manipulator. He wheeled and dealed in the lily white business world, married a white woman, bought a mansion in rural New Jersey, and owned railroad stock on trains he was not allowed legally to ride. He outsmarted his white contemporaries and generally set their teeth on edge. Jeremiah Hamilton was "perhaps the most finished villain the city ever harboured", railed one commentator. He brazenly "assumed the privileges of a white man", seethed another. Outraged by his audacity, the penny press branded him the "Prince of Darkness".

Prince of Darkness is a groundbreaking and vivid account of Jeremiah Hamilton's remarkable life. For the first time, historian Shane White reveals the larger than life story of a man who defied every convention of his time.

Professor Shane White is the Challis Professor of History, an Australian Professorial Fellow and a Research Associate of the United States Studies Centre at the University of Sydney specializing in African American history.

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https://events.unimelb.edu.au/events/6423-prince-of-darkness-the-untold-story-of-jeremiah-hamilton-wall

A Cruel Game of Chance: Administration of the Death Penalty in India

Venue: Room 920, Law Building

Presenters: Dr Anup Surendranath

Co-hosted by the Asian Law Centre, Centre for Indonesian Law, Islam and Society, and Reprieve Australia

Based on interviews with all of India’s death row prisoners and their families between June 2013 and January 2015, the Centre on the Death Penalty at National Law University, Delhi has documented the socio-economic profile of prisoners under the sentence of death along with mapping their interaction with various aspects of the Indian criminal justice system. While discussing issues of discrimination, custodial torture, incompetent representation, prison conditions and alienation from the legal system in the context of his work with death row prisoners, in this seminar, Dr. Anup Surendranath will also reflect on the Centre’s experience in providing pro bono representation to over 40 death row prisoners in the last 18 months.

Dr. Anup Surendranath is the Director of the Centre on the Death Penalty at National Law University, Delhi.

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https://events.unimelb.edu.au/events/6051-a-cruel-game-of-chance-administration-of-the-death-penalty

© William Shakespeare

Venue: Macmahon Ball Theatre, Old Arts

Presenters: Professor Ian Gadd

While many will have heard of the 'First Folio' (the first collected edition of Shakespeare's works published seven years after his death) few are aware of the process by which the collection was compiled, and the extent to which the selection of plays was shaped by what we would now think of as copyright restrictions.

Copyright in the sense that we understand it now did not exist in Shakespeare's time but since the early sixteenth century, the London book trade had been developing its own system of protecting individual members' publishing rights. This was centred on the Stationers' Company, a trade and craft body to which the vast majority of London's printers, publishers, and booksellers belonged. The officers of the Company managed the whole process: vetting publications to ensure they did not infringe others' rights and defending approved publications against unauthorised reprints. Shakespeare's printed plays—like the works of virtually every other author in 16th and 17th-century London—were published under the terms of this system: thus, compiling a collected edition of Shakespeare's plays involved a whole series of commercial negotiations between London publishers. many of whom were closely associated with one another through family and professional ties.

In addition, the authorisation of this collected edition—as recorded in the register of the Stationers' Company—was just the start of a very complex history of 'rights management' that would shape the publishing history of Shakespeare all the way to the late eighteenth century, paralleling the emergence of modern copyright.

Professor Ian Gadd will focus on the individual publishers, the commercial networks, the trade institutions, and the systems of publishing rights that together profoundly affected the publication of Shakespeare's collected works between 1623 and the 1770s.

Ian Gadd is Professor of English Literature at Bath Spa University, UK. His research focuses on the history of the English book trade from the 16th to the 18th century.

