Spr in g 2008 SAMSydney Alumni Magazine

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Regulars Editor Diana Simmonds Features The University of Sydney, 4 Letters Alumni Relations Office Room K6.06, Quadrangle A14, NSW 2006 6 Introduction You write, we publish Phone (61 2) 9036 6372 Q&A with Vice-Chancellor Dr Michael Spence 8 Nota Bene Fax (61 2) 9351 6868 Email Jane Foss Russell commemorated; [email protected] 17 Art Les Murray inspired; Outback Contributors Shaun Gladwell, video artist adventure remembered; hearing Jason Blake (sub editor), Anabel Dean, impairment researched; musical Lucy Howard-Taylor, Helen McKenzie, achievements reported Robert Mills, Alison Muir, Les Murray, 18 Health Richard North, Geraldine O’Brien, Dr Patricia Weerakoon: sex therapist Maggie Renvoize, Chris Rodley, Kelly 30 Books Royds, Ted Sealey, Richard So, Prudence 20 Cover Story God, Actually by Roy Williams; Upton, Linda Vergnani, Oscar Ware, Paul Death Among the Vines by Richard Wright, Jeremy Yao The cost of higher education is more than dollars and cents Young; Fragments From a Forgettory Editorial Advisory Committee by Doug Buckley; Rainbow by SAM the Sydney Alumni Magazine is Jennifer Horsfield; Globalisation and supported by an Editorial Advisory 24 Mental Health the Western Legal Tradition by David Committee. Its members are Kathy To anorexia and back Goldman; Solomon Island Years by Bail, editor Australian Financial Review James Tedder magazine, David Marr (LLB ’71) Sydney 26 Philosophy Morning Herald, Andrew Potter, Media Lord (Robert) May on almost Manager, University of Sydney, Susan 38 Grapevine Skelly, Editor, ACP Magazines, Helen everything Stay in touch Trinca, editor, Weekend Australian magazine. 34 Architecture 40 Diary Published quarterly by the University Wendy Lewin and the Venice Events and other notables of Sydney. Biennale Publishing Management 10 group 36 Sport Level 1, 30 Wilson St, Ultimate Frisbee, the secret new (PO Box 767), Newtown NSW 2042. team sport www.10group.com.au Publisher Paul Becker Design Wendy Neill Printing PMP Limited Cover photo David Gould / Getty Images Advertising Enquiries Janet Clark [email protected] mobile 0404 112 641 ph (61 2) 9550 1021

Member of the Circulation Audit Board Audited Circulation 148,263 copies

SAM Spring 08 3 letters

long-term, historical link between always be preceded by a semicolon; Leaflets and brochure are tempting the people of the highlands of Yemen however the debate is out. to retain but there I discipline

L >C I:G '%%- and those of the highlands of the myself, valiantly. As for pics and Martin Coote (BMus ’04) SAMSydney Alumni Magazine Darfu Region, resulting in high reviews on tropical and way-out North Rocks, NSW terracing for moisture collection- locations – the collection is growing. conservation in dryland agriculture Never a cross word Keep clipping Matthew, being common to both areas. I understand in fellowship, Unfortunately, the introduction I read SAM from cover to cover. scissors and serendipity. of tractors, with poor matching of Enjoyed the article about Professor My research also continues, tractor power, implements and Gavin Brown (Winter ’08). avidly, behind closed doors. cultivation methods to the land Astonished and thrilled that he likes management needs of the terraces, Anna B Rasztabiga (BA ’05) compiling crosswords. Wouldn’t it Leichhardt, NSW has resulted in the destruction be wonderful if he could compile of large areas of terracing that a regular crossword for SAM? To infinitively split took hundreds or thousands of I migrated from Germany in 1960 beyond 2020 s art s books s science s people >HHC&-()"(.(, years to construct. Repair of the with little English. A wise teacher Thanks for the issues of SAM 12039_SAM_Winter08_CVR.indd 1 16/5/08 2:00:40 PM systems has not been a priority. told me to never stop learning new which are now beginning to reach Tony O’Brien (BScAgr ’56) words. Crosswords are a fun way to me and which I’m enjoying. You might remember that I Inspirational Rees Sippy Downs, Qld do so, even at the age of 72. Here’s discovered the existence of SAM hoping for a crossword in SAM. Edward Duyker (SAM Autumn) has Parenthetically only recently among the reading reminded us how much we owe to speaking Ilse Harris (DipMusTeach ’91) matter of the local fish and chip shop Lloyd Rees. He was an inspirational Narrabeen, NSW in Yass and, on inquiry, found that teacher and many of his works are Re: Letters, Autumn ’08. Contrary to the son of the owner is a graduate now in the University collection. Yvonne Maley’s belief (impressively Professor Brown’s first crossword of the University. I’m in touch with But there is something further, backed up with the heavyweights of (cryptic and devilish) will appear you as a result of takeaway food. often overlooked, for which we have English usage), the word “however” in the Summer issue of SAM! Your correspondents are, by and to thank him. With his discerning has ceased to require a full stop and large, interesting and amusing, but eye for architectural detail, he new sentence. These days, it is more Snip go the scissors some of them are also extraordinarily commissioned statues for the niches likely to be used following a comma, precious and would have more tears that stood empty on either side of if the context allows. That is usually Re the article “I clip therefore I to shed about a split infinitive than the the great window of the eastern when the “however” supplies an am” by Matthew Gibbs. I relate certain news of the end of the world. end of the Great Hall. This was not immediate converse aspect within to his condition wholeheartedly. I suppose that an Editor uncommon at the time of the Hall’s the one statement. (Although it must Great to know there is another should publish the significant construction, where parts were be acknowledged that this is a more clipper out there! Occasionally I correspondence received, but I think deliberately left unfinished, to be casual application.) Lynne Truss cull, but do not recycle clippings. that you could almost establish a exploited by later generations. (author of Eats, Shoots and Leaves) I consider material on unusual “Pedants’ Corner” in SAM where Rees wanted representations further proposes that “however” topics too difficult to discard. the more nit-picking material you of the Arts and the Sciences and he turned to Tom Bass who, for the Arts, chose a female figure in the act of singing, and for the Sciences, a male figure, shaping an idea with his hands. They were unveiled in 1984. Si monumentum requiris, circumspice. RL Tindall (BA ‘72) Whistler, British Columbia

Other African terraces Though I thoroughly enjoyed the article Modernising Madagascar (Autumn ’08), I was saddened to see so little mention of the vast land degradation, loss of habitat and species extinction that is the hallmark of “modern” Madagascar. There is one point with which I would quibble. Madagascar is not the only African nation that has terrace agriculture. The Darfu (Darfur) area of Sudan has historical terrace agriculture that may go back to the time of the Queen of Sheba, or earlier. There has been a close,

4 SAM Spring 08 Letters to the editor Letters to the editor should include: full name, address (not for publication), degree(s) and year(s) of graduation where applicable, daytime phone number and/or email address. Please address your letters to: The Editor SAM K6.06 Quadrangle A14 University of Sydney NSW 2006 Letters may also be sent electronically (with full contact details) to: [email protected] Opinions expressed in the pages of the magazine are those of the signed contributors or the editor and do not necessarily represent the official position of the University of Sydney. Space permits only a selection of letters to be published Cartoons by Maggie Renvoize here. Letters may be edited by the editor for space or other reasons. receive might be located in a special Judgment Justified Preferred spelling spelling should be used. For verbs place and such little gems as the ending in –ize or –ise and their “CAM vs SAM” from David Cameron, “Consider what you think justice Tony Stockwell (Letters, Autumn derivatives, the forms in –ize, “F’R Instance” from Yon Maley, requires, and decide accordingly; 2008) asks what readers and the -ization, etc. (e.g., civilize, civilization) “Unacceptable Homophonia” from for your judgment will probably be Department of English think of are preferred.” The Oxford Guide to Gillian Varcoe, and “Illumination right, but your reasons will certainly the desirability or otherwise of Style endorses this policy as well. Snuffed” from Laura Jilka could be be wrong”. - William Murray, the use of the word “medieval” (Disclosure: I am a native of separated out from credible letters Earl of Mansfield (1705-1793) rather than his preferred the United States, but I am now such as Jim Sibree’s “Verraux What is the difference “mediaeval” in the magazine and an Australian citizen —and I spell and Sibree”, Steve Howard’s between the regimes of Saddam the university at large. He seems both ways with pleasure.) “Political Flicks” and “Lucid Latin Hussein and Robert Mugabe? concerned about what he calls the Dr Lawrence Warner Lovers” from Susan Ryan. Both of them imposed immense “Americanisation” of the university. Lecturer of Middle English You do deserve, however, suffering, arguably genocide, upon If so, then so too have the Department of English to be corrected as you were their own people. Why then did universities of Leeds, Bristol, University of Sydney, NSW in Michael Neustein’s “Wrong Hussein end up on the gallows, Nottingham, York, Reading, Glasgow, Humanist” but he did it with while Mugabe, basking in his Wales (Bangor), Oxford, and grace and without petulance. own infamy, was permitted to Cambridge, together with the British I think the quality of your articles lecture world leaders at the Food Academy, cause for concern: all have is excellent and I read them with Summit in Rome, blaming them centres (not “centers”), institutes, pleasure and without a red pen in for all the ills of his country? schools, or internet portals devoted my hand. And, as a closet “clipper” And to add insult to injury, the to “medieval” studies. (The University myself, I particularly enjoyed “I clip world leaders were listening to this of St Andrews is the hold-out, therefore I am” by Matthew Gibbs. monster, without any sign of outrage, preferring “mediaeval,” which Keep up the good work, Editor. like mischievous schoolchildren, comes across these days as an I’m looking forward to the next scolded by the headmaster. archaism that perhaps is assumed issue of SAM. The difference is, of course, appropriate to the subject matter.) Not receiving our Brian Millett (MA ’77), that there is about one third of the Mr Stockwell might also be monthly electronic Yass, NSW known world crude oil reserves in interested to know of such policies newsletter – eSydney? Iraq, but there is none in Zimbabwe. of British publishers as this, from Prof. Aleksander Samarin, the Modern Humanities Research Simply email us at (MEng ’75) Association Style Guide, item 2.1, [email protected] Rhodes, NSW “Preferred Spellings”: “British

SAM Spring 08 5 The view

Q&A from the Quad

Dr Michael Spence, the University’s new Vice-Chancellor, answers questions from Richard North

Did you have any reservations What has changed at Sydney University can increase the number of buildings Qabout coming back to Sydney? since you were a student here? and the number of academics. The trick with doing the latter is making No I didn’t. The University The university sector has changed sure that you do all things well when Ais a great institution and it’s a beyond recognition, and it’s very both physical infrastructure and clever wonderful city – and my children said hard to distinguish what has changed people are scarce resources. The trick they would leave home if I didn’t let at Sydney in particular. I think the with doing the former is making sure my name go forward for the job! sector is now full of people whom that the books still balance. I would call the ‘elect remnant’. How is the University perceived Forty years ago it didn’t make much What will be on the top of your agenda at internationally? difference whether you were a lawyer, your first meeting with the government? a doctor or an academic. But in a There is no doubt that Sydney is seen resource-constrained environment, I will want to talk about the funding internationally as a very high quality where life for academics is sometimes of research and about the role of research university. Ironically, if I quite tough, you do it because you are universities in innovation. I think have encountered uncertainty about passionate about it. I think that makes we need to make it clear that having Sydney’s international standing, it the university a more exciting place to research funded by cross subsidies has been here within the University work in than it has ever been before, from the funding of teaching is not rather than overseas. But there is an because people have a passion and smart. People have a tendency to enormous amount to be proud of a commitment to the university and think of Australia as a very clever here, and to trumpet to the rest of the have made sacrifices to work here. nation, but they talk about Victa world. mowers built in garages and not about It’s obviously a much bigger university the important role of universities How intimidating was the interview now than when you were a student. in the innovation process. I also process? Can we just keep growing and growing? think that the importance of what is sometimes called “lone scholar” Well, I had three telephone I think at the moment we have a research, or “pen and paper” research interviews from Oxford, a formal choice. We either have to radically — research in the natural sciences, interview with the Chancellor, two restructure ourselves and recognise humanities and social sciences that is interviews with different groups that the universities that do really well never going to attract large research from the selection committee, a on the league tables are working from grants — is inadequately understood. presentation and interview with a wholly different model of a research I want to encourage the government to invest in research across the the whole committee, and another university and from a wholly different range of the disciplines and to think telephone interview after I returned resource base; or, what I would rather about the variety of ways in which to Oxford. They took references from do, we have to affirm our dual mission it should fund university research, the Vice-Chancellor at Oxford, from as both a fine research university and particularly excellent research. But at least three other vice-chancellors a large comprehensive state education the government will also want to ask of UK universities, from almost all of provider and attempt to perform that me about social inclusion and I think the pro-vice chancellors at Oxford, more challenging dual role as well as there are real issues to be faced at from the administrator in my office, we can. Sydney around that question. I’m not and from about six of the heads of As to size, I don’t want to halve sure that the University reflects the faculties working in my division. I the size of the place as it has been diversity of the city, and I think that’s understand that they talked to other suggested that I do, but I think that a problem. people as well. It was quite a process, growth for the sake of growth is not and if they have made a mistake, they desirable. Every faculty I go to says have at least made it thoughtfully! I that the buildings are groaning and have to say, though, that I enjoyed the that academic staff are teaching more whole thing. It was a very interesting hours than God gives. Well, you can group of people to meet. cut the number of students or you 6 SAM Spring 08 students, particularly international Are you planning to teach? students, and that has to be a strategic challenge facing the University. I’d like to – I taught in my last job when my diary was full from 8 o’clock What can academics expect under in the morning until late at night. But your leadership? I also want to keep up my research and it may be a bit hubristic to try and I will count my time at Sydney a fit all that in, as well as being a father success if the University is performing to my five children and a partner to well on all the standard metrics, but my wife. also if it is a place over which working academics feel a sense of ownership What’s your style of leadership? On your and where they can participate in first day in the office will you be in a suit decisions about the strategic direction or a sports jacket? the University is taking. Harnessing the creativity of academic staff in I wear a suit or shorts – they’re my What are your thoughts on our Dr Michael Spence: strategic agenda setting for the a critical friend sartorial choices. international policy? University is crucial. The University should be a kind of At your first function a waiter approaches In percentage terms we have federation of self-governing academic you with a tray of beer, wine and orange more international students communities. It would be foolish juice. What do you choose? at undergraduate level than at for me, or for any other university postgraduate level, and it is not apparatchik, to attempt to dictate the Orange juice. I like to keep my wits immediately intuitive that that is the agenda for individual faculties and about me. I spent a lot of my time right balance. What we need to do is schools. Faculties and schools should in my last job rattling the can for the recruit more high quality international set their own strategic agenda. And university and I just think it’s good to graduates and that’s going to be to do that, they need to understand be pretty sharp at social functions. increasingly difficult as the major clearly what resources they earn, universities around the world invest where they come from, and to have As one of the perks of your new job you get a lot of money in international some control over how they are spent. offered tickets for the football and tickets postgraduate recruitment and training But there remains a crucial role for the theatre on the same night. Which do – particularly in North America for the central university. First, it you go to? where postgraduate students and should act as a “critical friend”, a kind postdoctoral researchers are seen of financial and academic auditor. It If I were offered tickets I would want not so much as cash cows but as the should ask faculties or schools why to make sure that it was in a context university of the future in which we they are about to send us broke, in which it was proper to receive have to invest. The range of options and also ask people why they are them! But I would rather go to the for international students is growing not publishing or not publishing theatre. all the time and the competition is in high quality outlets. Second, it stronger and stronger. I want to make should work to co-ordinate the whole Much has been made of your faith. Are you sure we bring the most able students so that we operate together as a going to continue as a lay preacher here? to Sydney and we need to put a lot of single institution, so that both in our work into that. teaching and research the whole is I have no plans. I never use the Rev more than the sum of the parts. Dr title at work. I think everybody What improvements would you like to Of course, in performing that has a worldview and that it inevitably see in the student experience at Sydney? second function the central university influences your actions and the way needs significant input from the core you interpret things. I think the Our students tell us that in some parts academic communities themselves. question is how open you are to the of the University there are issues to My biggest immediate agenda item worldviews of others, and how able do with the quality of the student is finding a forum for the faculties to you are to work with people who have learning experience and addressing participate in strategic planning for contrasting or conflicting worldviews. that must be a priority. But I also want the wider university. I am working That’s a challenge for everybody, to think about how you create campus with the deans, the deputy vice- including people who have some life for students who are commuters chancellors and the Chair of the kind of recognised faith, and I don’t and who operate in an environment Academic Board on formalising the think you can work successfully in where they are also holding down role of the senior executive group, a university environment unless paid jobs and where the time they and in particular on bringing the you can do that. On the other hand, have to give to the broader aspects deans into that group so that we can I also hope that the university is a of student life isn’t as great as it involve them in more institution-wide community in which people can have once was. We need to think about planning. commitments to ideas, even strong how to make a commuter university I suppose that the model I am commitments. That kind of passion a real intellectual environment proposing is neither a top-down, nor is surely what makes for a stimulating for people. We also don’t have a bottom-up model of management, intellectual environment. SAM enough on-site accommodation but rather one that is dialogic – if that or proximate accommodation for doesn’t sound completely naff! First published in UniNews, July 2008. SAM Spring 08 7 nota bene

