 What a crowd, you know how to pull them in Brian? I also would like to acknowledge the traditional owners on whose ancestral lands were gathered and I want to pay my respects to the eldest past and present of the Ngunnawala Ngambri peoples. So ladies and gentlemen and my dear colleagues at ANU. There was a flyer circulated a few weeks ago alerting people with the fact that I was to retire and would be giving a farewell lecture. The flyer nominated a few things that I'd be talking about. A few things regarding my time here at ANU. Well I'm not sure if I'll be covering all of those topics. But what I will be speaking about is Peter's review in centre, possum skin cloaks and eagle hawk and crow. And I'll also be talking about the long yard. A mysterious place where old horses go. John Maynard might not know that one. He likes riding about horses. So allow me to begin what the organisers call my farewell lecture. You know it's not really farewell because I'm not going very far. I'm actually eventually going to be in the building next door. So to Peter's review and centre. The associate professor as he then was Peter Reid. I was commissioned by the ANU to conduct a review of Indigenous engagement learning here at the university. And among Peter's recommendations was the appointment of an Indigenous professorial chair in Indigenous studies. And he also recommended that there be a dedicated centre at the university for research, Indigenous studies research. The chair's job was advertised and I was swanning around those days trying to be a consultant. That's another story. But some of my so-called friends said why don't you have a crack at that job. I'm applying for that job so I did. And I got shortlisted for an interview, most of my surprise. But I'll never forget the interview. It was held here on campus, I forget where, but it was a largest room and it had this huge rectangular table. And I was sitting on one side of the table, no one else, with my glass of water, my notes at the ready. And sitting across from me were 16 professors. I might have got the number wrong, perhaps it was, perhaps it was 14. But there were lots of them. And I thought they all wanted a piece of me. But I remember that they were all non-Indigenous people and most of them were men. And they all had a piece of me. And I hope we don't choose our senior petitions like this anyway. As it transpired, I navigated the interview successfully and apparently persuaded some of those dudes, because they're all blokes, that I was the blake for the job. And a few weeks later, I got a letter from Professor Ian Chow, offering me the job as chair of Indigenous Studies and director of this acronym called ANUIA. Which is the ANU, the Australian National University Institute for Indigenous Australia. Even with that acronym, you knew what was going to last. So these entities were meant to be virtual virtual institutes. And none of them really, there were about half a dozen of them. And none of them really took off, including the one designated Indigenous Studies. Admittedly, things back then, in the two decades ago online were not that they are today. But we soon discovered that virtual existence without human support is virtually non-existent. So I was a director of ANUIA for about two years before it fell apart. So this brings me to Peter Centre and the establishment by the council of the ANU of the NCIS in 2005. And since that establishment, the NCIS has carved a unique place at the ANU. We contribute broadly to the discipline of Indigenous Studies. We sit outside the college structure and the director reports directly to the vice-chancellor. And our charter describes a vision as an old quote. To be recognised as a leading academic institute for interdisciplinary research in fields that are of relevance to Indigenous Australians, especially in relation to the enrichment of scholarly and public understandings of Australian Indigenous cultures and histories. So what we try to do at NCIS is we aim to ensure that Indigenous knowledge, the perspectives and experiences of Indigenous people are respected, they're valued, accessed and incorporated into all learning environments at the ANU. And we also want to connect with the surrounding region, our nation and beyond to other folks outside of Australia. And we aim to ensure that Indigenous knowledge, sorry, our objective is to promote the recognition of and respect for Indigenous knowledge, perspectives and experiences in a broad range of areas including law, Indigenous public policy, community and public, and in the community and public domain. We want to promote debate between Indigenous and non-Indigenous peoples, between policy makers and researchers about our shared past, present and where we're going in the future. Not just locally but at the national and international global level. And we want to promote the participation of Indigenous peoples in research at the local, at the research and education teaching and learning at the ANU. And our aim was to establish a focal point for the coordination of Indigenous education and research across the ANU academic community and develop collaborative initiatives that brings us all together at ANU. And we also aspire to support the development of the knowledge, skills and capacities of Indigenous peoples and relevant organisations to build healthy, self-sustaining communities, clans, tribes and First Nations. You know, when I first started at the NCIS, I recall we had an advisory committee or more over, I had an advisory committee. It didn't really have much advice to give, and so we didn't meet much. And eventually it fell aside, and I won't go into why. I don't put too much store into these types of advisory bodies. If you don't get them right, they can be more of a hindrance than help. But I hasten to say I'm not against these sorts of bodies, and perhaps they ought to be at higher levels. Now, you're probably wondering about that. Once you're going to get this possum skin cloak and that other stuff. Well, I've dealt with some of the other stuff, but let's go to the possum skin cloaks. Traditionally, these garments grew with their owners. They were inscribed with stories and totems throughout one's life and its use. As a child grew, the cloak grew. Grew with them as additional pelts were at it. In 2017, last year, I accepted a possum skin cloak on behalf of the Australian Institute of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies. The cloak depicts events in the history of the Institute. It was designed and created by Lee Derek. He's a yorta yorta mootimooti and one-rung artist. And the aetsis cloak tells the story of the aetsis as a national cultural institution. The designs feature canoe forms that navigate shared waterways, depicting