Mr Peter Phipps

Position	Lecturer
School / Work Unit	Global Studies, Social Science &Planning
Contact Details	+(61 3) 9925 2039 peter.phipps@rmit.edu.au
Location	Building: 37 Level: 5 Room: 20 City Campus
Portfolio	Design & Social Context

"Peter Phipps"

Peter Phipps is a Research Project Manager with the Globalism Institute at RMIT where he has been since 2000 as a key member of the research team that established the Institute. He is the Honours Program Co-ordinator and a lecturer in the BA International Studies Program, responsible for co-ordination and delivery of four courses and supervision of a number of honours theses. He is the Research Project Manager (International) for the Local-Global Community Sustainability Project, as well as a number of smaller projects. He is currently completing a PhD on the cultural politics of postcolonial theory and is engaged in research on questions of community sustainability. Other research interests include the history of theory in anthropology, global tourism, transnational religious movements and Indigenous-settler relations in Australia. He has co-rdinated twelve local and international conferences and forums including the annual Garma Forum of Indigenous Knowledge in Arnhem Land (Northern Territory, Australia) from 2002. His essay ‘Tourism and Terrorism: An Intimate Equivalence’ was updated as a ‘classic essay in the anthropology of tourism’ in Sharon Gmelch, ed., Tourists and Tourism: A Reader, Waveland Press, Illinois, 2004, pp. 71-90.

Qualifications

BA Hons (first class combined honours in Politics and Anthropology)

Work responsibilities

Honours Program Co-ordinator and Lecturer, International Studies
Research Project Manager (Global), Community Sustainability
Research Project Manager, VRII Project Negotiating Local/ Global Tensions: Building Sustainable Communities, 2004-2006
Project manager, Pathways to Reconciliation and Global Human Rights Conference, Sarajevo
Co-convenor, Garma Forum of Indigenous Knowledge, Arnhem Land, 2005
Co-ordinator, The Two Fires Conference of Arts and Activism, 2005
Steering Committee, The Fifth International Conference on Diversity in Organisations, Communities and Nations, Institute of Ethnic Administrators, Beijing 2005
Steering Committee, The International Conference on Environmental, Cultural, Economic and Social Sustainability, East West Centre, University of Hawai’i 2005
Editor, International Journal of Environmental, Cultural, Economic and Social Sustainability, vol. 1, 2005, Common Ground Publishing, Altona
Associate Editor, International Journal of Diversity in Organisations, Communities and Nations, vol. 3, 2005, Common Ground Publishing, Altona
Editorial Board, Local-Global: Studies in Community Sustainability, RMIT, Melbourne

Research Interests

postcolonial perspectives on globalization, nationalism, and modernity in Australia, South and South-East Asia
Indigenous-Settler relations in Australia
Community sustainability
Transnational cultural and intellectual flows and religious movements
The cultural politics of postcolonial theory, cultural studies and the ‘culture wars’
History of theory in anthropology
Anthropology of tourism
South Asian studies

Research Projects, Consultancy

I am currently completing a PhD on the comparative cultural politics of postcolonial theory, comparing the ways these ideas have been taken up in the USA and Australia, and considering how these theoretical and historical debates in academia intersect with broader, public political struggles such as the ‘culture wars’ in the USA and the ‘history wars’ in Australia. I am engaged in research on questions of community sustainability in Australia and internationally. As the project manager of this large three-year project I take a co-ordinating role in this research, but I am also directly engaged with community-based research in Arnhem Land, Honolulu, Sarajevo and the Tibetan region of Amdo in the Chinese province of Qinghai.

Another broad, related research interest has been the history of theory in anthropology. This is concerned with historicizing the ways in which Western social science represents culture, in particular (but not exclusively) the cultures of non-Western or non-modern people. While the history of anthropological practice is associated with many of the abuses of colonialism, there have been strong strands of anti-colonial thought running through the discipline as well. One of the key questions for contemporary social science trying to move away from a model of research fieldwork as ‘knowledge extraction’ to a model which respects the agency of individuals and communities is what forms of reciprocity or community engagement are possible in such research relationships.

I have co-ordinated twelve local and international conferences and forums including the annual Garma Forum of Indigenous Knowledge in Arnhem Land (Northern Territory, Australia) for the past three years. Please see the Globalism Institute website for details of these and other projects.