t’s almost Jacaranda time again, something that may cause Ishudders of delighted anticipation, or repressed exam memory, for alumni. Either way, the famous veteran in the corner of Quadrangle – now just 11 years short of its century – is a sign of optimism and renewal; and the subject of long discussions about Remembering Jane how exactly to describe the colour of the tree’s flowers. The first person to get it right was R Godfrey Rivers, the artist permanent name has been created in the 1880s to help women who painted Under the Jacaranda, approved for the new student students accommodate themselves in Brisbane in 1903. The picture services building, known during to university life. Hers was the only A is one of the most popular in the construction as Sydney Central. female position on the University’s Queensland Art Gallery and depicts Jane Foss Russell had a lifelong teaching staff for many decades. a tree in the city’s Botanic Gardens, association with and commitment to She was also a founding member which is thought to have been the the University of Sydney, in particular, of Women’s College, a co-founder first of its kind to be planted in the experience of its students. She of the Sydney University Women’s Australia, in 1864. was in the second group of women to Association and helped to establish History – and context – form enrol, graduating in 1886 with a BA; the Sydney University Women’s a significant element of this issue and was the second woman to attain Society, an outreach organisation that of SAM with the arrival of Vice- an MA in 1889, just seven years after promoted the importance of girls’ Chancellor, Dr Michael Spence; Lord women were formally admitted to education and encouraged more to (Robert) May’s views on life, work, study for degrees. attend university. research, science, maths and fun; and She was passionate about higher She was a woman of her times, a cover story which seeks to put in education for women and soon after however, and in 1899, resigned from context the experience of student life. graduation, went on a study tour her position as Tutor to Women Books, music, mental health, sport, of women’s colleges in England, Students upon her marriage. science, art and poetry are also among including visits to Girton and Nevertheless, she continued as a public the features in what I hope you will Newnham Colleges. supporter of the University, helping find to be a mixture as interesting to On her return to Sydney, Jane to establish the Sydney University read as it was to assemble. Foss Russell became committed to Women’s Settlement, contributing to Thank you for the kind letters and the cause of female undergraduates public debate on questions of girls’ emails about the Winter issue, please and graduates at the University of education and other matters. do continue to share your ideas, Sydney, especially in terms of helping She is now commemorated in one compliments and brickbats; all are to enrich women's experience of of the exciting new structures rising much appreciated. student life. She was Tutor to Women around the campus: the Jane Foss Students from 1892-1899, a position Russell Building. Diana Simmonds – Editor

8 SAM Spring 08 Representing

Su Baker Nicholas Blowers Tim Burns Deidre But Husaim Peter Callas Claudia Chaseling Glen Clarke Peter Daverington Geoffrey De Groen eX de Medici Dennis Del Favero Farrell and Parkin September 3 – October 11 Glen Clarke Clare Firth Smith Louise Forthun Louise Forthun Murray Fredericks October 20 – November 15 Ian Hamilton Finlay Richard Woldendorp Catherine Woo Peter Hill Gavin Hurley November 19 – December 20 Troy Innocent Urban art group show Sam Jinks eX de Medici Ingo Kleinert Pamela Mei Leng See Andrew Nicholls Halinka Orszulok Ulrich Rückriem Arryn Snowball David Stephenson Teo Treloar Ken Unsworth Gosia Wlodarczak Richard Woldendorp Catherine Woo Louise Forthun Shadowlands (detail) acrylic on canvas, 120 x 160 cm

SAM Spring 08 9 Inspirational terraces

ike many readers, Les and Valerie Murray were struck by LPaul Porteous’s photographs of Madagascar (SAM Autumn 2008). In particular this one of which they requested a copy. A few weeks later, a poem was delivered to the SAM office – inspired by the photo and as thanks from Australia’s poet laureate. He also wrote: “This poem is the fruit … of that marvellous photo of the Malagasy farm terraces. Of course, those aren’t solely the ones on Madagascar, but in E Asia, S America and all over. The narrowest and poorest I ever saw were in NE Spain. Many thanks. Cheers, Les Murray” The Farm Terraces

Beautiful merciless work around the slopes of earth terraces cut by curt hoe at the orders of hunger or a pointing lord. Levels eyed up to rhyme copied from grazing animals round the steeps of Earth, balconies filtering water down stage to stage of drop. Wind-stirred colours of crop swell between walked bunds that recall the beast tracks, harvests down from the top by hands long in the earth. Baskets of rich made soil boosted up poor by the poor, ladder by freestone prop stanzas of chant-long lines by backwrenching slog, before money, gave food and drunk but rip now like slatted sails (some always did damn do) down the abrupts of earth.

Les Murray

Photo: Paul Porteous

10 SAM Spring 08 nb The wisdom of Solomon Priscilla, Queen of By Oscar Ware ydney University alumnus Brett Solomon (BA LLB the Desert Mk1 S’94) is moving to New York to take up a post as a campaign manager at Avaaz.org, the global Internet advocacy site which has 3.2 million online members. Currently the executive director of GetUp!, the Australian advocacy site focusing on local campaigns, Solomon will start his new role this month (September). As executive director of GetUp!, Solomon has overseen the growth of a grass-roots organisation which has emerged as a considerable political force since its founding in 2005. obert Mills (BA ’79 MA ’89) The landscape was surreal, With some 280,000 online writes: A select band of readers especially after rain, when the members (more than the members Rmay remember that August vegetation erupted in the rich red of every political party in the country 2008 marked the 30th anniversary soil. It was an amazing spectacle. combined) GetUp! has campaigned of the 1978 Sydney University Wildflowers covered whole areas and on issues such as detention centres, Geography Department Arid Lands extended to the horizon. the incarceration of David Hicks Excursion to outback NSW. A splendid time was had by at Guantanamo Bay, the Iraq The 1978 tour was led by a very all. We even sang to the primary War, and same-sex marriage. capable Head of Department – schoolchildren at Tibooburra – it was Solomon has also worked for Professor Trevor Langford-Smith customary to do so on each excursion Community Aid Abroad and – and introduced a coach-load of - and in 1978 the song was a rough the Australian wing of Amnesty translation of the Beatles tune When eager (and highly urbanised) third International. He is expected I’m 64. year students to the wonders of the to use his experience to further So here’s to the memory of that outback. Big sky country. Avaaz.org’s global campaigns on amazing trip, the staff who made issues such as war, human rights, The trip reached Tibooburra via it possible (Trevor, Jack, Ron and poverty and global warming. the Murrumbidgee Irrigation Area Dave), the students, some of whom According to its own website, and Broken Hill after several days are sadly no longer with us, and to Avaaz means “voice” in many travel and, in the 1970s, you just the incredible overnight journey Asian, Middle-Eastern and knew that the few settlements north back to Broken Hill through 330-odd Eastern European languages. The of Broken Hill were way out in the kilometres of sticky red mud caused organisation uses the advocacy Never Never. No satellite TV or by heavy rains. The return trip lasted and support of its online members trendy food on menus then. In fact, around 13 hours. It usually took four. to lobby world leaders to close the food at Tibooburra consisted of I was lucky enough to return to Red mud and the the gap between the world basic beef and gravy for breakfast, this part of NSW five years ago and wonders of the wanted by most people and the lunch and dinner! yes, it rained! Outback in 1978 world that currently exists. SAM Spring 08 11 We’re off & racing this... C h r i s tm a s P a c ka ge s

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12 SAM Winter 08 Judy Bailey

nb honoured by music industry

n July, the Australian music New research on industry celebrated the year’s Ioutstanding Australian classical music achievements at the Classical Music Awards. They were presented hearing impairment by APRA and the Australian Music The typical experiment, says Dr Centre, in the Playhouse Theatre By Kelly Royds of the Sydney Opera House. Best, “involves playing some kind of The night’s final and major earing impairment is speech material with another kind award – for Distinguished Services estimated to affect 20 of noise and then asking the person to Australian Music – went to jazz Hper cent of Australia’s to repeat it back to see how much great Judy Bailey in a citation population. Dr Virginia Best (PhD they can actually retain. We vary the that “recognises her enormous ’04) is conducting new research into listening situation to work out which hearing loss at the School of Medical contribution to Australian new part people are having trouble with.” music through her role as a mentor, Science at University of Sydney According to Dr Best, hearing and says “the studies are presently composer and educator.” loss blurs the ability of the brain to A founding teacher in jazz studies looking at the basics of what goes distinguish sounds. A useful way at the Sydney Conservatorium of wrong in hearing impairment.” to conceptualise hearing loss is Music and Musical Director of the The University of Sydney “to think of a visual image where Sydney Youth Jazz Ensemble, Bailey Postdoctoral Research fellowship has everything is blurry and you want is a passionate and active member given Dr Best three years in which to enhance contrast. The problem of the new music community. to conduct her studies. “Sydney is that if you imagine you are a She is widely recognised as University is really specialised in the hearing aid, you don’t know what a brilliant musician and musical way of spatial hearing,” she says. parts of the mixture are important, director and has played a crucial role “There are two aspects to the what you need to emphasise and in the development of contemporary research, spatial and cognitive. what not to emphasise,” she says. jazz in Australia and the fusion of The spatial dimension focuses This work is being carried out the classical and jazz genres. on understanding how the brain in a specially designed laboratory The awards evening featured pinpoints where sounds are coming (pictured) in the School of Medical performances by Mark Isaacs, The from. The cognitive aspect has to do Science. Dr. Best’s studies aim Song Company and Windstrokes, with whether hearing loss affects our to ultimately improve hearing William Barton, Claire Edwardes, ability to pay attention,” says Dr Best. technologies, such as hearing aids Iain Grandage, Mel Robinson and, “People with hearing loss say they and hearing implants. She will finally, Judy Bailey’s Jazz Connection. have real trouble at parties, pubs, all be working at Sydney University Jazz Connection is a not-for-profit places where hearing aids don’t really and at the Hearing Research organisation dedicated to the provision work. We are beginning to understand Centre at Boston University. of high quality education and training why that is, because hearing aids “Most of this kind of work in jazz for youth, ensuring that the amplify all sounds. So the problem comes from Boston, particularly the craft of musical improvisation is alive that people are having is sorting behavioural aspect of the study” and well for successive generation out the different sound sources”. she says. Dr Best is currently of musicians. Honouring their mentor, Jazz Connection performed A central aspect of hearing loss working in Boston and when Dr Virginia Best has to do with the difficulty the brain she returns to Sydney, will start (above) and her aural two of Bailey’s compositions to experiences in distinguishing sounds. recruiting people for her research. laboratory close the awards ceremony. SAM Winter 08 13 Keys to success By Helen McKenzie

