ASBS Newsletter I Gave an Overview of Outside Our Sector), and of the Importance and Taxonomy Australia and Its Role and Governance
Total Page:16
File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb
Newsletter No. 177 December 2018 Price: $5.00 AUSTRALASIAN SYSTEMATIC BOTANY SOCIETY INCORPORATED Council President Vice President Darren Crayn Daniel Murphy Australian Tropical Herbarium (CNS) Royal Botanic Gardens Victoria James Cook University, Cairns Campus Birdwood Avenue PO Box 6811, Cairns Qld 4870 Melbourne, Vic. 3004 Australia Australia Tel: (+617)/(07) 4232 1859 Tel: (+613)/(03) 9252 2377 Email: [email protected] Email: [email protected] Secretary Treasurer Jennifer Tate Matt Renner Institute of Fundamental Sciences Royal Botanic Garden Sydney Massey University Mrs Macquaries Road Private Bag 11222, Palmerston North 4442 Sydney NSW 2000 New Zealand Australia Tel: (+646)/(6) 356- 099 ext. 84718 Tel: (+61)/(0) 415 343 508 Email: [email protected] Email: [email protected] Councillor Councillor Ryonen Butcher Heidi Meudt Western Australian Herbarium Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa Locked Bag 104 PO Box 467, Cable St Bentley Delivery Centre WA 6983 Wellington 6140, New Zealand Australia Tel: (+644)/(4) 381 7127 Tel: (+618)/(08) 9219 9136 Email: [email protected] Email: [email protected] Other constitutional bodies Hansjörg Eichler Research Committee Affiliate Society David Glenny Papua New Guinea Botanical Society Sarah Mathews Heidi Meudt Joanne Birch Advisory Standing Committees Katharina Nargar Financial Murray Henwood Patrick Brownsey Chair: Dan Murphy, Vice President, ex officio David Cantrill Grant application closing dates Bob Hill Hansjörg Eichler Research Fund: th th Ad hoc adviser to Committee: Bruce Evans on March 14 and September 14 each year. Chair: Matt Renner, Treasurer, ex officio Marlies Eichler Postdoctoral Fellowship: on July 31st each year. Grants Policy Gillian Brown Public Officer Alexander Schmidt-Lebuhn Anna Monro Jen Tate (Council) Australian National Botanic Gardens Peter Weston GPO Box 1777 Peter Wilson Canberra, ACT 2601 Chair: Daniel Murphy, Vice President, ex officio Tel: (+612) (02) 6250 9530 Email: [email protected] Web presence ASBS Website: www.asbs.org.au ASBS Facebook Group Webmasters Viewable currently to any member of Facebook; Anna Monro permission to post by application to administrators. Australian National Botanic Gardens Administrators Canberra, ACT 2601 Australia Todd McLay, email: [email protected] Tel: (+612) (02) 6250 9530 Mike Bayly, email: [email protected] Email: [email protected] Murray Fagg Cover image: Elaeocarpus sedentarius Maynard & Crayn. Australian National Botanic Gardens Leafy twig with clockwise from top: open flower, petal, Tel: (+612) (02) 6250 9561 sepal, proximal end of fruit, longitudinally sectioned fruit. Email: [email protected] Artist: Catherine Wardrop (NSW). With permission of CSIRO Publishing. Publication dates of previous issue Australas. Syst. Bot. Soc. Newslett. 176 (September 2018) ASBS Web site: 22 Oct 2018. Printed version: 2 Nov 2018. Australasian Systematic Botany Society Newsletter 177 (December 2018) From the President Adjournment of AGM members “hold office until the conclusion of the Due to a delay in obtaining an audit of the annual general meeting following the date of the society’s accounts it was decided to hold the AGM member’s election”. as planned at the Brisbane ASBS conference, It was decided to reconvene the AGM in Sydney complete all business except the tabling of the as soon as possible after the audit is complete. auditor’s report, then adjourn the meeting to Members will be notified once a date is fixed to a later date to deal with the audited financial enable them to attend. report. A result of this is that the change-over to Darren Crayn the new ASBS council will be also be delayed, Outgoing President as the society’s constitution states council Taxonomy Australia report In the last ASBS Newsletter I gave an overview of outside our sector), and of the importance and Taxonomy Australia and its role and governance. impact of our work. Recapping, Taxonomy Australia’s primary role The Taxonomy Australia website is focused on is to advocate, implement and coordinate actions stories for two reasons – because we have good under the taxonomy and systematics decadal stories to tell, and because there are many people plan, with an overall aim in the medium and long in the general community who would like to term to reinvigorate investment in taxonomy hear them. Good stories are one of our important and biosystematics in Australia. It has been assets, and we need to make the most of them. established initially as a program within the Of course, every media channel is in the Australian Academy of Science, and is governed storytelling business. Stories about taxonomic by an Advisory Committee and representative discovery appear on occasion in the conventional Steering Committee, and