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https://events.unimelb.edu.au/events/6414-william-shakespeare

Beattie Smith Lecture 2016

Venue: Ian Potter Auditorium, Ground Floor, Melbourne Brain Centre, Kenneth Myer Building

Presenters: Associate Professor James Scott

Bullying: A modifiable risk factor for mental illness

Bullying during adolescence is a significant risk factor for both contemporaneous and future mental illness. In any school term, approximately one in ten Australian Adolescents are involved in bullying as perpetrators, victims or both. Bullying can be considered in terms of verbal (name calling and teasing), relational (spreading rumors and exclusion), physical and cyber bullying and these often co occur. The proximal and long term adverse impact on the mental health of individuals is significant matching other forms of interpersonal trauma such as maltreatment in childhood and domestic violence. The role of medical professionals in screening for and addressing bullying in the health care setting will be discussed.  

Associate Professor James Scott holds a conjoint position with the University of Queensland School of Medicine and the Royal Brisbane and Women’s Hospital Early Psychosis Service. James has worked extensively in child and youth mental health services, is an elected member of the RANZCP Youth Special Interest Group and expert advisor to the Global Burden of Disease Collaboration for childhood mental disorders.

Whilst maintaining his clinical work, he has also established a broad programme of research in child and youth mental health for which he has been awarded an NHMRC Practitioner Research Fellowship. He has co-authored over 100 peer reviewed publications, many in leading international journals and is an investigator and collaborator in local as well as global research projects. 

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https://events.unimelb.edu.au/events/6393-beattie-smith-lecture-2016

Contemporary India Master Class

Venue: Copland Theatre (Basement), The Spot Building

Presenters: Professor Craig Jeffrey

This two hour pop up event is designed for students, staff and faculty at universities and colleges in Melbourne and Sydney who are interested in learning more about India in a relaxed and friendly environment. It would also greatly interest government servants, businesspeople, community members, and members of the public - anyone, really, interested in becoming more informed about economic and social change in one of the most vibrant countries in the world. The two-hour event is aimed especially at getting people to think about how they could engage with India more closely, either through their studies, research, or via travel or volunteering.

The event will start with a 50 minute state-of-the-art presentation by Craig Jeffrey, Director of the Australia India Institute, on what is happening in modern India in terms of the economy, society, politics, and culture. Craig will explain why India matters in the world today, and why it matters for Australians. Craig and other staff will then arrange a series of break out groups at which participants discuss how they might be able to engage more with the country in the future.

Join us for samosas and chai after the event!

Win a trip to India! Everyone who registers for this event will go into a draw to win a return economy fare flight to India! You can only accept your prize if you're physically present at the Contemporary India Masterclass, so make sure you bring some photo identification.

You must register by Sunday April the 17th, at 11pm to be eligible for this competition.

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https://events.unimelb.edu.au/events/6395-contemporary-india-master-class

Borderland City in 'New' India: Blood banks, Blockades & Bryan Adams

Venue: Seminar Room, Australia India Institute

Presenters: Dr Duncan McDuie-Ra Professor of Development Studies and Associate Dean Research in the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences

Imphal is a militarised, violent, and frequently dysfunctional city. It is city where military, paramilitary and underground groups compete to control different neighbourhoods, services, and black markets. It is regularly shut down by bandhs and blockades and experiences chronic water shortages and power cuts making it an easy caricature of the ‘troubled periphery’ for the national media and scholars alike. Yet the same city is home to a burgeoning private health sector attracting patients from across internal and international borders. This talk explores this so-called 'health city'; a place of blood banks, cosmetic surgery clinics, and ghost stories carved out of a reserved forest. The success of the health city has radically altered the landscape. The gentrification of the once-anarchical Langol foothills brings Manipur's fraught inter-ethnic politics into the frame as settlers fleeing conflict outside the city face evictions and fight back. Crucially, most of this battle takes place 'off-stage', as it were, while the Indian and Manipuri Governments remain preoccupied with military control of Imphal and its transformation into a gateway city connecting India with Southeast Asia. The health city tells a compelling story of neoliberal India as told from its unruly frontiers.

Duncan McDuie-Ra is Professor of Development Studies and Associate Dean Research in the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences at UNSW, Sydney.