the linking of different parts of the Institute and representing the flow of material and knowledge between communities and the institutions. Also on the cloak is another design depicting the Eagle Hawk and Crow letter of 1975. And this is why I've made this reference to the cloak. And it is here now where I want to go with what I have to say this evening. And it's about ethics in indigenous research. God, what happened then? Ongi! No, back in 1970s for the Australian Institute of Aboriginal Studies, as it was then known, was planning a 17-day, yes, a 17-day conference. An international conference for May of 1974. There were to be 300 papers and of those 300 papers, three were from indigenous scholars. I should have acknowledged before I go on that I'm deeply indebted to Dr J.A. Lambert for her wonderful PhD thesis on the history of the AIS. A-I-A-S. I'm not fluent in acronym, sorry. But her wonderful thesis on the history of the Institute from 1959 to 1989. The six signatories to the letter were Terry Whitters, Gary Williams, Lynne Thompson, Peter Thompson, Lynne's husband, Bob Blair and Lynne Watson. All were Aboriginal except Peter Thompson. And to quote Dr Lambert, she said, Eagle Hawk and Crow launched a stinging attack not only on the conference, but also on Aco and the Institute. Now Peter Aco was the principal of the Institute at the time. That's like the CEO, not the principal of the school. And the letter essentially accused the Institute of indulging in a talk fest at the expense of the natives. The letter asked in no uncertain terms what direct impact the Institute and its research was having for Aboriginal people and their situation. And as the authors of Eagle Hawk and Crow saw it, the conference is a major weapon for gaining international prestige and modern relevant image. I'll come back to relevance at the end of this address. This we know is to impress the government enough to make it think the Institute is worth more money and worth listening to for advice on Aboriginal matters. This will have the effect of extending the power, academics exercise over the lives of the people they study and claim. Now the letter criticised the Institute on a number of other matters including the huge indulgence of a 17-day conference and the Institute's non-involvement in other very important matters like land rights, education and countering racism. On the first count I paused tonight in fairness that the Institute is about to celebrate the 25th anniversary of the establishment of the native title research unit. You know it lead me to say the impact of a letter over time was enormous not only on the Institute but the academy as well when it came to ethical research in the Indigenous space which is where I want to go now. NCIS is primarily a research centre, research that's focused in the Indigenous Studies field. Some of us do a bit of teaching. Most of us carry a heavy burden of supervision and for my part, not solely but for much of my work, the day-to-day management and administration decisions I have to make or carry out. I won't be missing that part of NCIS directorship. What I really want to talk about now and it would reference to the Institute in particular about the Australian Institute of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies but the ethics of our work. For Indigenous peoples it's important for us to consider critics of ethics and the processes of knowledge creation and data sovereignty in the context of the historical legacy of research. That historical legacy has not in our perspective on many of our perspectives served us well. On one perspective it's all been bad for Black fellas. On another, SLAND, it leaves us with a valuable historical lesson on how not to do it and how to avoid bad practice for now and beyond. Any discussion about this issue, that doesn't look like red, Brian. Doesn't taste like it either. Any discussion on this topic ought to start in the context of the violence and the institutionalised relations of power that are the inheritance of colonisation as I've already outlined with the Eagle Hawk and Crow letter. And it's not a legacy that necessarily reflects well or builds confidence in researchers who may want to work with our people today. Over 50 years ago the Australian Institute of Aboriginal Studies began without the natives. It began as a selvers exercise to preserve knowledge of indigenous societies and cultures before they disappeared or were swallowed up by modernity. Decades ago research was largely undertaken by white male academics who published across the world about our cultures in many languages. They rarely, if ever, in ours. They became the experts on our cultures and societies. Indigenous people were not often partners in the research or indeed even recognised as owners of knowledge that was recorded and archived. We were de-informants a word that certainly has become contentious and potentially loaded with meaning. Ownership of the knowledge that was generated by that research sorry, ownership of knowledge generated by that research is still considered in Western copyright law as being belonging to the researcher that recorded it, wrote it down or published it. And archives across the country and internationally suffers this historical legacy too. Many researchers imposed restrictions on access and retained a decision-making role in relation to access and use including for the communities whose knowledge was contained therein. That being said, our people recognised that the legacy of that research is a rich archival collection of our histories, languages, stories and ancestors. And in large part, Indigenous peoples have reclaimed what is now called IACSIS, the Australian History of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies, and the knowledge held in its vaults that still lives on for generations. And we now have new expectations of what we expect from researchers who want to work with us. I think there's no contestation that since Eagle Hawk and Crow that IACSIS has played a leadership role in setting the standards for ethical research with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples. I said earlier that the Institute's been around for 52 years. I spent 27 of those years on its council and for 17 years I was the chairman of that council. And as chairman, I can tell you that the IACSIS journey has not come without moments of sometimes forced introspection. Indeed, the famous, or some may say infamous, letter of March 1974 from Eagle Hawk and Crow was such a moment for the Institute. With such an effect that it had on the Institute, it is referenced as the pivotal moment of the IACSIS story in that section of the possumskin cloak that I've already mentioned. And since that, 1974, the