advised by a broad- news media, usually when they have a cute hook based Reference Group. such as a species named after a celebrity or a So, Taxonomy Australia is now established. It bizarre new discovery. However, while a good now needs to fulfil its vision and promise. hook is important to a good story, a good story An important early goal of Taxonomy Australia needs more than a good hook. It also needs solid, is to raise awareness of, and improve the profile well-crafted context, it needs to explain why of, taxonomy and systematics in the community people should care, and it needs to be based on a and with government. To do this, early in 2019 sound understanding of the breadth and depth of we will embark on a media campaign and launch our science. a Taxonomy Australia website and social media For these reasons, Taxonomy Australia plans to channel. This report will focus on these. provide an opportunity and mechanism for us to The Taxonomy Australia website tell our own stories, rather than relying solely on The core of the new Taxonomy Australia website the traditional media (important though they are) is still under construction and not ready yet for to tell our stories for us. general release. I’ll be happy to share the url A key transformation in the 21st Century has with anyone who would like to check it out. I’m been the democratisation and decentralisation also keen for volunteers to help create and curate of media. Traditional media no longer have a content. More on this later. monopoly on storytelling – any community with The overall aim of the Taxonomy Australia enough creativity and energy can now create their website is to provide a channel for the taxonomy own channel. This is what Taxonomy Australia and systematics community to tell our stories plans to do. – stories of discovery, of discoverers, of the Why do we need to tell our stories? Because marvels of biodiversity (marvels that are often what we do – discovering new species and new commonplace to us but fascinating for people knowledge about the biodiversity of Australia and 1 Australasian Systematic Botany Society Newsletter 177 (December 2018) its surrounding oceans – is really cool science. across the breadth of biodiversity Many of the organisms we work on and with • Dark Biodiversity – this feed will be used for every day are also really cool. Many people don’t blogs about the things we don’t know (but know this yet. suspect). This is important for the advocacy that is another Three of the feeds in this list are preceded by key role for Taxonomy Australia. Our advocacy an asterisk*. These ones will need constant will be much more effective if we can position attention – whenever a new paper is published, ourselves as a science that has a demonstrated a news article comes out, or a good field trip or impact and is perceived as cool by the public. expedition gets underway, we need to blog about Telling our stories is thus part of a broader it. This can take as little as a few minutes for strategy. simple announcements or can be longer when the Of course, the website is only one part of a story demands it. broader media channel, which in the next few The feeds without asterisks will be more months (once the website is up and running) occasional, but still need to be regular. will include other social media feeds on Twitter, I’m very keen to get volunteers to help manage Facebook, Instagram etc. I’ll report on these in this content. Volunteers would help by writing the next ASBS Newsletter. announcements and articles for the site. For the Volunteers needed asterisked items, it will be very helpful to have I said earlier that Taxonomy Australia needs volunteers who can keep abreast of the literature content contributors and curators. Stories and the news, and write short articles whenever of discovery are best if they are told by the an item appears. discoverers. So – this is your chance to get In addition, it will be helpful to get a short (or involved with Taxonomy Australia. longer) announcement blog whenever you publish This is how it will work. The Taxonomy Australia a paper – an announcement would be best coming website has a very easy-to-use blogging tool that from the authors rather than from a third party. manages blogs for several separate feeds, under Taxonomy Australia and you the following headings: Taxonomy Australia has been established to • *Discoveries – this feed will be used to keep support and advocate for all taxonomists in subscribers up-to-date with new species and Australia. Initially, as discussed, a key task is to other publications, in real time. Whenever a raise the profile of taxonomy and systematics and paper comes out that describes new Australian to reposition our science to enable more effective species or other significant taxonomic advocacy. In the longer term, the goal is to effect a changes, we plan to write a short blog about it substantial increase in funding for our discipline.