or those in the teaching profession, the writing of reports on their students’ progress can be an arduous task. For FDane Ropa (BMusEd ’04), Head of the Arts Department at Cumberland High School, the writing of Seung Min Oh’s report has been a highlight of his music teaching career. In September, 16-year-old pianist Oh leaves the familiar territory of Sydney’s north-western suburbs to take up an offer from one of the world’s most prestigious performing arts conservatories, the Juilliard School in New York. While it is an honour and an achievement to be accepted into the hallowed halls in which some of the world’s greatest artists have been schooled, Oh’s piano teacher To help ends meet, Ropa organised the Above: Dane Ropa, Katarina Makarova says it is also a recognition of the hard work he first-ever piano recital at Cumberland High Katarina Makarova School. In the past, Ropa has trained and and Seung Min Oh. has already put in and an understanding that “such talent deserves Photo: Paul Wright further development.” conducted groups of 200 combined High In much the same way that Olympic athletes rely on their School singers to perform at The Sydney support team, Oh has benefited from the efforts of a number of Opera House for Primary Proms and, people. Team Oh is made up of his devoted Korean-born parents, notably, supporting Lionel Ritchie during his Ukrainian-born piano teacher Makarova (and her father Victor his appearance in the Australian Idol concert before), and the positive input and fundraising expertise of Dane in 2007. Ropa attributes Oh’s solo recital Ropa and all at Cumberland High. The Juilliard School scholarship success to the fact that he can connect with his allows for a return airfare to New York City, but all other expenses audience even while playing difficult pieces. must be met by the applicant. “He looks like he is having fun, the exact opposite of serious classical focus,” says Ropa. “The focus is on enjoyment. I watch the kids when they see him play, and once they get past the amazement of ‘wow, that’s cool’ - because it just sounds like a recording - it’s more about seeing it happen, like watching a rock musician. There is a kind of energy that comes out of his performance. You can hear others play and they can be exceptional, but they are very serious and you can just see and hear it as a museum piece. When Seung Min performs, you get involved.” For his audition in New York, Oh chose to perform Chopin to the group of six examiners. Makarova says that Oh’s mastery of Chopin is unusual in a 16-year-old. “He has emotional flexibility. Chopin is very sensual, intimate and emotional, and Seungmin’s approach is very sophisticated.” Two months later, Seung Min was advised by letter that the Juilliard School examiners had seen the same talent Makarova has valued and honed. Dane Ropa’s pride in his student is palpable. Oh’s music report would read more like a A JOURNEY OF DISCOVERY concert review: “We stuck the piano almost in LATIN AMERICA the middle of the room with everyone sitting Latin America specialist, BFirst Travel, offers an outstanding and refreshing choice of tours and stopovers in Latin America - from Central America to the breathtaking wonders of Patagonia, from the amazing really close by. Out he comes with the Chopin wildlife of the Pantanal to fascinating Antarctica. BFirst Travel tours are designed with a more personal they are all cheering at the end.” approach allowing you to explore and discover this amazing continent. Likewise, Oh is unable to mask his delight Whether you prefer to take part in an organised trip, or let us design your personal itinerary, BFirst Travel will provide you with a trip of a lifetime! and excitement. A warm smile slowly spreads across his face as he says, in a shy way, that he BFirst Travel (ABN 13110975936) Phone: 1300 763 338 “can’t wait to get over there to learn from some WWW.BFIRSTTRAVEL.COM of the best teachers in the world, and to prove NSW Travel Agents Licence 2TA5659

myself at piano.” nb 14 SAM Spring 08 Duke of sax

he Sydney Conservatorium of Music has appointed master Tsaxophonist Michael Duke as its new classical saxophone lecturer. He will be Australia’s first full- time classical saxophone14268-2_Booklet, lecturer Druckbogen 1 von 12 - Seiten (24, in1) 11.10.200 7 18:31 Uhr Produced by Winsome Evans a woodwind faculty and returns to Johann Winsome Sebastian E v a n s , Sydney after 10 years of performing Bach Clavicembalo Six Sonatas and Partitas BWV 1001-1006 and teaching in the United States. Transcribed, with Embellishment, fo r Clavicembalo by Duke has performed with some of Winsome Evans Australia’s finest orchestras, including

1 4 2 6 8 -2 the Australian Chamber OrchestraPrinted in Germany on recycled Paper S. 24 S. 1 and the Melbourne Symphony. In the United States he received Masters and Doctorate Degrees in Music Performance from Indiana The food of love University, and pursued jazz studies at Berklee College of Music, Boston. By Diana Simmonds It is expected Duke will insome Evans (above), had learnt as a composition student continue to perform while teaching associate professor of and also bearing in mind that I was at the Sydney Conservatorium. Wmusic at the University, always telling students in History of has been a musical powerhouse for Performance Practice lectures – to more 40 years. She was awarded a embellish. There is this idea that BEM in 1980 and an OA in 1985 in Bach is sacred and shouldn’t be Sustainability recognition of her work, not that she’s altered, but you should ornament been sitting on her laurels since. Bach. He did it himself in his own compositions and performances.” he Institute of Sustainable As well as her academic work, So she put her money where Solutions was launched music lovers will know her from the her mouth is and embellished. in July with an address Renaissance Players, as a soloist with T The result is both exquisite and by Professor Jeffrey D Sachs to a the Australian Chamber Orchestra, exciting. What makes it really packed house in MacLaurin Hall. and as a member of more musical interesting, however, is that among Prof Sachs is Director of the societies than could be listed here. the dozens of instruments she plays, Earth Institute, Quetelet Professor About 12 years ago, however, she the violin is not one of them. of Sustainable Development, and decided to transcribe a Bach partita, “I started with piano, then the Professor of Health Policy and “just for fun, to see if I could.” recorder, then clarinet. All the single Management at Columbia University. Later, in one of the regular reed instruments, then the double “It’s a wonderful initiative,” he Thursday-at-5.15pm concert series reeds. I do play viola da gamba, but said. “A wonderful opportunity for on campus in the Old Darlington I found the guitar very difficult. Australia and a gift for the world.” School, she played the piece. The You need such strong hands.” The challenges facing us are response was instant: “Do them all!” There are four more CDs complex, he continued, and he Evans kept the thought in completed and awaiting release was not offering pat solutions. the back of her mind until, after soon: the Renaissance Players “Universities have a unique serious illness and the deaths of playing medieval Catalonian responsibility at this time,” he said. several friends, she found herself and Spanish music. “Each generation faces its challenges “depressed, sick and away from Now Evans has started on a and ours is sustainable development. work for some time. I thought I new project: transcribing Bach’s The challenge of living together would do it for them and, of course, cello suites for harpsichord. on a crowded planet … we are working with the music helped.” “I should say I’m struggling with bound together in ways that were The result is a double CD set them,” she laughs. “But I don’t unimaginable a moment ago.” (with mini-score booklet as well as think it will take another 12 years.” In a wide-ranging address, Prof the full score, available separately) Sachs urged Australians to embrace of Bach’s six sonatas and partitas Johann Sebastian Bach: Six Sonatas solar power and nuclear energy for solo violin, transcribed for and partitas, BWV, 1001-1006, as an alternative to coal power. harpsichord – with embellishment. transcribed with embellishment by That last bit is important. “When Winsome Evans. On Celestial Harmonies A podcast of the address may be heard I came to do them all, I went back 14268-5. The Renaissance Players will at www.usyd.edu.au/podcasts/ to the first one, remembering what I also be available on the same label. SAM Spring 08 15 <_dWdY[9Wh[[hi Oekh_cW]_dWj_ed_idÊjj^[edboj^_d]oekÊbbijh[jY^

8dXV"8daV6bVi^a886^hdcZd[i]ZaVg\ZhiegZb^jbWgVcYZY WZkZgV\ZhVcY[ddYXdbeVc^Zh^ci]Z6h^V"EVX^ÒXgZ\^dcVcYV edlZg]djhZd[aZVY^c\WgVcYh^ci]Z6jhigVa^VcbVg`Zi#=ZVYfjVgiZgZY ^cHnYcZn!886ZbeadnhVeegdm&-!%%%eZdeaZVXgdhhdjgh^mXdjcig^Zh d[deZgVi^dc#>c6jhigVa^V!886]VkZVXfj^gZYhZkZgVaXdbeVc^ZhhjX] VhHE86gYbdcVVcYCZkZg[V^aHeg^c\lViZgVcYbdgZgZXZcianlZ]VkZ aVjcX]ZY^cidi]Za^fjdg^cYjhign# 6iigVXi^c\!gZiV^c^c\VcYYZkZade^c\iVaZciZY^cY^k^YjVah^hVii]Z]ZVgi d[djgWjh^cZhhhigViZ\n#L^i]i]Zhjeedgid[886ndjÉaahigZiX]ndjg h`^aah!WgdVYZcndjg`cdlaZY\Z!h]VgeZcndjgXdbbZgX^VaVXjbZc! X]VaaZc\Zi]ZegdXZhh!l^YZcndjg]dg^odchVcYZmeVcYndjg^YZVhid bdgZedhh^W^a^i^ZhVcYVhVgZhjaindjÉaaY^gZXian^beVXidci]ZÒcVcX^Va eZg[dgbVcXZ!\gdli]VcYZkdaji^dcd[djgWjh^cZhh# JeÓdZekjceh["Y^[YaekjekhYkhh[djlWYWdY_[ieh h[]_ij[hoekh;nfh[ii_edie\?dj[h[ijgkej_d]H[\,+'/ l_i_j0 mmm$Yea[YWh[[hi$Yec$Wk 37453 ‘Coca-Cola’, the Contour Bottle & the Dynamic Ribbon device are registered trade marks of The Coca-Cola Company.

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               “           ”

Dr Thalia Anthony is researching wages withheld or stolen from thousands of Indigenous cattle station workers. This work enriches her teaching in the area of Indigenous people and the law. From human rights to genetic engineering, the internet to global climate change… researchers at Sydney Law School are constantly developing new ways to understand and improve our changing world. Please contact us to find out how you can support these and other important projects. (What legacy will you leave?) Philanthropy & Development Officer: Guy Houghton T: + 61 2 9351 0391 F: + 61 2 9351 0200 E: [email protected]

16 SAM Spring 08 Shaun Gladwell: pataphysical man By Anabel Dean

conversation with Shaun National Gallery of Australia). acclaimed for work shown in the Gladwell (BVis Arts ’97) “All I know about is making international exhibition. This time, Awill have to be brief. The art,” Gladwell says gently. “I can as Australia’s senior representative, Sydney artist is preparing for San certainly appreciate the opportunity Gladwell will exhibit the yet-to- Diego in two days time, after which to show work but it’s really tough be-completed Maddest Maximus. he will dash to Melbourne, fly back for me to comment on the position “It’s not like you’re selected to Sydney before heading off to of an artist in a field of activity.” to show and then all of a sudden Jakarta, returning home again to plan Gladwell usually engages in his there’s a beautiful calm that for Taipei and then, Sao Paulo. field of activity from a studio above sweeps over the studio,” Gladwell Gladwell is astoundingly busy the luxury car showrooms of William confides. “It kind of throws it all exhibiting his work around the globe Street in the zone he describes as the into gear. It’s a great challenge.” but his impact on the international “hotbed” of transsexual prostitution. His challenge with Maddest art scene was set long before he “This is where it all happens after Maximus is to further develop was selected as Australia’s official nightfall,” he says. “I like that an evocative suite of five videos representative at the Venice because it makes the area edgy and (including the black-clad figure Biennale in June next year. energetic. It’s a 24-hour environment of a motorcyclist cradling a dead The Sydney College of the Arts … like a mini Manhattan simulator kangaroo on a red dirt road) utilising graduate is not just well known, he’s with high rises everywhere.” the Australian desert landscape and probably the best known of Australia’s From these heights, the western the varied interpretations of the DVD artists, and his creation of one suburbs boy who might have become outback by great artists of our time. video in particular – Storm Sequence a professional skateboarder chooses “I’m really interested in off- – has been credited as the flint that to explore the creative possibilities road bike riding and I love a lot There has sparked real interest in contemporary of street sub-culture by transforming of the cinematic experiences DVD work in Australia today. break-dancing, BMX bike-riding and of the kind of Australian desert been this “I can’t think of another Australian graffiti art into virtuoso performances. landscape that exists in Broken crazy long artist that has had the same kind of He loves the notion of drifting like Hill. It’s a very fertile space even though it’s arid in content.” conversation interest and focus,” declares gallery a window shopper through urban director Simeon Kronenberg. “There space, fostering performance within Kronenberg, director of Anna going on have certainly been many other landscape, while still maintaining Schwartz Gallery, predicts that with art Australian artists that have had, or a sincere interest in art history. Maddest Maximus will become just are having, wonderful international Gladwell completed his Bachelor as important as Storm Sequence or the and life careers but I don’t think there’s been of Fine Art at SCA in 1996, and equally iconic Pataphysical Man (a anything quite like the focus that’s then undertook postgraduate much quieter video of a man spinning been on Shaun and that’s a very great research at the College of Fine on his head on the floor with arms indication of the power of his images.” Arts (COFA). In 2001, he won a outstretched in a way that evokes Leonardo da Vinci’s Vitruvian Man Public acceptance and collector Samstag International Visual Arts Time will tell and, for Gladwell, support seemed to coalesce around the Scholarship to study at Goldsmith’s success is simply the means by which iconic image of Storm Sequence (created College in London and completed he is able to dedicate his life to his art in 2000). In the video, Gladwell a celebrated residency at the Cite in its various forms (including painting skateboards freestyle on a flat space Internationale des Arts in Paris. and sculpture). He remains focused of concrete above the crashing waves “It wasn’t until art school that on ideas and production of DVD work of Bondi, the ominous black clouds I started to think about ways of with a dedicated crew of collaborators. of an approaching storm reminiscent collapsing my interest in various “My work doesn’t intend to say of a brewing Turner sky-scape. and more extreme sports into anything in particular but is open to One of the four editions of this my art practice. There has been many possible readings,” the artist work sold recently on the secondary this crazy long conversation explains. “I leave the metaphors open market for $120,000 while his current going on with art and life, or but pregnant. I don’t try to be didactic video installation at Cockatoo Island art and everyday experience, or pontificating.” Speaking of which, for the Sydney Biennale – titled Ghost and I’m interested in that.” time for talk is up, and Gladwell Rider – sold for $250,000. His buyers The dialogue of the wanderer must get on. Details must be are the art cognoscenti: significant will continue at the world’s oldest finalised. The world is waiting.SAM national and international private and largest biennale in 2009. collectors and institutions (such as It will mean a return to Venice art the Art Gallery of NSW and the for Gladwell who was last year

