In celebration of NAIDOC Week 2023, the Melbourne Graduate School of Education (MGSE) is delighted to welcome Professor Barry Judd, Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Indigenous), to present a special Dean’s Lecture on Monday 3rd July:
As the Referendum on the Indigenous Voice to Parliament approaches later in the year, Judd reflects on the role formal education has played in shaping the ongoing relationship between Indigenous peoples and settler-colonial Australians.
Drawing on his own experiences, Judd asks if formal education in Australia has worked to facilitate mature national debate on issues like the Voice proposal or whether it has in fact hindered and undermined such possibilities.
These questions go to the heart of the assertion by legal academic, Megan Davis, that Indigenous Australia continues to remain unknown to settler-colonial Australia. As well as the related refrain of Australian historian, Henry Reynolds, when pondering contemporary ignorance of the Australian past and the place of Indigenous Australia within this history, Why weren’t we told? (2000).
Judd critically discusses why formal education in Australia continues to be a largely unhelpful “friend” to Indigenous Australia in the task of overcoming the mistruths and misrepresentations that continue to characterise discussion and debate about the place Indigenous people occupy or should occupy in Australian society.
Please note: In the event that this lecture reaches venue capacity we will require a change of venue within the University of Melbourne, Parkville campus. Keep an eye out for communications!
Join us at 5.30pm for registration and refreshments.
Lecture commences at 6.00pm.
Registration is essential.
Professor Judd is Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Indigenous)
Director of the Indigenous Studies Program in the School of Culture and Communication at the University of Melbourne.