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https://events.unimelb.edu.au/events/6372-borderland-city-in-new-india-blood-banks-blockades-bryan

Immigration and entrepreneurship: narratives of women’s entrepreneurship in the Indian diaspora

Venue: Seminar Room, Australia India Institute

Presenters: Erin Watson-Lynn

Australia has a history of migrants arriving from India dating back to the early 19th century. Today, India is Australia’s largest source of migrants. While some research has explored the experiences of the diaspora in Australia, there is an absence of literature that examines the experiences from the perspective of Indian women. Research demonstrates that for women who have migrated from India to western countries, entrepreneurship enables women to manage family responsibilities, increase their economic capital, and to renegotiate relationships within the family and the broader diaspora community. Additionally, entrepreneurship is one way to overcome ethnic marginalisation in the labour market and subsequent underemployment. However, other research from India and Australia tells us that gender, caste, and class influence women’s motivations to enter self-employment, perceived business outcomes and the everyday experience of entrepreneurship.

The purpose of this talk is to explore immigration and entrepreneurship among first generation migrant women from India. Nine case studies were conducted including a demographic survey, a narrative interview and a field observation. Emerging findings support the propositions that gendered norms and class influence women’s decision to establish an enterprise and its operations.

Erin Watson-Lynn is a Lecturer in Entrepreneurship and Ph.D. Candidate in economic sociology at Monash University.

*A light lunch will be provided, therefore registration is essential!

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https://events.unimelb.edu.au/events/6371-immigration-and-entrepreneurship-narratives-of-women-s-entrepreneurship-in-the-indian

Inspiring India

Venue: Theatre D, Old Arts Building

Presenters: Dr Jane Dyson

Inspire 1. To fill someone with the urge or ability to do or feel something, especially to do something creative. 2. To breathe in, inhale (Oxford English Dictionary Online 2015).

India has always had the capacity to inspire people and ideas. This is true of the ‘old India’ of pre-Independence times and the new India that emerged out of partition in 1947, and of which Nehru spoke so eloquently in his famous speech ‘Freedom at Midnight’. More recently, people within and outside the country have identified India as a place where there are inspiring events occurring, in the economic field, socially, politically and culturally.

This series brings together individuals who have had a dramatic effect on the development of modern India in either the economic, political or cultural spheres and in the areas, for example, of business, government, or civil society. The aim of the series is not only to inform audiences about examples of innovative practice but to inspire them.

Dr Jane Dyson is a Lecturer in the School of Geography, University of Melbourne. She has worked for over a decade in the high Himlayas in India examining gender, work, and social transformation from the perspective of social geography, cultural anthropology and development studies.

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https://events.unimelb.edu.au/events/6370-inspiring-india

What are the social responsibilities of the new networked economy?

Venue: Prest Theatre, FBE Building

Presenters: Professor Rob Phillips

Innovation in the “share” economy through companies like Airbnb and Uber are garnering ever more users and media attention.

Their disruptive models carry significant potential for environmental efficiencies, but the social impacts of their disruptive models have caused governments to look closer at the need for regulation. We continue to struggle, therefore, with how to understand social and moral responsibilities in the relationships these companies have with their stakeholders. The process of value creation is increasingly the result of outsourced commercial relationships. Hierarchies are being replaced by networks of relationships, dissipating and complicating notions of responsibility.

In this public lecture Professor Rob Phillips will take a deeper look at responsibility in the network economy.

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https://events.unimelb.edu.au/events/6360-what-are-the-social-responsibilities-of-the-new-networked-economy

Urban Life in Ancient Mesopotamia

Venue: Laby Theatre, Physics South

Presenters: Professor Paul Zimansky, Professor Elizabeth Stone

The World’s earliest cities are to be found in southern Mesopotamia, initiating an urban tradition that was to last for some four thousand years. The remains of these cities have been the focus of archaeological excavations for more than a century, providing details of their institutional structures and the residences of the broader population, both supplemented by documents written on clay.

Professor Elizabeth Stone and Professor Paul Zimansky have initiated new archaeological excavations at the celebrated southern Mesopotamian city of Ur, where they are employing modern technologies to expand the exploration of a neighborhood of private houses uncovered by Sir Leonard Woolley in the early twentieth century CE.