SAM Spring 08 17 No agony, much ecstasy For Dr Patricia Weerakoon, Christian values go hand in hand with the joy of sex. By Linda Vergnani

hen students see the smorgasbord of sexual behaviours patriotic New Zealander is also an middle-aged woman in a they may encounter at work. Most All Blacks fan. She looks matronly in Wpurple sari striding across of the 70 students are from Australia, a fuzzy jumper and pair of training the campus they greet her as Auntie though she also tutors students from shoes, yet it is her lively intellect and Pat. But this is no ordinary Aunt. a dozen other countries, including mischievous humour that holds sway. This one is on her way to introduce Egypt, South Africa, Canada and Weerakoon says that despite the postgraduate students to an intensive Iceland. Those enrolled include sexual revolution and the availability

health session of erotic movies. general practitioners, nurses, of explicit material in all media, On her office door is pinned a counsellors, schoolteachers and other sexuality education is as important cartoon dominatrix and her colleagues educators. She has even tutored two and relevant now as it was 35 years gave her a riding crop and spurs as sex workers, who are now researching ago when she trained. “That’s birthday presents. She laughs at the a PhD in sex and disability. because sex, even in today’s world, risqué trophies adorning her wall. “It’s The “Auntie” moniker, used is not accepted as something holistic all the theme of the dominatrix who with genuine respect and affection, and pleasurable between man and runs the sex program. It’s sexualising resulted from her appearance in ABC woman, man and man, or whatever.” leadership qualities!” television’s Agony Aunts, where, with She says sexual therapy and For Sri Lankan-born Dr Patricia help from an economist, they tried counselling encompasses a lot more Weerakoon, the contradictions come to sort out the sexual, relationship than treating sexual dysfunction. with her specialist territory, sexology. and financial problems of floundering “Today, because of the medicalisation A medical doctor, she is senior baby boomers. of sexual dysfunction, people believe lecturer and academic coordinator Weerakoon’s passion for her if you have erectile dysfunction you of the University of Sydney’s online subject, her professionalism, warmth go to the doctor and get a blue tablet, Graduate Program in Sexual Health. and frankness inspire her students. or if you have pain during intercourse The course, which she initiated, In the windowsill of her office at the the doctor gives you something for it. attracts students from around the Cumberland campus are a tumble “But sex concerns the whole world. of soft toys in New Zealand sports person. Even if you have a pathology, The erotic movies are intended gear. A Canterbury Crusaders cap there is a psychological and social to desensitise students to the hangs from her noticeboard. This overlay and that’s what therapy or

18 SAM Spring 08 counselling is all about. Sex therapy a committed relationship. Isn’t it a “I realised that people actually is about looking at the person in a contradiction for an academic and researched this and there was this holistic way. It’s about looking at supposedly neutral sex therapist to thing labelled ‘sexual response’. I pleasure and satisfaction, sexuality teach Christian sex? “It’s a hard line realised you didn’t just lie there and and sexual health. It’s about a whole to walk,” admits Weerakoon. let it happen and have babies,” says body, whole person experience, Other academics and researchers Weerakoon. whether you are into single sex, also ask “how, as a conservative She decided to study sexology homosexual sex or heterosexual sex.” Christian, I can teach sex?” She and teach people about sex so they Among the most common matters recently told a Kinsey Institute could be “healthy and happy and sex therapists deal with are myths or researcher that there was no sensual and sexual.” She went on to misconceptions - that sex must be contradiction because the Bible is a do a Masters in Reproductive Health spontaneous or that partners should sex-positive book. “We worship a God at the University of Hawai’i where have simultaneous orgasms, for who celebrates sex and desire.” she studied the biology of gender example. They might need to counsel Though she rarely has time disorders under Professor Milton couples about what to do about for sex counselling nowadays, Diamond, a world expert on gender desire discrepancy (where one or Weerakoon makes an exception for identity. other might not want to make love as those she terms “Brownies” – Sri Returning to Sri Lanka, she set up frequently) or how to deal with issues Lankans, Indians, Pakistanis and a separate unit teaching sexual health such as erectile dysfunction. Where Nepalese. “Anyone who looks like and sex education in the medical necessary, therapists refer clients to me,” she says. “Because if this faculty at Colombo University. For medical doctors for treatment. post-menopausal, Christian, 38-years- the next six years she was also much In couple counselling, Weerakoon married woman can stand up and say in demand as the country’s sole sex teaches about the three Cs of good ‘penis’ and ‘clitoris’ it must be alright, therapist. But in 1983 Sri Lanka was sex: commitment, comfort and because she is like our grandmother.” riven by ethnic tension and virtual communication. For a relationship The daughter of a tea maker, she civil war. With a “cross-ethnic” to work, says Weerakoon, you need was raised in a conservative Tamil marriage and a young son to care for, a degree of commitment and to feel Christian household on a plantation the Weerakoons decided to migrate to comfortable with your partner. “You in Watagoda, Sri Lanka. “In all the Australia in 1989. Weerakoon began are going to be involved in the most years I was growing up my family teaching undergraduate courses in intimate activity. You are going to take never talked about sex,” she recalls, sexual health at the Faculty of Health your clothes off and probably stick explaining that, as a young woman, Sciences at the University of Sydney a bit of your anatomy into someone she was expected to conform to a and in 2004 started the online course else’s anatomy.” traditional female role. “But it didn’t in sexual health. And it includes being comfortable feel repressive to me as I accepted the In her spare time, Weerakoon and when your skin wrinkles as you reach rules were placed in love.” her 32-year-old son Kamal are writing middle and old age. “You don’t have Yet she realised if she did not a novel about sexuality for young to be trim and taut. You don’t have find a suitable career her parents Christians. Kamal is an assistant It must be to have the Botox and the breast would arrange a marriage for her. So minister in a local Presbyterian alright, enhancement and the labiaplasty she enrolled for a medical degree church. “He is quite proud of his because you are comfortable with at the University of Colombo. Soon mother being a sex therapist,” says because she each other as you are.” after graduating, she fell in love with Weerakoon. is like our Within the faculty, Weerakoon a young engineer, “a wonderful, Dr Vijay Ramanathan has dropped facilitates a “Sexuality Research light-hearted man” who led the by to demonstrate a newly acquired grandmother Group” of students, staff and external church choir. He was also Sinhalese, harmonica. He is a medical doctor researchers. She notes that sex an ethnic group with whom Tamils and one of Weerakoon’s research therapists also need to be comfortable were not meant to have any contact. students. He came to the University with who they are while accepting Against strong opposition from both from India to complete a Masters that the sexual values, needs and families, they married. in Clinical Medicine in HIV and practices of clients might be very While the young doctor knew sexually transmitted infections but different. about reproductive sex, she was says he was inspired to study sexology Weerakoon is comfortable with her ignorant about the pleasures of sex. after hearing just one of Weerakoon’s own values. “Everyone knows that “Remember this was Sri Lanka, a lectures. With her encouragement, he I am an evangelical Christian from developing country. I knew there was enrolled in a single course, went on the Sydney Anglican diocese” (one a vagina. I knew which aperture the to complete a Graduate Diploma in of the more conservative Anglican penis went into and about ejaculation Sexual Health and is now doing his groups). Weerakoon is also faculty but apart from that I didn’t know doctorate. member of the University of New anything.” “I would say Patricia doesn’t see South Wales’ Centre for Apologetic At the age of 28 she became a her subject apart from herself. She Scholarship and Education, which lecturer in the physiology department blends sexual health with her own focuses on a Christian understanding at Colombo and was startled to personality. I still remember her of intellectual and social issues. find that one of her duties would opening remark: ‘I’m a Christian, Apart from her university work be teaching sex and reproduction. I’m a lady doctor from Sri Lanka and she also teaches Christian youth Handed an ancient copy of Masters I love sexology,’ or something like groups about sex, which in the church and Johnson’s Human Sexual Response that. She really likes and loves her context means heterosexual sex in as a primer, she was fascinated. subject.” SAM SAM Spring 08 19 What price uni life?

Once upon a time in Australia, higher education was considered a collective responsibility. But a quiet counter-revolution has taken place on the nation’s campuses over the past two decades, Chris Rodley reports

20 SAM Spring 08 What price uni life?

think alumni who went to uni in the 1970s would be shocked to see how different campus life is these days,” says Kate Laing, President “Iof the University’s Students’ Representative Council. “It is just so much harder now to be a student.” Publicly funded higher education was born in Australia on January 1, 1974. In a bid to make universities accessible to more Australians, the Whitlam Government abolished tuition fees and introduced a means-tested allowance for students. “It meant that people had more time to live the university experience, and the University of Sydney was a really lively place in the mid-70s,” recalls David Patch (BA ’78), who served as President of the SRC in 1975. “There

cover story was also an increasingly diverse student population, with more women and older people, which I think was substantially because of Whitlam’s changes.” However, the free education era did not last. The Hawke Government, after briefly introducing an administration charge for students, implemented the Higher Education Contributions Scheme in 1989. It required students to make a contribution towards their tuition costs, either by paying up front, or by deferring the fee, then $1800. After the election of the Coalition government in 1996, student charges rose by an average of 40 per cent as HECS was restructured into a three-tier fee system. Later, under a further policy shake-up, by Education Minister Brendan Nelson in 2005, tuition fees were deregulated, allowing universities to lift charges by as much as 25 per cent. Many young graduates now have considerable debts as a result of the continuing fee rises, which student advocates say have distorted the original intent of the scheme. Lulu Stewart (BA ’04), 26, has calculated that she will owe $41,000 by the time she completes her Master of Commerce course. After her undergraduate degree she started full-time work and began repaying the debt through a sum withheld from her pay. As a consequence: “I had to use credit cards to get through my final years of university. So adding my HECS debt on top of everything else was a huge burden,” she says. “It holds you back at a time when you are struggling to be independent.” Another policy that has undergone a quiet transformation is student income support. The federally funded allowance introduced in 1974 evolved into Austudy in 1987, which was itself replaced under the Coalition by Youth Allowance for 16 to 24-year-olds. According to the National Union of Students, the maximum support available to recipients of Youth Allowance provides an income that is 40 per cent below the Henderson Poverty Line. Recipients must either meet very strict parental means tests or show they are independently supporting themselves. Young people are not automatically counted as independent until age 25. Many students fail to meet these criteria and typically need to juggle their studies with a significant amount of Photo: Kate Laing part-time work. That is the situation of Arts/Law student

SAM Spring 08 21 society at large, and there should be rich opportunities to Campus life get involved in debating, music and all the other kinds of has fared university activities,” he says. better at To maintain those opportunities and also to preserve the autonomy of student-run organisations, Professor Sydney Brown spearheaded a major rescue package to help make than at up the shortfall in union fees caused by VSU. In the first two years of the new policy, the University allocated most other $30 million to student representative bodies, with the universities organisations continuing to maintain their independence despite the financial aid. As a result, campus life has fared better at Sydney than at most other universities around the country in the aftermath of VSU, although some activities have disappeared. Faced with losing $8 million annually in fees, the Union was forced to cut a number of initiatives including subsidised child care and some student publications, although its President, Ruchir Punjabi, says that in general, the Union has been able to maintain a strong level of services. Meanwhile, Sydney Uni Sport & Fitness has introduced a charge for activities such as Russell Schmidt, who works three part-time jobs to joining a club or gym, which has had a negative impact cover his study costs, which this year included $600 on on sporting participation by women in particular: the textbooks. Even though his family cannot support him percentage of women playing club sport has dropped from financially, the 19-year-old does not qualify for Youth 41 per cent to 33 per cent, while 11 netball teams have Allowance. By running on “very little sleep”, he hopes to become five. work enough hours over 18 months to earn $18,000, which Beyond the University of Sydney, VSU has had a will entitle him to qualify for Youth Allowance. much more visible impact. Significant job losses have Schmidt believes that spending so much time at work been reported at 25 out of 30 unions around the country is affecting his academic performance: “I feel the level I and some student-run organisations have lost their achieve is because I don’t have time to do the reading,” independence after being taken over by their university. he says. The fallout has particularly affected smaller and regional Students who work long hours are also often too busy schools: the University of Western Sydney, for example, to be involved in the University’s culture of ideas and sacked 48 of 50 staff and cut its entire funding for services, debate, says Kate Laing. “It’s not surprising activism is not welfare and events. “We are now negotiating with the what it used to be because students simply don’t have the University for a funding arrangement, but there are also free time,” she observes, although she points to the huge all sorts of student advocacy issues that we can’t address rallies against voluntary student unionism as proof that because the University can effectively stand over us,” campus activism is still very much alive when it comes to says David Holmes, co-President of the UWS Student the crunch. Association. “The purpose of a student union has been While other higher education policies have evolved effectively destroyed.” over time, VSU was a much more dramatic upheaval. And what of the future for our higher education Traditionally, universities had charged annual levies for system? It is clear that, whatever critics of the status quo student amenities. But in 2005, the Coalition government may claim, universities are vastly more accessible now than abolished compulsory fees, arguing that students who did in days gone by: in the 1920s, for example, just 1.4 per not want to play rugby or join a protest should not have to cent of Australians between the ages of 17 and 22 were in pay for others who did. The law was passed in the face of higher education. Yet in spite of the enormous strides that strong opposition from student groups, who claimed that it have been made in opening up the campus to all parts of was an attempt to stifle their political voice. society, does more need to be done? One of Australia’s most high-profile opponents of VSU The federal Labor Government certainly thinks so. It was Professor Gavin Brown, then the University’s Vice- has made the issue of access to education part of its vision Chancellor, who joined with students in protesting that the for an “education revolution” and says it is tackling the policy would have a disastrous impact on university life. problem of affordability. “The Government is concerned Professor Brown says he opposed the law not only because about the increasing tuition costs for Australian students of the practical damage it would do to student culture and is implementing a range of policies to make university and services, but also because it enshrined in law the study more affordable,” says Minister for Education Julia principle that classroom learning was the only legitimate Kate Laing (l) Gillard, who points to a reduction in education fees for part of the university experience. “Our students should Lulu Stewart (top) mathematics and science students and the phasing out of be given a background that enables them to contribute to Russell Schmidt (r) full-fee paying places. Student income support issues, she

