Institute Researchers Awarded Australian Research Council Discovery and Linkage Grants

Congratulations to ICS researchers Dr Emma Power, Professor Gay Hawkins, Dr Stephen Healy, Dr Fiona Cameron, Distinguished Professor Ien Ang, Associate Professor Rae Dufty-Jones and their colleagues for their success in the latest rounds of Australian Research Council (ARC) Discovery and Linkage Grants, announced on Friday.

Dr Emma Power will lead a Discovery project exploring shadow care infrastructures in Australia, Professor Gay Hawkins (with fellow ICS researcher Dr Stephen Healy) will lead a Discovery project investigating waste and the circular economy and Dr Fiona Cameron will lead a Linkage project on museums and climate change mitigation. In addition, Distinguished Professor Ien Ang is a researcher on a Linkage project to be administered by UNSW, focusing on developing inclusive regional art museums, and Associate Professor Rae Dufty-Jones is a researcher on a Linkage project to be administered by the University of Wollongong, aiming to generate knowledge for sustainable regional settlement for refugees.

About the projects

Shadow care infrastructures: sustaining life in the post-welfare city

Discovery project

Researchers: Dr Emma Power, Dr Ilan Wiesel (The University of Melbourne), Associate Professor Kathleen Mee (The University of Newcastle)
ARC funding awarded: $362,421

Mounting evidence points to difficulties faced by Australians reliant on government income support in meeting market costs of essential needs. This project investigates whether and how ‘shadow care infrastructures’ – a wide range of formal and informal material and social supports – enable the survival, well-being and flourishing of income support recipients. Focusing on people with disabilities, unemployed and asylum seekers, the study evaluates the benefits and harms such infrastructures produce for those receiving and providing care, and the wider community. It examines risks and opportunities to scale up emerging care infrastructures identified as critical to making ends meet for income support recipients in contemporary cities.

Investigating innovative waste economies: redrawing the circular economy

Discovery project

Researchers: Professor Gay Hawkins, Dr Stephen Healy, Associate Professor Abby Mellick Lopes (UTS and ICS Institute Associate), Dr Ruth Lane (Monash University)
ARC funding awarded: $309,001

Australia is facing a waste crisis and government and industry are promoting the Circular Economy as a solution. This project investigates innovative cultural and economic practices in three waste streams: single use plastics, organics and bulky household waste, to understand how they realise or redraw the circle. The project develops empirical evidence to advance thinking about how novel waste economies are organised and the cultural and social innovations they generate. Outcomes include national and international case studies of innovative waste economies, social learning events with industry stakeholders and academic publications. Key benefits provide evidence of how different waste practices enable more sustainable ways of living.

Curating museum collections for climate change mitigation

Linkage project

Researchers: Dr Fiona Cameron, Professor David Ellsworth (Western Sydney University), Professor Karen Malone (Swinburne University of Technology), Dr Deborah Lawler-Dormer and Adjunct Associate Professor Mark Hughes (Museum of Applied Arts and Sciences), Professor Rosi Braidotti (Utrecht University, Netherlands)
Partner organisations: Museum of Applied Arts and Sciences, Swinburne University of Technology, Utrecht University, Netherlands
ARC funding awarded: $520,582

The project aims to investigate how museum collections, many of which have histories entangled in Australia’s high emission sectors that supported the nation’s economic growth, can be curated to support climate change mitigation. Drawing together the disciplines of biogeochemistry, museology, environmental humanities, Indigenous knowledge and education, the project anticipates enhancing the Museum of Applied Arts and Sciences' capacity for climate action through innovative programs. Its benefits include developing new collections-based climate research which incorporate the perspectives of multi-stakeholders, including Indigenous Australians, and builds museums' capacity to grow public climate literacy.

Settling well: a longitudinal study of refugees in regional Australia

Linkage project (administered by University of Wollongong)

Researchers: Associate Professor Natascha Klocker (University of Wollongong), Associate Professor Rae Dufty-Jones, Dr Paul Hodge (The University of Newcastle), Dr Celia McMichael (University of Melbourne), Dr Karen Block (University of Melbourne), Ms Margaret Piper (Western Sydney University Humanitarian and Development Research Initiative (HADRI)), Dr Olivia Dun (University of Wollongong)
Partner organisations: Department of Home Affairs, AMES Australia, Australian Red Cross Society, Multicultural NSW, Multicultural Australia Ltd
ARC funding awarded: $1,115,069

Regional humanitarian settlement is a key priority across all levels of government in Australia. This study aims to provide the first longitudinal assessment of the impacts of regional settlement for humanitarian migrants and destination communities. Its innovative, mixed-method and multi-sited approach will generate new knowledge of the opportunities and challenges for sustainable regional settlement. Expected outcomes include enhanced community, organisational and government decision-making capacity. By guiding end-users’ current and future actions, the study has strong potential to support the wellbeing of humanitarian migrants and to contribute to healthy and resilient regional communities.

Diversifying Australian regional art museums

Linkage project (administered by UNSW)

Researchers: Dr Verónica Tello (UNSW), Distinguished Professor Ien Ang, Ms Salote Tawale (The University of Sydney)
Partner organisation: Murray Art Museum Albury
ARC funding awarded: $338,927

Regional art museums need to diversify to maintain relevance to the communities they serve as these communities are increasingly Culturally and Linguistically Diverse (CALD) resulting from humanitarian resettlement programs. However, their strategies are limited to diversifying audiences rather than including CALD people in leadership positions in the museum. Working with the Murray Art Museum Albury, situated in Albury-Wodonga, this project creates a new museological method to generate structural change, training future CALD cultural leaders and prototyping an inclusive museum. It proposes that regional art museums, embedded in sites with shifting populations, are able to lead structural diversification in Australian art.

Further information

• ARC Discovery Projects announcements (opens in a new window)
• ARC Linkage Projects announcements (opens in a new window)

Posted: 16 November 2020.