Dr Siobhan McDonnell
Research interests
I am a Legal Anthropologist who engages in applied work in Indigenous Australia and the Pacific around climate change, land rights and gender.
My commitment to the practice of engaged anthropology means that I produce research that contributes to high-impact policy and legal outcomes.
I am currently engaged in the following research projects: (1) issues related to gender and climate change in Oceania; (2) displacement and resettlement in the context of climate change and disaster; (3) disaster responses and planning in the Pacific; and, (4) how to adapt the family law system to better meet the needs of Indigenous, refugee and migrant families.
Biography
Career Highlights:
- Lead drafting committee negotiator for the Republic of Vanuatu on climate change and regional political issues (West Papua) in various regional and international forums (2019-2020).
- Chief Investigator on the evaluation of a $8.25 million project looking at the use of family dispute resolution in the context of family violence in Indigenous and refugee families (2017-2020);
- Chief Investigator on an ARC Discovery Project on Climate Change and Gender in the Pacific (2018- 2021);
- Awarded the Australian Anthropology prize for the best thesis in Anthropology in Australia (2017);
- Awarded the Gender Institute prize for the thesis that most contributed to the advancement of gender studies (2017);
- Chief Investigator on a project for the Solomon Islands Government to develop a land reform pathway (2015);
- Principal drafter of a new set of land laws in Vanuatu, as well as amendments to the Constitution of the Republic of Vanuatu (2013-14);
- Legal/policy advisor Central Land Council (2003-2008);
- Project Manager Reconciliation Australia (2001-2003);
- Research Officer Centre for Aboriginal Economic Policy Research (1999-2003).
Researcher's projects
Dr Siobhan McDonnell is currently working on projects in Indigenous Australia and the Pacific including:
- Climate change and gender in the Pacific;
- Displacement and resettlement in the context of climate change, disaster and eviction;
- Land reform and indigenous land rights in the Pacific and Indigenous Australia;
- Use of family dispute resolution processes amongst Indigenous, refugee and migrant families who have experienced violence;
- Concepts of 'resilience' and 'vulnerability' in the context of disaster management in the Pacific; and,
- The practice of activist research.
Current student projects
- Maeve Powell. Indigenous Wellbeing in Urban Spaces: expressing voice through walking and photography in Canberra (PhD Primary Supervisor).
- Evie Rose. Not drowning, fighting: geopolitics, gender and the rising tides of climate change diplomacies in Ocenaia. (PhD Primary Supervisor).
- Kathy Jetnil-Kijiner. Thesis title TBD. (PhD Co-supervisor).
- Sarou Long. The Indigenous Communal Land Title Programme in Cambodia: Indigenous Identity, and Relationships to Land and State (PhD Panel Member).
- Jade Anderson. Migrant? Refugee? Neither? Both? “Mixed Migration” and the Production of Difference in Human Mobility (PhD Panel Member).
- Almah Tararia. Women's political participation and decison-making in New Ireland, PNG (PhD Panel Member).
- Sam Provost. Challenging the cadastre: counter-mapping Yuin landscapes to reinscribe Country (PhD Panel Member).
Past student projects
Completed students:
- Ed Wensing. Decolonising Property: How Indigenous and Settler systems of land ownerhsip, use and tenure can coexist in parity (PhD Thesis, Panel Chair).
- Evie Rose. Undervalued, Not Underwater: A Talanoa on Climate Change in Oceania (Honours Thesis, Primary supervisor). Subsequently awarded the Gender Institute prize.
- Méabh Cryan. Report on ‘Property, State Land and Lisan: Assembling the Land and the State in Post-Independence Timor-Leste’. (Joint Primary supervisor).
- Emily Crawford. 'A gender analysis of food security and food sovereignty in Vanuatu: potential pathways for a multi-vocal approach in changing climate'.
Publications
- McDonnell, S 2019, 'Other Dark Sides of Resilience: Politics and Power in Community-Based Efforts to Strengthen Resilience [IN PRESS]', Anthropological Forum, vol. Online.
- McDonnell, S 2018, 'Selling "Sites of Desire": Paradise in Reality Television, Tourism, and Real Estate Promotion in Vanuatu', The Contemporary Pacific, vol. 30, no. 2, pp. 413-436.
- McDonnell, S 2018, 'Cartographies of Power: Book review of Becoming Landowners by Victoria Stead', Postcolonial Studies, vol. 21, no. 1, pp. 1-3.