22 SAM Spring 08 University Professor in the Faculty of Education and Social Work. She argues that government funding policies have only exacerbated an existing problem of class division in our education system, which stacks the deck against students from poor families and non-European backgrounds before they even set foot on campus. “The emphasis that the Rudd Government has placed on social exclusion is a way of talking about these class divisions, so one can hope this issue will come back on the agenda,” she says. “But it must be said the Government is hardly a bunch of revolutionaries.” SAM The University provides a number of support services for students suffering financial difficulties. See these websites: www.usyd.edu.au/stuserv/finances/ www.usyd.edu.au/stuserv/financial_assistance_office/index.shtml

The future

n his inaugural address to the University, Vice- Chancellor Dr Michael Spence said, inter alia: I … We should encourage our students to participate fully in all the activities that the University has to offer. Drawn as they are from very different communities, and with different experiences, they have at least as much to teach one another as we have to teach them. And they do that, not only in the classroom, but also in the wide range of activities that make up the student experience. Participation should be the keyword here. Many students have their confidence built, and form deep and lasting friendships, when they first try activities that they have never tried before. That is an important part of a University experience. says, will be addressed as part of the ongoing Review of We’ve heard It is hard to maintain in a commuter university, and in Australian Higher Education led by Denise Bradley. a culture that can increasingly see university education Meanwhile, universities are waiting to see how students as an employment certification process, but for those the Government will respond to the effects of VSU loud and able and willing to be involved, it can be personally following its inquiry into the policy. “The introduction of transformative … voluntary student unionism by the previous government clear on … We need to be talking to industry about more has impacted negatively on student services, amenities this – Youth funding for basic research than Australian universities and representation,” says Youth Minister, Kate Ellis. Minister, have known. We need to be talking to our communities “We’ve heard students loud and clear on this. And we about the need for greater levels of philanthropic are responding.” As well as continuing the previous Kate Ellis support than have been typical in this country, and to government’s transition fund and earmarking new government about ways in which philanthropic support funds for campus infrastructure, the Minister says the for universities could be encouraged. We need to be Government will be announcing a long-term solution to talking to government about ways in which higher the impact of VSU. levels of contribution from students who could afford In contrast, supporters of the policy say that student it, might be compatible with needs blind admission organisations need to be taking the initiative in the post- and with generous packages of financial support for VSU era. “If student unions provide the services students students who could not. These are all, of course, actually want, they would have no trouble attracting difficult conversations to have, but unless we begin to members,” says Shadow Education Minister Tony Smith. explore some of these options, Australian universities “Kate Ellis and Julia Gillard should be demanding that may never be able to achieve either the levels of student unions become more accountable to the demands funding, or the freedom, that they require to achieve of everyday students.” their world-class potential … Whatever the politicians decide, we cannot expect to To download the address or listen to the podcast, go to make universities more accessible to Australians from all www.usyd.edu.au/vice-chancellor/welcome/inaugural_ walks of life without grappling with some deep-rooted Photos: address.shtml issues of class in our society, according to Raewyn Connell, Paul Wright

SAM Spring 08 23 Feeding the demon Misunderstanding and the culture of silence surrounding anorexia is no help to sufferers or their carers By Lucy Howard-Taylor, third-year arts/law student

norexia is a devastating illness. It is the most my daily “living” as I did my daily food. Over time it fatal of any psychiatric illness, and generates a became my padded cell, and I raged and banged and suicide rate 32 times beyond what is considered tried and tried so hard to understand myself, to make A“normal”. It is all encompassing, merciless and sense of a horrifying illness, a present so warped and recovery is difficult. Rates of relapse are high, the average perverted that I could deny myself – and do so readily, duration of the illness is five years – in many cases is much euphorically – of the most basic means of existence: food. longer – and recovery is generally agreed to take twice as Reading those cramped lines of tiny script, I recognise it, long as the duration of the illness itself. almost as though it were myself, but then something – be The agony of an eating disorder is inexpressible, it “recovery” or “the healing process” or something as but I can say it is psychological torture in the extreme. simple as “time” – reveals just how different I am, and just Looking back on my anorexia, it feels like one of those how far I’ve come. fevered half-dreams we have all had in that hour just Anorexia is born of years, not a quick flick through before dawn. I recall little of the months I spent in bed, Vogue, or a passing comment one day at the gym. One does in tears, in despair. I recall little of the crushing fatigue, not wake up one morning and decide “to be anorexic” little of the hours spent drawing spaces in my shadow as I and forgo cereal that day. For me, it was the end point of walked; little of the suicide watch, the ages spent weakly years of low self-esteem, rampant perfectionism and high cushioning my spine with a pillow, staring blankly at the expectations, those I placed on myself and those I believed silhouettes of trees on the ceiling. I do not remember how others to have placed on me. It was a way to remove from I felt, beyond emptiness. And I remember little of what I myself any responsibility, to withdraw from a world I found saw, beyond black. so at odds with myself, a world where I could see no place Sometimes when I wake up in the early morning, with for “me”, other than standing adrift, looking on; excusing the sky pink and the trees still, my curtains cold from the myself from the race, circumventing the possibility of night air, I wonder whether the past few years were in my failure by not trying at all. It was my haven, my screaming, imagination. I run my fingers over my stomach and I feel hellish refuge. nothing of the cavity that used to gnaw there, nothing of But I did not have a spare life to sacrifice. This is my the stretched veins or aching spaces that used to make one and my only, and there are things I want to achieve. I me feel so safe. The fact that I have had anorexia, and could not countenance dropping out of school, conceding that my experience is now almost entirely in the perfect defeat to an illness, forfeiting my talent and letting others tense, and mostly forgotten to a mind focused now on self- take my place. When my pride – battered, hollow and preservation, concerns me. I feel invalidated, as though almost gone – gave its final kick, I took my first, little step a slice of my history has been erased, annulled. I cannot from the edge. reconcile my present – my warm, vital present – with that Contrary to popular belief, an anorexic cannot “just which supposedly went before. eat”. For the first few weeks of recovery I could not think But so it went. I starved myself silent and almost beyond having one marshmallow for afternoon tea, instead slipped over the edge. Drowning in the all-consuming of the usual piece of spearmint gum. The idea of having black of depression, body and mind weakened from lack a marshmallow in the afternoon was so frightening that it of food, I walked in front of cars, forswore seatbelts, beat took me about half an hour to eat it. When I occasionally and clawed at my arms, my thighs, my face, in a desperate braved a nut (a cashew, generally) it took even longer. To attempt to rid me of being, to absolve myself of myself. have something in my mouth – even water, sometimes – My mind, now comfortably considering the potato bake I literally terrified me. ate for dinner and the Nabokov next on my list was once Obviously, there is something deeper at work here so collapsed, so wasted, that I lay down and prayed to a than mere obsession with weight. What is commonly deity I could not believe in for a heart attack that would misunderstood is that intrinsically, anorexia has nothing not come. to do with weight. Weight – food – becomes the adopted I know all this now thanks to my mother, who nexus of the many underlying issues. Starvation of body unfortunately remembers it all, and thanks to the diary conveniently becomes starvation of mind. And with the I kept leading up to, during, and after my fall. To begin disabling of mind comes the disabling of issue. Emotions with, this diary was just another way to constrain myself, numb. Nothing matters. Adrenalin kicks in. At the

mental health to compel myself to apply the same fastidiousness to beginning at least, the anorexic has more energy, more

24 SAM Spring 08 vigour. What once served as a biological power surge to I did not to eat. We need to pay people to tell us when, how much help find food in times of scarcity becomes a perverse and what to eat; what to feed our children; where to buy validation of this very hunger. have a our food; how to prepare our vegetables. We have lost our The trap is set: from here it is harder to eat than it spare life biological connection with the most fundamental means is to deny, and it is easier to ignore than it is to combat. of survival: the gathering and consuming of food. We are The ability to eat, the functions of appetite, are lost – to sacrifice raising a generation of people preoccupied with what willfully forgotten – and as starvation establishes itself, the should be natural. dangerous rhetoric of an eating disorder becomes harder I am on the other side now, but I am no nearer to and harder to penetrate from the outside. But this is only understanding what I went through, or why. I – we – can the beginning, and for those suffering from an eating only speculate. And this is what is important: the culture disorder, there will only be further surrender. of silence that surrounds mental disorders does neither The questions I am commonly asked tend towards its observers nor its sufferers any good. Current attitudes ideas of prevention. What can we do, asked one radio to mental illness must change. An eating disorder is not a interviewer, to prevent our children developing eating weakness. It is a misguided way to cope. SAM disorders? I am not an expert, I only have the (scrappy) Biting Anorexia – a first-hand account of an internal war, memory of the madness. But I do have something to say by Lucy Howard-Taylor, Finch Publishing, $24.95. about it. My upbringing was happy, healthy and stable. My parents both have a healthy relationship to food, and we Useful websites: have always eaten as a family around the table. My brother The Eating Disorders Foundation Inc: and I are encouraged to speak up, to express ourselves, http://www.edf.org.au/ and I have always been unconditionally supported and encouraged in any endeavour. Clearly, according to some The Butterfly Foundation: analysts, I should never have developed a mental illness. www.thebutterflyfoundation.org.au But I did, and I did so badly. Reach Out: www.reachout.com.au What could my parents have done to prevent it? I Lucy and Wobby believe that our communities must shoulder at least part aka Oscar We Bite Back Internet Support Forum: of the blame. As a modern society, we have forgotten how photo: Jeremy Yao www.webiteback.com

SAM Spring 08 25 Happy accidents: the making of a marvellous man

Lord (Robert) May interview and photography: Alison Muir

n a recent speech to policymakers in Berlin, world “Sydney University was an extraordinary place to be leader in mathematical biology, Australian-born in the 1950s,” he says, recalling how Messel, one of the ILord May of Oxford (BSc ’57 PhD ’60) said: “Small first to seek research funds from corporate and private actions now are disproportionately important. They are sponsors, ended up in a poker game with Sir Frank more important than bigger actions later because of the Packer and other potential donors. Not long into the game non-linearity of the process we are talking about.” Messel was dealt a royal flush but instead of scooping What he and the policymakers were talking about – the pot, he kept his mouth shut and quietly discarded and what Australia is talking about with renewed vigour the winning hand. “He thought it would not be very since the ratification of the Kyoto Protocol – is climate helpful if he won,” May reports with an impish grin. change. Lord (Robert) May – “call me Bob” – whose first At the time, “Harry and his mates” were working philosophy choice of title for his 2001 life peerage was Lord May of on the hot topic of superconductivity and were Woollahra (vetoed by Australian government protocol, having such a good time that May decided to join in sadly) has made deceptively simple yet potentially the fun and do his PhD in theoretical physics. One world-shaking pronouncements the habit of a lifetime. of Messel’s “mates”, Robbie Schafroth, became his President of the Royal Society of London from PhD supervisor. When Schafroth was offered the 2000-2005, former chief scientific adviser to the British foundation chair at the University of Geneva, he Government and a professor at Sydney, Harvard, asked May to join him as his assistant. A short time Princeton, Oxford and the Imperial College, London, later, however, Schafroth was killed in a plane crash. Lord May graduated from the University of Sydney in May took off for Harvard to do a post-doctorate. 1959 with a doctorate in theoretical physics. Chemical It was while at Harvard that he met his wife, Judith, engineering had been his original choice but as he pointed and with his post-doctorate under his belt, the pair flew out in November 2007 when he delivered the keynote home to Sydney. They married in the summer of 1962 and lecture at the Lowy Institute (he sits on its advisory built a house in Lane Cove. For the next 10 years May was committee), his life has been “a series of accidents.” Professor of Theoretical Physics at Sydney University. “I wasn’t sure what I wanted to do when I left Sydney Boys’ High,” says May. “The careers advisor said I should Animal dynamics be a lawyer as we had a rather good debating team, and Drawn to Charles Birch, the main figure for founding my family wanted me to do medicine. However, I had a social responsibility in science in Australia, May says it very influential science teacher and it was partly because was during this time that he literally “blundered” into of him – and because I wanted to do something practical ecology. “I was trying to find out what I was being socially – that I enrolled in first year chemical engineering.” responsible about, when I read Ecology Resource Management Young Bob May loved puzzles and games and thought by Ken Watt and began thinking about applying it would be “fun” to sit the same exams as his friends. mathematics to ecological problem solving,” he says. History doesn’t record what they thought when he Birch didn’t think “this theoretical stuff” would topped maths and chemistry and came third in physics. be of any use but rather than dismissing it out “I hadn’t studied for physics,” he says cheerfully but of hand, he suggested May talk to Princeton’s adds that he won a ₤100 prize – one contingent on him famous ecologist Robert H. MacArthur. completing second year physics and chemistry. “The sheer “Again it was just an extraordinary lucky accident accident of that meant I studied second year chemical because this was at a time when some of those in engineering and physics.” He “did pretty well”. ecology had begun to frame questions in the style of By third year, May decided to major in pure theoretical physics, such as the structure of the food web, maths, applied maths and physics. “Then the people or what determines the relative abundance of species in [the School of] Physics were very keen that I do within a community,” May remembers. “For example, the Honours year and that’s how it happened.” why were there six species of warblers in the trees of Vermont and not 60 or just one.” MacArthur, he says, Science is fun was a leader in framing these questions. “But none of May is convinced that anyone planning to study them had the box of tricks to handle it,” he adds. science should want to do it because it looks like None that is, until May came along. Rather than Bob May lecturing “fun”. This was exactly how he viewed his chance embark on an 18-month sabbatical to study astrophysics at the Harry Messel International Science to work with eminent Canadian-born physicist Harry in Britain, May went to Princeton. Terminally ill with School, circa 1971 Messel, then running the School of Physics. renal cancer, MacArthur, 42, had only a few months