This lecture will use the data that has resulted from these projects, including Stone and Zimansky's own fieldwork at the cities of Ur and Mashkan-shapir, to describe how people lived some four thousand years ago in what is now modern Iraq.

Elizabeth Stone is a Professor of Anthropology at Stony Brook University, New York. Her research has been directed towards the ways in which urban structures reflect the underlying social, political and economic organization of their civilizations.

Paul Zimansky is a Professor of Ancient History at Stony Brook University, New York. His research concerns are early empires and states of the ancient Near East, particularly how governing institutions influenced the social and economic behaviour of their inhabitants.

IMAGE: Standard of Ur, British Museum

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https://events.unimelb.edu.au/events/6377-urban-life-in-ancient-mesopotamia

Alpha and Omega, or The Boundary of Our Orient

Venue: Theatre A, Elisabeth Murdoch Theatre A

Presenters: Professor Alexander Nagel

Art Historian Professor Alexander Nagel, from the Institute of Fine Arts in New York City, will present a public lecture drawing on his recent research on ideas of Asia and America in Renaissance Europe.

The decades after 1492 brought Asia closer to Europe than it had ever been. The art, cartography, and literature of the period we call the High Renaissance expanded to imagine a new convergence of worlds where East rejoined West and New neighboured Old.

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https://events.unimelb.edu.au/events/6359-alpha-and-omega-or-the-boundary-of-our-orient

Lunar Mission One at Melbourne

Venue: Copland Theatre, Basement, Copland Theatre

Presenters: Mr David Iron

Lunar Mission One is an internationally crowd-funded effort to send an autonomous robotic lander to the Moon’s South Pole in 2024, to perform scientific experiments and leave a time capsule containing a permanent record of humanity. The lander will drill deep into the lunar surface, accessing rock samples up to 4.5 billion years old to reveal secrets about the early days of the solar system, and evaluate local conditions for a permanent manned base. This public lecture by David Iron, will introduce Lunar Mission One and its motivations, the scientific and social importance of the mission and the future of international space exploration.

David Iron is Founder of Lunar Missions Trust and a former Royal Navy Engineering Officer and advisor to national investment institutions, specialising in creating public-private partnerships.

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https://events.unimelb.edu.au/events/6382-lunar-mission-one-at-melbourne

The City of Sorrow: Sexual Violence and the Culture of Impunity in Dimapur

Venue: Seminar Room, Australia India Institute

Presenters: Dr Dolly Kikon

Focusing on women’s testimonies of sexual violence, this talk discusses Dr Kikon's ethnographic experience in Dimapur, the largest city in Nagaland. Dr Kikon traces the everyday experiences of structural violence in militarized societies and examine how they are produced in intimate spaces like the family unit and within the community.

Using the framework of ‘culture of impunity’, a term Dr Kikon borrows from her ethnographic investigation, she explain how there is a direct relationship between the rising cases of sexual violence and the culture of impunity in contemporary India.

By carefully weaving political history, interviews of rape survivors, and the spaces of competing authorities (state and non state actors) in the city of Dimapur, she will assert that women’s testimonies of sexual violence offers us an important lens to track how violence and trauma are alloted values, meanings, rarified, or turned into mundane incidents. Some of the questions Dr Kikon explores in this talk are; how do social relationships, otherwise presumed to be secure and familiar, such as families and kinship networks, become fraught with violence and insecurity? What does the city of Dimapur tell us about militarization, trauma, and violence in contemporary India? These questions, as she will highight in her talk, are significantly connected with issues of governance, citizenship, sovereignty, and justice.

Dr. Dolly Kikon joins the University of Melbourne in the Arts department. Prior to joining Melbourne University, Dr Kikon was a postdoctoral fellow at the Department of Social Anthropology at Stockholm University.

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https://events.unimelb.edu.au/events/6383-the-city-of-sorrow-sexual-violence-and-the-culture-of