- McDonnell, S & Dodson, M 2018, 'Race, citizenship and military service', in Joan Beaumont and Allison Cadzow (ed.), Serving our country: indigenous Australians, war, defence and citizenship, NewSouth Publishing, Sydney, pp. 23-52.
- Fogarty, W, Bulloch, H & McDonnell, S 2018, Deficit Discourse and Indigenous Health: How narrative framings of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people are reproduced in policy. Lowitja Insitute: Melbourne. ISBN: 978-1-921889-54-7.
- McDonnell, S 2017, 'Urban Land Grabbing by Political Elites: Exploring the Political Economy of Land and the Challenges of Regulations', in Siobhan McDonnell, Matthew G. Allen, Colin Filer (ed.), Kastom, Property and Ideology: Land Transformations in Melanesia, ANU ePress, Canberra, pp. 283-304.
- McDonnell, S, Allen, M & Filer, C (ed.) 2017, Kastom, Property and Ideology: Land Transformations in Melanesia, ANU Press, Canberra.
- Filer, C, McDonnell, S & Allen, M 2017, 'Powers of Exclusion in Melanesia', in Siobhan McDonnell, Matthew G. Allen, Colin Filer (ed.), Kastom, Property and Ideology: Land Transformations in Melanesia, ANU Press, Canberra, pp. 1-56.
- Dodson, M & McDonnell, S 2017, 'Indigenous People as linked to Place, the Race power in the Tasmanian Dam Case', in Michael Coper; Heather Roberts; James Stellios (ed.), The Tasmanian Dam Case 30 Years On: An Enduring Legacy, The Federation Press, Australia NSW.
- Dodson, M & McDonnell, S 2016, Why did they serve? Facing entrenched discrimination in Australia, why did black diggers still enlist to serve their country?, pp. 10-16pp.
- McDonnell, S 2015, ''The Land Will Eat You': Land and Sorcery in North Efate, Vanuatu', in Miranda Forsyth and Richard Eves (ed.), Talking it Through: Responses to Sorcery and Witchcraft Beliefs and Practices in Melanesia, ANU Press, Canberra, Australia, pp. 137-160.
- McDonnell, S 2015, Vanuatu embraces landmark reforms, East Asia Forum pp. 1-3.
- McDonnell, S 2015, Dirty Politics in Vanuatu, Fairfax Media 14 October 2015.
- McDonnell, S. 2015, Building a Pathway for successful land reform in the Solomon Islands. A report prepared for the Solomon Islands Government. pp. 1-82.
- McDonnell, S 2015, 100 days since Cyclone Pam, people across Vanuatu pause to reflect on loss and resilience, The Conversation. pp. 1-4.
- McDonnell, S 2014, 'Tax Havens and Sovereignty in the Pacific Islands by Anthony B Van Fossen (review)', The Contemporary Pacific, vol. 26, no. 2, pp. 563-566.
- Allen, M, McDonnell, S & Filer, C 2014, 'For Sale: Analysis of exclusion of people from land in Melanesia and directions forward'. Working Paper, SSGM.
- McDonnell, S 2013, 'Exploring the Cultural Power of Land Law in Vanuatu: Law as a Performance that Creates Meaning and Identities', Intersections: Gender and Sexuality in Asia and the Pacific, vol. Online, no. 33, pp. 1-15.
- Altman, J, McDonnell, S & Ward, S 2002, 'A review of the literature', in Jon Altman and Sally Ward (ed.), Competition and Consumer Issues for Indigenous Australians, Australian Competition and Consumer Commission, Canberra, pp. 6-24.
- McDonnell, S & Martin, D 2002, 'Indigenous community stores in the frontier economy', in Jon Altman and Sally Ward (ed.), Competition and Consumer Issues for Indigenous Australians, Australian Competition and Consumer Commission, Canberra, pp. 25-63.
- McDonnell, S & Martin, D 2002, 'Possible breaches of the TPA', in Jon Altman and Sally Ward (ed.), Competition and Consumer Issues for Indigenous Australians, Australian Competition and Consumer Commission, Canberra, pp. 152-155.
- McDonnell, S 2001, 'Giving credit where its due: The operation of micro-credit models in an Indigenous Australian context', Indigenous Law Bulletin, vol. 5, no. 12, pp. 6-9.
Projects and Grants
Grants information is drawn from ARIES. To add or update Projects or Grants information please contact your College Research Office.
- Engendering Climate Change, Reframing Futures In Oceania (Secondary Investigator)
- LACADR Evaluation (Primary Investigator)
- Land in Solomon Islands: Pathways to Reform (Primary Investigator)