26 SAM Spring 08 SAM Spring 08 27 to live. Within an hour of their meeting, he offered May the job as his successor. Thus, as a result of yet another “accident”, May became Professor of Zoology at Princeton for the next 16 years, where, using his He created skills in theoretical physics and mathematics, he created the new biology field of “chaotic dynamics”. By the new using mathematical modeling, May not only revealed biology field the fluctuating dynamics of animal populations but of “chaotic contributed greatly to the formulation of environmental policies and how best to manage different ecosystems. dynamics” “If you look backwards to the theory of evolution, there’s a wonderful phrase in one of Darwin’s letters in which he bemoans the fact that he didn’t have maths,” says May. HIV and AIDS Leaving the USA in 1988, May took up professorships at the Imperial College, London, and Oxford University, where he continued his research into mathematical biology, analysing the conditions under which viruses and bacteria affect host populations. The results he obtained impacted a broad spectrum of science in the public health sector, ranging from genetic research into disease carriers to strategies for dealing with parasites. In addition he investigated the spread of AIDS and offered effective proposals for policies to slow the spread of HIV, AIDS and other contagious diseases. “Ecologists like more romantic things – preferably things with fur and feathers – rather than looking down a microscope and thinking about diseases,” he says. “But my colleague, Roy Anderson, and I were interested in

Please take 10 minutes to take the on-line Faculty of Science Alumni Survey: www.science.usyd.edu.au/alumnisurvey TheThe SearchSearch ForFor Please complete the survey by midnight on 3rd October 2008 and have a chance to win one of four iPod Nanos! If you would like to know more about the survey or about our current range ScienceScience AlumniAlumni of activities please contact Trixie Barretto: [email protected]

Did you graduate from the Faculty of Science at In addition to this, our current and prospective Sydney? What are you up to now? students are always keen to know what a degree in science will mean to them in terms of Science can lead you in so many different preparing for an interesting career - I hope that directions and it is always interesting to learn feedback gathered by the survey will provide about the career paths and achievements of our information about how a science training can be alumni. used to prepare for the wide range of careers in I would like to find out more about our Alumni which we know our alumni are engaged. and how you would like to be contacted by the I encourage you to provide us with information University and the Faculty. Would you like to through the survey and look forward to your know more about our outreach activities, your feedback – it will assist me and my team to classmates and be invited to events? Would better understand the science student and you be interested in mentoring current students alumni experience, enabling us to change or or finding out more about the research and improve our services where necessary. achievements of our scientists? Professor David Day, Dean of Science

Professor David Day, Dean of Science The Faculty of Science

28 SAM Spring 08 the degree to which infectious disease might affect the It is more extinction, he dismisses claims that today’s flora and fauna numerical abundance and geographical distribution of are the raw stuff of tomorrow’s biotech industry. Instead he animals and plants. That led us back to thinking about valid, he contends that in the future scientists will begin designing humans and their engagement with infectious disease.” believes, to breakthrough medicines and biotech products from the May and Anderson published the world’s first estimate molecule up rather than go bio-prospecting for them. of HIV infection in sub-Saharan Africa in 1991 but cautions measure the It is more valid, he believes, to measure the health of that understanding the exact pathogenesis of HIV is still health of ecosystems in conventional GDP terms. “Attempts are some way off. “We understand how individual molecules ecosystems in now being made to do this but we still don’t understand act, how the virus interacts with the immune system cells, enough about how ecosystems are structured, how they and we can describe it at a molecular level. But we still conventional function, or what happens when we take bits out of them don’t understand how lots of strains of HIV interact with GDP terms or put new bits into them unintentionally,” he says. He lots of strains of the immune system cells. We are probably quotes one of the founding fathers of the conservation going to need to do this before we have a vaccine.” movement, Aldo Leopold, who said that the first rule While many would regard the USA as the number one of intelligent tinkering “was to keep all the pieces”. leader in science, May disputes this, particularly in regard May cites the 2001 United Nations-sponsored to AIDS research. “Australia is one of the leaders here Millennium Ecosystem Assessment (www. and from the beginning looked at the science and did milleniumassassment.org) which grouped ecosystem not befuddle it with faith-based doctrinaire prejudices,” services under 25 broad headings to find out what sort he says, citing the US government’s opposition to needle of shape they were in. With five of the categories it was distribution programs and the distribution of condoms. hard to say. With three associated with human food production, they had actually improved. Worryingly, Climate change however, the remaining 17 were all deemed to be in serious trouble. But while May believes this creates From his own research as well as his work as Scientific a compelling argument for stewardship, he points Adviser to the UK Government from 1995-2000 and his out that “stewardship is a motive that comes more time as President of the Royal Society, May is well aware comfortably with the luxury of the comfortable life. If of the problems facing the world from climate change, new you are someone struggling to feed your family in the and re-emerging diseases and the loss of biological diversity. developing world it may be a less powerful motive.” “Ahead of us are dangerous times,” he warns. “Many of He pauses, then flashes a quick smile. “As a these threats are not yet immediate, yet their non-linear scientist, though, it is not a question of whether or character is such that we need to be acting today.” not I care about these things. I work on the problem Examining the different arguments put forward by Above left: Lord May not out of some sort of motive to be a good person conservationists in their bid to save various creatures from and Bob May above but simply because they are good problems.” SAM

SAM Spring 08 29 books

GOD, ACTUALLY DEATH AMONG THE VINES FRAGMENTS FROM A ROY WILLIAMS RICHARD YOUNG FORGETTORY ABC BOOKS, $35 ZEUS PUBLICATIONS, DOUG BUCKLEY $27.95 or $26.95 online at SID HARTA PUBLISHERS, $29.95 www.zeus-publications.com

Roy Williams (BA ’84 LLB ’86) was a Detective Sergeant Sloan of Cessnock The cheeky young scamp who was successful lawyer and religious sceptic Police tells his younger colleague, Doug Buckley (BE (Civil) ’58) as a until 2004 when illness forced him out “Cherchez the relatives.” It’s advice lad of 11 recalls John Curtin’s funeral of the courtroom and into a period of that would be familiar to most at Perth’s Karrakatta Cemetery. It was deep reflection. The result is a book experienced murder squad detectives. a sweltering hot day, he recalls. The whose subtitle is: “Why God probably Richard Young (BA ’62) has worked Buckley family was living in the West exists, why Jesus was probably divine and for many years in advertising, teaching “because of the war” and it’s where why the ‘rational’ objections to religion and journalism before turning his hand this charming memoir begins. are unconvincing.” It doesn’t get much to this, his first novel, a page-turning Buckley’s style is discursive, more provocative than that. murder mystery that achieves its aim digressive and – despite the title – he It’s also a painstakingly honest of bamboozling the reader with red shows no sign of having forgotten and thoughtful book. And wherever herrings and dead ends. anything during his 74 years. More you sit on the believer-nonbeliever The dead end is literal in the than that, few ideas or matters spectrum, it demands close attention case of Col Ashcombe, patriarch of momentous or minor have escaped for the respect demonstrated by the Ashcombe Estate, a Hunter Valley his interest and consideration. author for his readers. vineyard with a fading reputation. Buckley has a droll sense of One of Williams’s most compelling He is found, face down and violently humour. His shortcomings as an arguments for the existence of deceased in a creek. engineering student at Sydney are God is what has become popularly His son Tim comes home from comically recalled. More significant, known as “intelligent design”. It’s an New York to a family as dysfunctional perhaps, is his account of student life unfortunate tag because it has become as ever and his estranged cousins, the as a minority “Australian” resident of debased and degraded by association Clements, glowering from next door. Wingham, the house on the other side with ignorance, stupidity and various There are plenty of likely suspects of the harbour that was the forerunner attempts – Ohio’s Creation Museum, to cherchez: a slighted son-in-law, a for example – to prove that the world dodgy investment broker, and various of International House. is only 6000 years old. people to whom Col has been rude. A self-confessed duffer and joker, Williams argues, however, that There is also Tim himself, for a you might think that Buckley’s “intelligent design” and the theory number of reasons. later illustrious career happened by of evolution are neither inimical A rekindled childhood romance accident. His modesty and wry sense nor mutually exclusive. Both sit complicates the issue as Pearl is of of himself in the world permeates comfortably in the underlying fractal the Clements clan. That she and Tim every page. geometry of Nature and creation. last met at 15 and 14 respectively The book is a series of ruminations God, Actually is a book that will and are now in their mid-30s adds an on this and that: the meaning of stir ferocious argument and debate. interesting element. “west” for instance occupies a couple It is erudite, wide-ranging, reasoned The Hunter is evoked in all of light-hearted paragraphs; weightier and reasonable, and asks only that its mid-summer stifling heat; matters are allowed to run their its observations and arguments be the business of vineyards is also course. The style is informal and full approached with an open mind. convincing, as is Tim’s edgy world of insight. Anyone who’s ever had the Sadly, if what usually passes for in New York. The “psychological” good fortune to sit down for stories public debate in this country is any aspects are less plausible for being with a favourite uncle or granddad All reviews by guide, that’s an awfully big ask. I telegraphed and explained, but the will revel in the tone and richness of Diana Simmonds recommend you give it a try. overall effect is of ripping readability. this delightful forgettory.

30 SAM Spring 08 with an awful smell; now we’ve got one that’s fallen in love with George the gardener.” It’s Upstairs Downstairs with a colonial twist. Meanwhile, Rania and Alice fossicked for what they needed, badgered the top brass, and provided smokes, good fresh food and even, occasionally, icecream for the soldiers. Among their visitors: Banjo Paterson, T.E. Lawrence, and many Bedouin dignitaries. Rainbow is laced with excerpts from letters, diaries, journals and official papers, but is not overwhelmed by its research. It is always human and colourful. Horsfield has brought to life the reasons why so many young RAINBOW Australians signed up and sailed away JENNIFER HORSFIELD GINNINDERA PRESS, $27.50 to their deaths and also the terrible toll taken on their families and society back home.

Historian Jennie Horsfield (BA Hons IN BRIEF ’68) first came to public notice with Mary Cunningham, her eponymous GLOBALISATION AND THE biography of the Canberra region’s WESTERN LEGAL TRADITION 19th century pioneer. Horsfield’s DAVID GOLDMAN second non-fiction work is subtitled CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY PRESS, $89.95 “the story of Rania MacPhillamy” and tells of another hitherto unknown Digital technology and the Internet Australian heroine. This time the have been embraced by commerce setting is WW1 and Egypt. and communications and have In 1915, Rania left Warroo, the accelerated change in societies around family property beyond Forbes, for the world. Law, morality and politics Cairo and worked in a hospital among are struggling to catch up. As the the Gallipoli wounded. She was a title suggests, this book explores and privileged young woman and little in seeks to understand the impact and her background could have prepared implications of globalisation on hitherto her for the conditions and work nation state-bound Western law. that faced her. She teamed up with When he launched the book, another older Australian woman, Alice Justice Michael Kirby said it should Chisholm, and between them they be “compulsory reading in all not only coped but flourished despite Australian law schools”. appalling conditions. Their work and Dr David Goldman is a partner in care became legendary among the law firm Deacons and an Honorary Light Horsemen and eventually they Affiliate of the Julius Stone Institute were recognised with an OBE for of Jurisprudence at the University. Rania and DBE for Alice. Horsfield puts the war and Rania SOLOMON ISLAND YEARS in context by drawing a rich picture of JAMES TEDDER moneyed rural life in Australia leading TAUTU STUDIES, $40.70 inc P&P up to the conflict. And she contrasts Like many young men of his time, that life – unimaginably far away, full James Tedder (BEc ’51) MBE, of loss and longing, but relatively safe finished University and joined the – with Rania’s experiences in Egypt. Colonial Service. He was promptly While she is coping with death sent to the Solomon Islands and the and disease, for instance, her younger adventures of a wet-behind-the-ears, sister writes, “The cook I got from 20-something District Officer would Muriel, rather too friendly, but very be familiar to anyone who has lived in clean; the housemaids have been very an outpost of Empire. hard; the first after the Newberrys left The book can be purchased by (they were dogs) was Annie – she got sending a cheque or money order subpoenaed in a divorce case; second made out to the author at Pavans was Etta Jones who nearly killed us all Access via Stuarts Point, NSW 2441.

SAM Spring 08 31
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32 SAM Spring 08

CSC_118x90_SAM.indd 1 12/8/08 8:56:40 AM Process CyanProcess MagentaProcess YellowProcess Black Waiting for Lucky nb By Kelly Royds