A list of recent projects follows:

Project Manager, Fourth International Reconciliation and Human Rights Conference, Sarajevo, 2005
Forum Partner Co-ordinator (with Charles Darwin University), Seventh Annual Garma Festival , Key Forum (Sustaining Cultural Livelihoods) for Yothu Yindi Foundation, North East Arnhem Land August 2005
Research Project Manager (Global), Community Sustainability
Project Manager, VRII project Negotiating Local/ Global Tensions: Building Sustainable Communities, 2004-2006
Conference Co-ordinator, Two Fires Conference of Arts and Activism, Braidwood NSW, March 2005
Forum Co-ordinator, Sixth Annual Garma Festival, Key Forum (Indigenous Livelihoods) for Yothu Yindi Foundation, North East Arnhem Land August 2004
Forum Co-ordinator, Fifth Annual Garma Festival Key Forum (Dhuni: Indigenous Arts and Culture), For Yothu Yindi Foundation, North East Arnhem Land August 2003
Forum Co-ordinator, Tibetan Refugees in Australia, RMIT May 2003
Consultant, Cultural Diversity in a Globalising World: Third International Diversity Conference, Hawai’i February 2003, Los Angeles 2004
Assistant co-ordinator, After September 11th: Religion Diversity and Social Cohesion under Globalisation Conference, RMIT September 2002
Forum Co-ordinator, Fourth Annual Garma Festival Key Forum (Djakamirri Wangawu: Indigenous People and the Environment), For Yothu Yindi Foundation, North East Arnhem Land August 2002
Project manager, Fourth National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Visual Arts Conference, Adelaide 2002. http://indigenousvisualarts.com
Project manager, Indigenous Peoples and Racism Conference, Sydney, 2001. http://racismconference.com
Co-ordinator, with Chris Ziguras, What Next? A Forum on Asylum Seekers, September 2001
Co-ordinator, Forum, The Afghan Tragedy: 23 Years of Night, October 2001.
Consultant Researcher, Creator to Consumer, Print and Publishing in the Age of Digital Technology, for Department of Industry, Science and Technology, 2001-2.

Publications

Book Chapters:

‘Michel Leiris: Master of Ethnographic Failure’, in J. Hutnyk and Rao, eds, Celebrating Transgression as Method in Anthropology: Essays in Honour of Klaus Peter Köpping, Berghahn, Berlin, forthcoming 2005.

‘Tourism and Terrorism: An Intimate Equivalence’, in S. Gmelch, ed., Tourists and Tourism: A Reader, Waveland Press, Illinois, 2004, pp. 71-90.

with Jonathan Wearne, ‘Print, Publishing and Indigenous Australia’ in Bill Cope and Rod Brown, eds, Value Chain Clustering in Regional Publishing Service Markets, Common Ground Publishing, Altona, 2002, pp.

‘Tourists, Terrorists, Death and Value’, in Hutnyk and Kaur, eds, Travel Worlds: Journeys in Contemporary Cultural Politics, Zed Books, London, 1999, pp. 74-93

Journal Articles:

‘Community Sustainability Research: The Challenge of Reciprocity’, International Journal of Environmental, Cultural, Economic and Social Sustainability, vol. 1, forthcoming 2005.

‘Is Capitalism Hybrid Now? Hybrid Identities and Cosmopolitan Community in an Age of Intensified Global Capital’, International Journal of Diversity in Organisations, Communities and Nations, vol. 1, forthcoming 2005

with Des Cahill, ‘After September 11th: Religion, Diversity and Social Cohesion Under Globalisation’, Australian Religious Studies Review, vol. 16, no. 2, 2003, pp. 8-18.

“Tourorists”, Left Curve, no. 23, 1999, pp.

Conference Papers

‘The Postcolonial Struggle in Australia: Reports on Reconciliation in Remote Places’ at The Fifth International Conference on Diversity in Organisations, Communities and Nations, Institute of Ethnic Administrators, Beijing, China, 30 June to 3 July 2005 (submitted)

‘How a Gubba becomes a Balanda: Reports on Identity from Garma, Arnhem Land’ at the Two Fires Conference of Arts and Activism, Braidwood, NSW, March 2005.

‘Reflections on Community Sustainability’ at The International Conference on Environmental, Cultural, Economic and Social Sustainability, East West Centre, University of Hawai’i, February 2005. (refereed)

“Postcolonialism: The ideology of the global intelligentsia?” at the annual Asian Studies Association of Australia conference, Sydney, 1998.

Journal Editorships

Editor, International Journal of Environmental, Cultural, Economic and Social Sustainability, vol. 1, 2005, Common Ground Publishing, Altona.

Associate Editor International Journal of Diversity in Organisations, Communities and Nations, vol. 3, 2005, Common Ground Publishing, Altona.

Editorial Board, Local-Global: Studies in Community Sustainability, RMIT, Melbourne.

Editor (with Adam Possamai), Australian Religion Studies Review, Special Edition, vol. 16, no. 2, 2003.