uncher & Wattmann is a prize winning publishing Phouse dedicated to spicing up the Australian literary scene, says founder and alumni David Musgrave (PhD '97). “What we publish is new, innovative and slightly out of the mainstream.” Musgrave’s interest in poetry and literature first found its outlet in Hermes, Sydney University’s longest running literary journal. He also formed associations with other literary Angkor enthusiasts and worked on a weekly newsletter. “I was always interested Summer in putting things together and I was writing the whole time,” he said. School After completing his PhD in n January (2009) Dr Martin Menippean satire (an ancient Polkinghorne, a specialist in form that mixes poetry and prose), are people like me hanging out for IKhmer art, will lead an intensive Musgrave won a number of awards a book that they can read and lose 18-day study tour to Cambodia including the Bruce Dawe Poetry themselves in ... Something that is focusing on the history, art history Prize, the Broadway Poetry Prize, the stimulating and that makes you want and archaeology of Angkor. Sidney Nolan Gallery Poetry Prize to go and find out about things.” The tour is open to students, staff and the Henry Lawson Poetry Prize. The successful publication of and alumni of the University, and “The opportunity to start up Alex Jones’ first novel, Helen Garner members of the public. Successful the press only really came in 2004 and the Meaning of Everything and completion of the academic elements after I won a couple of reasonably his more recent, Morris in Iceland, big prizes. I had an agreement with of the tour will be worth six credit has helped to build Puncher & my partner that the money I won points. It is also a unique opportunity Wattmann’s profile and reputation wouldn’t go on the mortgage, and I to gain access to lesser-known for high editorial standards. basically used it to set up the press.” remnants of the Khmer empire. Musgrave believes that the The press is Puncher & The School of Languages and standard of editing has fallen in Wattmann, named for two unknowns Culture within the University has Australia and says it is having a who are mentioned by Lucky – structured the trip to integrate negative impact on the quality formal lectures with exclusive site but never appear – in Beckett’s of published material. visits and field excursions to temples Waiting For Godot. Launched in “In almost all the reviews I‘ve and archaeological excavations 2005 by David Malouf, its first read in the past few years there (which are not normally open to publication, Nick Riemer’s James are the comments that ‘this book tourism’s 2 million annual visitors). Stinks (and so does Chuck), came could have done with more editing.’ According to Dr Jillian Stewart, third in the Mary Gilmore Award. That emphasis, it seems, is gone." Director of Sydney Summer In 2007, Musgrave joined forces The downgrading of expert School, the trip will also include with Matthew Halt (PhD ’98), a “a boat trip to Phnom Penh, visits prose writer, and poet Greg McLaren in-house editing and reliance to contemporary art galleries, the (The Kurri Kurri Book of the Dead), on software-based spelling and National Museum of Cambodia, the who met Musgrave in the early grammar programs has contributed Russian market and several dinners.” years of Puncher & Wattmann. to the falling standards he says. The study tour is from 10 to 27 The trio’s passion for writing is “Spellcheck has made everything January. A non-refundable $500 vital to the company’s success. easier but potentially sloppier,” says deposit will reserve your place. “We are all pretty fired up about it, Musgrave, adding pragmatically, we do it all on our own money and we “Our current goals are to outsource Kelly Royds work out of my flat,” says Musgrave. the editing, find an office and For a tour brochure and further Puncher & Wattman is focused be able to pay ourselves.” Angkor Wat detail on finding exciting material and information, contact Wayne Isbister (above left) on (02) 9351 3038, or David Musgrave, getting it out to the public. “I’m not For more information visit the website: [email protected]. (above right) unusual,” says Musgrave. “There www.puncherandwattmann.com SAM Spring 08 33 From Sydney to Venice f there is one architect who defines Australia to the world – indeed, defines Australian architecture to locals as well – it would probably be the Pritzker IPrize-winning Glenn Murcutt (DArch ’04). It’s a sweet irony, then, when Wendy Lewin (BSc (Arch) ’75 BArch ’78) talks about “opening up the perception of what Australian architects do. “For many years people overseas have thought only of what’s produced by a handful of Australian architects, and the media goes along with that as well. Yet this country has very diverse ways of practicing, and extraordinary projects that are being produced around the country. But they are not seen.” Now Lewin, respected architect and teacher at the University of Sydney, who is also married to Murcutt, is about to remedy that. With colleagues Neil Durbach, Melbourne architect Kerstin Thompson, and designers Vince Frost and Gary Warner, she is part of the Australian Pavilion’s creative team for the forthcoming 11th Venice International Architecture Biennale. Typically, the Biennale showcases an individual’s work, or that of a handful of practices. But this year the team thought big and broad, approaching architects across the country who, in the past four or five years, had been listed for awards, or whose teaching involved them closely in new architecture in Australia. Sydney’s Professor Tom Heneghan is represented among the teachers, with a playful new take on Geraldine O’Brien talks to the “cubby house”. Other Sydney-based practices include Choi Ropiha, Dale Jones Evans, Eeles Wendy Lewin about the Trelease, Neeson (Nicholas) Murcutt, Peter 11th Venice International Stutchbury and Terroir, as well as artist Janet Laurence and artist-architect Richard Goodwin. Architecture Biennale Oddly enough, Lewin and her partners had already been chosen from a shortlist of seven to plan the Australian exhibition well before the 11th Biennale’s theme had been formalised. When director Aaron Betsky announced it as Out There: Architecture Beyond Building, it chimed happily with their own approach. “The theme can mean many things, and for us it was pleasantly open,” Lewin says. “It can mean buildings by themselves are not enough to make ourselves at home in; it can take in interiors and landscape and other elements. “Betsky talks about some buildings as ‘tombs of architecture’ which we shouldn’t promote for the future. Instead, we should embrace vitality and change; He’s also very interested in media that now enables us to make extraordinary shapes – it’s not necessarily [producing] good architecture, but the media does allow us to explore new shapes and materials.” The theme can also embrace environmental and landscape issues as well, giving the team a free-ranging choice. They approached 180 individuals and practices, asking for a model of either a work-in-progress or “the germ of an idea”. Some models already existed, others were made especially for the Biennale – and they come in a host of materials: timber, resin, brass, steel, acrylics.

34 SAM Spring 08 manipulation going on.” And that is what makes for the distinctive “Australianness” within the local architectural tradition. Having been immersed in this historical context visitors are then moved through to the lower room where the 280 models will be assembled on individual yellow anodised stands around the room – “like a sort of free-form coastline,” Lewin says, that visitors will be able to walk around. The recurrent choice of yellow, specially created

architecture by Dulux for the occasion, has a practical purpose. The Australian Pavilion is set back behind two rather substantial older buildings, and the exuberant colour will be noticed from the main path and, hopefully, will draw visitors in to see what lies beyond. Dulux have named it “Abundant”, in tribute to the team’s own theme for the exhibition. Having gone through months of work to refine their ideas, collate and mount the exhibition, Lewin is more convinced than ever of the generous abundance of talent and creativity in Australian architecture. the theme There is a façade based on the filigree pattern of a She completed her architecture can mean moth’s wing; a “future shack” made from a shipping degree at Sydney in 1977 and since container; an origami crane of stainless steel mesh; a then has worked as a tutor, conducting many things space science centre inspired by the spirals of a birthing master classes in design in the and for nebula, and a luxury mixed-use building based on a School of Architecture, in addition snowflake pattern. The latter is a proposed new work us it was to running her own practice. for Dubai, but there are also proposals for houses, She has seen huge changes pleasantly commercial high-rise and medium-density housing. over that time, particularly since open “But they are not recognisable objects,” Lewin the doldrums of the 1980s. emphasises. “They’re exploratory models, the ideas “The design studios are now open, for work. there’s great freedom in using the place, “We approached people who we knew and it’s more collegiate than it was. would take the idea seriously but who would “Teaching here is a joy in the also do it with enthusiasm and humour.” sense that it pleases me to have the The results will be on show in Venice during discussion and debate with students the Vernissage from September 11-13, and then and with the other teachers.” open to the general public for three months. Philip Cox’s Australian Pavilion – painted a vivid Footnote: For those who won’t make it acid-yellow for the occasion – will house the exhibition to Venice, Lewin and her confreres have on two floors. In the upper level, visitors will see a arranged with Sydney’s Object Gallery slide presentation assembled by artist Ian de Gruchy, to show the exhibition in January, showing all the buildings mentioned in the catalogue during the Sydney Festival. SAM essay by architectural historian Conrad Hamann. The popular misconception, Hamann argues, is that Australian architecture historically has been derivative – from the earliest Georgian to the International Style. Wendy Lewin and But, says Lewin, “whether it comes from Europe or the various elements States or Asia, architects have manipulated that model of Australia’s and there’s some play or hybridisation going on. Very Venice exhibit. few buildings are pure ‘Georgian’ or ‘International’ Photos: Brett Boardman style. Those styles are taken on very comfortably Photography here but there’s always some idiosyncratic

SAM Spring 08 35 Come in spinner Everything you didn’t know you didn’t know about a fast-growing sport. Oscar Ware reports

ith the focus so firmly on set of rules. Since then it has spread traditional sports such to more than 40 countries around Was rugby, cricket and the world. As well as having its own rowing, it is not really surprising that world championships, Ultimate Ultimate Frisbee, one of the most Frisbee is played at the World Games skilful and fast-paced sports played every four years. While it reached at University of Sydney, receives Australia in the 1970s, it has been so little attention. Even though it only over the past 10 years that the has been on the University‘s fixture game’s popularity has taken off. lists for more than a decade, Team “When I started there were not Frisbee still slips beneath the radar. many people around to play with,” “You get used to it,” Brett Latham says. “Now people say ‘oh Latham says on the low profile of yeah, I’ve heard of that’ or ‘oh yeah, his sport. Latham is the president I’ve seen people playing that’.” of the Sydney University Ultimate And while Latham concedes Frisbee Association, or SUFFA. that Ultimate Frisbee – or simply Now a fourth-year BSc student, Ultimate to many enthusiasts – is Latham stumbled across Ultimate still developing its own place in Frisbee during student orientation the Australian sporting landscape, week. He was hooked immediately. he is optimistic about its future. “It’s so easy to get into,” he says. “You “This is my fourth year of playing just pick it up and start playing.” at uni, and we’ve gone from having 30 To an outsider, the game might or so members in the club to recruiting seem a little strange. In what seems 70-plus at orientation week,” he to be a peculiar blend of netball says. “Just give it a few more years and American football, two teams and Ultimate is going to be huge.” of seven players use an array of Not that the University’s results different throws to move a 175-gram aren’t impressive already. Having plastic disc from one end of a field placed first in the Australian to the “scoring zone” at the other. University Games in 2001, Sydney The playing field itself is came second for the next three years rectangular in shape and while most before placing third in 2005. They games are played outdoors on grass, slipped to fifth and then seventh on less formal games of Frisbee may the ladder during 2006 and 2007, but be played on beaches, indoors, even Latham is confident of future success. in quiet streets and car parks. “The last time we got a medal was The result is a fast-moving, 2005, but this year we’ve got a few free-flowing game that players and people who have been playing on spectators find captivating. “I’ve national teams,” he explains. “We’re played every sport under the sun but definitely expecting to get a medal.” once I found myself in Frisbee there The team goes to Melbourne to was no going back,” Latham says. contest the 2008 Australian University Little known beyond its devotees Games later this month (September). in Australia, the sport itself is not Part of the appeal of the new. Ultimate Frisbee was officially Ultimate Frisbee comes from its conceived in the United States in inclusiveness. Age, skill and fitness 1968 when students at Columbia levels do not limit participation in High School in New Jersey laid out a the sport, and because many of the

36 SAM Spring 08 games are mixed-gender, there are different weekly comps you can play, opportunities for anyone to play. as well as training and tournaments.” “At Sydney Uni we get people It’s the same for Latham. “All my to start playing socially,” Latham best friends are frisbee people,” he explains. “Then, if they like it, says. “It’s something you all share; you they can play more competitively all have in common. It’s extremely

sport at tournaments that usually take rare for me to play in a team where I place every couple of weeks.” don’t know half the people already.” From there the But Latham admits it can be possibilities are endless. frustrating coming across those “If they want to take it even outside Ultimate Frisbee who don’t further they can start training see it as a “real” sport. “When you regularly, trying out for uni say you play Ultimate Frisbee people games and even get into a will often say ‘oh yeah, does your dog national team,” Latham says. play as well?’” he laughs. “But the But for many, what clearly sets people who say it’s not a real sport are Ultimate Frisbee apart from other usually people who haven’t played it.” sports is its spirit of fair play and Gavin agrees that hearing people sportsmanship. Even at the highest discredit her sport can be tiresome. level the game is self-umpired, leaving “When I told people I was going the rules in the hands of the players. overseas to represent my country, Clare Gavin, who with Latham the general reaction was amazement, was part of Sydney University’s but when I said it was for Frisbee, Ultimate Frisbee team in the they would laugh,” she says. “That Australian University Games last year, annoyed me because playing at an attests to the good nature of the sport. elite level, no matter what the sport “There’s a ‘spirit’ award, which is, still requires skill and motivation, comes from the fact that the game is self-refereed,” she explains. “So fitness and hard training.” you have to abide by the rules But Latham can understand and play in a spirited manner. It’s the cynicism some people hold friendly but still competitive.” towards the game. Even he wasn’t Latham agrees. “People say altogether sure if it was genuine because it’s self-refereed it’s not the first time he heard of it. competitive, but once you’re on the “I was a bit sceptical at first,” he field you realise that it’s extremely, says. “But once you see people doing extremely competitive,” he says. these amazing things, you start having It might explain why ultimate a certain level of respect for them.” players are such a tightly knit bunch. And both Latham and Gavin Everyone who plays the game seems have responses for people to know everyone else, as if it were who dismiss their sport. some kind of underground subculture “As soon as you pull out the rather than a sporting community. fact that you’ve been to world “Frisbee is probably the most championships and played all over the incestuous sport of all,” Gavin laughs. globe, they tend to shut up,” Gavin “I think that comes down to the fact laughs. Latham agrees. “In the end Photos: that you’re seeing the same people it’s their loss if they haven’t tried it Prudence Upton all the time – you’ve got a couple of because it’s such a great sport.” SAM

SAM Spring 08 37 grapevine class notes across the decades

and International Relations at 2000s Aalborg University, Denmark. I decided to return to Scandinavia Bryce Cassin (RN, BA ’00) After to study because of the wonderful nearly two decades working in the experiences of my undergraduate NSW public health system, six years exchange at the University of Oslo, ago Bryce moved into project and Norway in 2006. I am now embarking program management on national on a research project and field and state organisational change studies in Aden, Yemen. My research projects in complex health care will focus on Ethiopian and Somali organisations. He was recently migrant protection and livelihood appointed senior lecturer in the support in southern Yemen, and will postgraduate Project Management be completed in collaboration with Program within the Faculty of Design the Danish Refugee Council. Once Architecture and Building at the returned from Yemen, I intend to University of Technology, Sydney. continue my research on voluntary His research aims to understand and forced migration from the Horn the social space within workplace of Africa in Denmark. environments. His research at the University of Technology Sydney in the Master of Design program modelled the limits of organisational 1990s interaction and communication. Alphonse Kapi Malipu Bryce’s PhD research interprets (MEc ’97) Served as Head of Banking interaction problems within local and Finance within the School of workplace cultures from the work Business Administration, University of John Dewey and Lev Vygotsky. of Papua New Guinea from January Bryce’s primary degree was a 2004 to June 2007, and served as Bachelor of Arts (Hons Class 1) in Associate Director (Centre & Student Medieval Studies at the University Support) of the Open College, Sea to the Caspian with transfered Carolyn Smale (MAppSc ’97) of Sydney, completed in 2000. He is University of Papua New Guinea B. ovata. Results showed that as the I graduated as a physiotherapist married to Stephanie and they live from June 2007 to January 2008. two are interconnected, bacteria is in 1975 and have since continued with their three children in the Blue I'm currently reading for my PhD in as likely to be carried by ships. Also, my studies, achieving a Master of Mountains near Sydney. Finance and Banking at Southern parasites die off during adaptation Applied Science in 1997. I started my Cross University’s Lismore Campus. to change of salinity, so there is little own practice in 1978 and became Cindy Forshaw (BSW Hons ’00) risk in introducing B. ovata into the interested in business issues, is currently completing a Masters Hossein Negarestan (PhD ’98) Caspian. We also tried to artificially the things we were not taught at in Psychoanalytic Study with Deakin My PhD is in the field of Marine propagate B. ovata but could not get University at that time. Soon after University and has “dug in” to the Ecology. At present I am Head of larvae to grow to adult stage in lab I became a foundation member Virtual England” (Bowral in the Department of Aquatic Ecology conditions. of a new School and this has led NSW southern highlands). Here at the Iranian Fisheries Research I am also interested to establish me to increase my involvement in she is practicing counselling with Organization (IFRO). One important an Iran Alumni Association. Please management and governance issues. the help of Narrative Therapy. Also scientific challenge we faced here contact me on I am now Chairman of the board of a researching schizophrenia and in the 1990s was the invasion of [email protected] if large private school and although I hoping to complete some writing on the Caspian Sea by a comb jelly, you would like to participate. have sold my physiotherapy practice, the subject in the next few months. Mnemiopsis leidyi. My research I continue to work full time as a (Still getting a buzz from having my team conducted studies on its Anthony Perosh (BAppSc ’94) musculo-skeletal physiotherapist writing analysed!) Fellow Social Work impact on the ecosystem, especially (above) is now an Ultimate Fighter! and have recently completed my students (of 2000) who would like to zooplankton of the Caspian Sea. I have competed at the highest level Diploma of Financial Services with attend a reunion, please contact me Its effects were dramatic on the in the sport at UFC61 and UFC66 Kaplan. I am now interested in on [email protected]. Kilka fisheries. These small fish (Ultimate Fighting Championships). completing a MBA. are vital to the local economy and I now own and run two full-time Madhu Gayer (MComm ’06) ecology and we worked to combat martial arts schools where students My degrees at Sydney (Bachelors and the comb jelly populations. We were may learn Brazilian Jiu Jitsu, Thai 1980s Masters) in Commerce have taken able to find a workable solution kickboxing, wrestling, mixed martial Vincent Crow (BA ’71 DipEd ’72 me all over Asia in the finance world using its natural predator enemy arts and Ki yoga. (www.spma.net.au). Med (Hons) ’86) was awarded the and I am now working at a boutique Beroe ovata. To do this we had to Medal of the Order of Australia fund manager, helping manage $340 find out whether B. ovata can live Andre Schoen (MBA ’92, in 1994 “for service to heritage million-worth of super fund money in and propagate in Caspian Sea water PhD ’02) was recently appointed conservation”. He did the original global fixed income. (less salty than normal). Then we Director Infrastructure, in charge research and began the campaign looked at B. ovata’s potential effect of all railway-related infrastructure to have the Federation suburb of Ariel B Press (BIntS ’07) on other zooplankters. We found business for Siemens UK. The Haberfield in Sydney declared an Shortly after graduating from that it doesn’t feed on anything but railway infrastructure business urban conservation area. In 2003 the Bachelor of International jellies, basically only M. leidyi. We in the UK is grouped around he received a Heritage Volunteer Studies, I commenced a Master of also worked on possible transfer of five different units, employing Award for his conservation work Social Sciences in Development bacteria or parasites from the Black approximately 300 people. such as leading tours, writing books

38 SAM Spring 08 Send your updates via email or post: contact details page 3

Party. But the years have given him 2001 she has developed her practice the disillusionment necessary to as a mediator of disputes ranging deal with the world as it is, which from workplace, family, wills and he feels to be for the main part estate to strata title and franchise. self-interested. Tony however admits She lives in the Blue Mountains and freely that he learnt the hard way combines writing with mediation. the meaning of disinterested – Bob Moore once, in front of a studio audience at the ABC, corrected his Seeking Fine Arts 1, misuse of the word. Tony thought it Class of 1968 meant uninterested and has been Forty years ago, in 1968, the correcting people ever since, even Power Institute enrolled its total strangers on buses. first students in Fine Arts (now Art History & Film Studies). A re-union of 1968 students will Greg Parkins (BVSc ’75) has be held in November 2008. retired from every day veterinary If you would like to attend, practice and sold the business please register your interest by on Anzac Highway, Adelaide. contacting: Before retiring was successful in Dr Catherine De Lorenzo, establishing a dog boarding facility [email protected]. behind the practice which was greatly appreciated by clients, but less enthusiastically by neighbours. Council tried to rescind development 1950s approval, much to the benefit of the Patti Payne (nee Young) legal profession. Since putting down OAM PhC, (Mat Med ’58) is the scalpel, travel, caravanning, continuing her active life as a fishing, gardening and a return to fundraiser and member of the board building and construction have made of directors of the Children’s Medical an interesting and occupying change. Reseach Foundation (CMRI), the Jeans for Genes people. At the same time she is Australia’s representative 1960s on the Executive Committee of the Bruce McFarlane (MEc ’61) Community Pharmacy Section of the served as professor of politics at the International Pharmacy Federation. University of Adelaide and, later, as This involves her in up to three trips Richard Young (BA ‘62) after teaching for a few years moved into full professor of economics at the overseas each year. advertising, first as a copywriter, then in client management. He spent the University of Newcastle in NSW. rest of his working life with a number of international advertising agencies, He is the author of Other Economic apart from five years with the Trade Commissioner Service 1968-72. He Systems, Yugoslavia: Economics, 1940s has lived in New Zealand and Chile and travelled extensively in Europe, Politics and Society and Economic North America and Latin America. In 2001 he retired to devote more time Policy in Australia. Tom Haney (BSc Ag ’48 ) would to writing fiction. His first novel, a psychological mystery, Death Among the appreciate hearing from any of those Vines, was published by Zeus Publications and launched by Ken Done! Babette Smith (nee Macfarlan) who returned in 1946 to Ag Science (BA '64) In 2008 Allen & Unwin after war service. (NB All responses published her latest book Australia's to this entry, email or letter, will be Birthstain, the startling legacy of forwarded.) and giving talks on the heritage Professional Association and has the convict era. In September they significance of Haberfield. In April visited NSW conferences annually. will publish a new edition of her Malcolm Stewart 2008 his book Tours of Haberfield: Her professional interests are in groundbreaking 1988 work A Cargo (BSc Hons ’48) received the Order Past and Present, Part Two received a Practice Education and alternate of Australia general division in of Women: Susannah Watson and the Highly Commended award in the 2008 ways of delivering academic the Queen’s Birthday Honours convicts of the Princess Royal. EnergyAustralia Heritage Awards education at all levels of study. for service to the community, Occasional journalism has included conducted by the National Trust. particularly through the Meniere’s two stints as a columnist – 1997-1999 Research Fund and Meniere’s Professor Susan E Ryan 1970s for the Australian Financial Review Support Group of NSW. (BApSc ’81) has come full circle and 1989-1992 for ITA magazine. Malcolm continues to enjoy his after nearly 30 years away from James Anthony (Tony) Farrell Having first worked as a secretary, retirement with wife Anne, having Australia. She has accepted the (BA ’77 MA ’78) is running for the then ultimately a producer in theatre recently made a seachange move to position ofheading the Occupational ACT Legislative Assembly elections and television, in 1983 she became Sawtell on the mid-north coast. Therapy program at the University in October, for the second time, as National Marketing Manager for of Newcastle. Additionally, Susan is an independent. His political views the Hoyts Corporation. Last notable deputy head of the School of Health are still largely those of his University corporate appointment was Chief Sciences. Over the years Susan has undergraduate days, where he was Executive of the New South Wales maintained her membership of the heavily involved in the Australia Bar Association, 1993-1997. Since

SAM Spring 08 39 diary

10 SEPTEMBER 16 OCTOBER Graduate Connections Breakfast Speaker: Dr Jim Peacock (Chief The Sydney Global Scientist CSIRO). Illumination Gala Dinner Tea Room, Queen Victoria Building 7.00pm in the Great Hall Info and rsvp: Andrea Besnard on To raise vital funds for the National (02) 9036 9278 or [email protected] Breast Cancer Foundation for research into the prevention and 12 SEPTEMBER cure of breast cancer. Sydney International Piano Proudly supported by The Faculty Competition VC’s Concert by the of Medicine and the University. winner. Free admission Michael Moore of the Summit The Great Hall Restaurant will create an Info: Andrea Besnard (02) 9036 9278 exciting three course dinner or [email protected] complemented by premium Margan wines. 19 SEPTEMBER Tickets: $400 each or $4000 for Southern Highlands Alumni Dinner a table of 10 Hosted by the VC, Dr Michael Spence Contact Amanda Durack Info: Sarah Portelli (02) 9036 9278 or (02)( 9036 7185 [email protected] or [email protected]

24 SEPTEMBER Faculty of Law Cocktails 14 OCTOBER 23 OCTOBER college, catch up, exchange news Join fellow alumni and friends Sydney Ideas: Professor Sara Roy University Art Gallery Tour and enjoy a full day of celebration in to hear guest speaker: Kerry 6pm, Seymour Centre A tour for alumni with Senior Curator your honour. Families are welcome to Chikarovski (BEc ’77, LLB ’79) Info: Meredith Hall (02) 9036 6509 Louise Tegart of the Art Gallery’s new take part in a variety of cultural and solicitor and former NSW Opposition or [email protected] exhibition: Foresight – works from sporting events and entertainment. Leader, talk briefly on “Politics: The the University of Sydney Union’s art See the program leaflet in this issue Trials and Tribulations.” 15 OCTOBER collection. It features works by then- of SAM or contact Sarah Portelli At: Justice and Police Museum, Economics & Business Reunion emerging and now among Australia’s (02) 9036 9278 or 8 Phillip Street, Circular Quay; (1957-65 era) best known artists, including Emily [email protected] 6.30pm-8.30pm, includes tour of The Refectory, Holme Building Kame Kngwarreye, Shaun Gladwell, Water Police Station. Info: Kim Lockwood (02) 9036 6271 Bill Henson, Del Kathryn Barton, 9 NOVEMBER Info and rsvp: Yvonne Cheong, or [email protected] Anne Ferran and Michael Riley. Glebe Music Festival and Sydney (02) 9351 0327 or 6pm – 8pm, including refreshments. Conservatorium of Music Ensembles [email protected] 18 OCTOBER $25 alumni, $30 guests. Studies Unit celebrate the music China Alumni Association Reunion Info and rsvp: Sarah Portelli of Ralph Vaughan Williams 50 25 SEPTEMBER Reception (Shanghai) (02) 9036 9278 or [email protected] years after his death and of Olivier Happiness+Wellbeing @ Work JW Marriott Hotel, Shanghai Messiaen 100 years after his birth. Conference Info: Sarah Portelli (02) 9036 9278 29 OCTOBER Preceded by a carillon recital. Harbours Edge, Darling Harbour. or [email protected] Economics and Business Alumni The Great Hall, 3pm. Free admission. Speakers include Hugh Mackay, Drinks Reception For other festival events: Dr Timothy J Sharp (aka Dr Happy) 20 OCTOBER Settler’s Hall, Waterfront, Sydney www.glebemusicfestival.com and Chris Taylor. Topics include: are Hong Kong Alumni Association Info: Kim Lockwood (02) 9036 6271 happy workers better workers? Want Reunion Reception or [email protected] 21 NOVEMBER to improve retention, productivity Hong Kong Club SRC 80th Anniversary Gala Reception and absenteeism rates? Learn Info: Sarah Portelli (02) 9036 9278 2 NOVEMBER Celebrate with past and present SRC from others who have successfully or [email protected] William Wardell Exhibition and and Honi editors. implemented strategies within their Fine Wine 6-8pm The Great Hall own organisations. 23 OCTOBER The display will be introduced at Info and rsvp: Sarah Portelli Info and rsvp: Kristy Bergin Dr Charles Perkins AO Memorial 11am by historian Dr Ursula de (02) 9036 9278 or [email protected] [email protected] Oration and Prize 2008 Jong, followed by a family day in the Speaker: Tom Calma, Aboriginal grounds of St John’s College as part at the Macleay ... 26-27 SEPTEMBER and Torres Strait Islander Social of the 150th anniversary celebrations. Small matters: exploring the SUGUNA Conference Justice Commissioner and Race Info and rsvp: Trish O’Brien world of microscopy Philadelphia, USA Discrimination Commissioner. (02) 9394 5204 or an exhibition celebrating 50 years of Info and rsvp: Sarah Portelli The Great Hall [email protected] the Electron Microscopy Unit at the (02) 9036 9278 or [email protected] Info: Alumni Relations Office University of Sydney (02) 9036 9278 or [email protected] 8 NOVEMBER 1 August 2008 - January 2009 29 SEPTEMBER Spring Back to Sydney Accidental Encounters science, life Sydney Ideas: Tim Flannery This year it is the turn of the “8s” – and culture in Australasia 1846-1850 6pm, Seymour Centre calling all alumni who graduated in an exhibition to mark the anniversary Info: Meredith Hall (02) 9036 6509 or a year ending in 8. Meet old friends, of Darwin’s ideas [email protected] colleagues, visit the campus and your 12 February 2009 - May 2009

40 SAM Spring 08 210mm x 275mm 23/1/08 9:11 AM Page 1

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WE ARE CURRENTLY SEEKING AUSTRALIAN ART FOR INCLUSION IN OUR SPRING AUCTION SERIES FOR A CONFIDENTIAL AND OBLIGATION FREE APPRAISAL, PLEASE CALL TO ARRANGE AN APPOINTMENT WE ARE CURRENTLY SEEKING AUSTRALIAN ART FOR INCLUSION IN OUR SPRING AUCTION SERIES FOR A CONFIDENTIAL AND OBLIGATION FREE APPRAISAL, PLEASE CALL TO ARRANGE AN APPOINTMENT

NEXT AUCTION IN MELBOURNE 25 NOVEMBER

ENQUIRIES: 02 9362 1000 | 03 9509 2900 | WWW.SOTHEBYS.COM NEXT AUCTION IN MELBOURNE 25 NOVEMBER

ENQUIRIES: 02 9362 1000 | 03 9509 2900 | WWW.SOTHEBYS.COM Image: Jeffrey Smart, On the beach, San Diego, sold in April 2008 for: $420,000

Image: Jeffrey Smart, On the beach, San Diego, sold in April 2008 for: $420,000

SOTHEBY'S_LookMag_Jun08_03.indd 1 1/7/08 3:11:41 PM

SOTHEBY'S_LookMag_Jun08_03.indd 1 1/7/08 3:11:41 PM