Australian Institute of Aboriginal Studies set about establishing an ethical approach and standard for research design. For decades, the Institute was able to set the standard for research design and conduct through their small grant research program. One of my greatest regrets as chairman of the council was the winding up of that program because of successive federal government funding cuts too great to absorb by the institution. And I sometimes wonder if Eagle Hawk and Crow Letter had something to do with the funding to stagnation at the institution for over two decades and never an increase in the annual allocation. And that program, the grant program, remained the primary source of funding for Indigenous studies right through up until the end of the last century. In 1996, the Institute established the Research Ethics Committee. The committee was to provide advice on the ethical context of grant applications and research to the council. And then the IACSIS guidelines for ethical research in Australian Indigenous studies were first published in 1998 and revised in 2012. In 1998, that's 20 years ago. It's not that long ago. The guidelines embedded within the Australian Code for Responsible Conduct of Research were embedded and the National Health and Medical Research national statement on ethical conduct and human research. And they're referred to by the Australian Research Council and in the Ethical Principles and Guidelines for Indigenous Research produced by the Australian Housing and Urban Research Institute. This was groundbreaking because the Institute took a rights-based approach to research concerning Indigenous peoples. And that underpinned at the time what was then the draft declaration on the rights of Indigenous peoples. And the guidelines express core principles of ethical research founded on some basic points like respect for Indigenous peoples, inherent right to self-determination, the right to maintain and renew our cultures and heritage, and the control, the use and exploitation of our knowledge. It's considered that these principles are not only a matter of ethical research practice, but they're principles of human rights. And it must be noted that in the new age of ease of data duplication and transference that these guidelines also take into account emerging developments in digitisation and data and information management. And these developments have very significant impacts on research and other aspects of Indigenous studies. And the guidelines put us in good stead as this technology becomes cheaper and more pervasive and the sovereignty of data becomes a potential issue. Increasingly, it is also evident that the guidelines are exemplary of good research because of the way they encourage researchers to engage Indigenous peoples in research from the outset. Impact and engagement has become the new buzzword of research policy and investment with the launch of the Australian Research Council engagement and impact assessment pilot. I could say something about it, but I won't. This new form of assessment, the value of research was a central pillar of the Australian Government's national innovation and science agenda that they launched in 2015. And we're going to see the first full national assessment this year, I'm told. So I think the broader Australian research community have a lot to learn from how Indigenous peoples have shaped engagement by researchers. You know, I'm not repeatedly mentioning the IATSIS guidelines because I like to say IATSIS guidelines. And this is a crucial document. This is like a founding document for researchers in this Indigenous space. But the guidelines set an expectation that research will be carried out in respectful partnership that pay attention to important aspects of reciprocal and tangible benefit, agreement and informed consent, engagement in design, conduct and communication of research, attribution, authorship and collaboration in the presentation and publication of research and finally ownership, representation and the reuse of data, knowledge and personal information. And these are essential foundations for impactful and engaged research. There's no reason why our university cannot provide leadership in the area of ethical practice in Indigenous studies research as well as providing leadership in archival practice and other related areas such as publishing. We have a robust Human Research Ethics Committee which consider applications for ethical clearance in all areas of our research including that in Indigenous studies. And we have a duty to ensure all our external partners in research are also suitably cleared. And we must be vigilant in providing training to our researchers not just the emerging researchers but the long-established on what good ethical practice means in the Indigenous studies space. And our leadership in good ethical practice extends to other functions in what we publish, for example, I've just mentioned that. And we must be sure that the research used in publications has been undertaken with the fruit, prion and form consent and will benefit Indigenous peoples in the way Indigenous peoples value. And that the subsequent publishing practices share those philosophical underpinnings. Now the other thing the Institute did and I'll keep going back to Eagle Hawk and Crow just a devastating effect in one sense but a crowning with glory in another sense. Because the Institute is also the co-founders of the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander protocols for libraries, archives and information sciences. These protocols are intended to guide libraries, archives and information services in appropriate ways to interact with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people. Not only with the people in communities which organisations serve but also when handling materials with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander content held in their collections. Good ethical research practice focus is not a bolt on thing. It's got to be core business and it should be ingrained in the fabric of what we do as a university and perhaps I could ask you all to have your own forced introspective moment. Too met, no. But at least ask yourself what direct impact your work is having for Indigenous people in our situation. How are you engaging with us with our communities, with our families, with our friends, your friends, your families, your community and how are you ensuring positive transformation? For Indigenous peoples research has the power to transform our lives. Influence the relations of power in our societies and indeed contribute to our cultural well-being. But only where it's grounded in an understanding of our right to be involved and to make informed choices about the research we are engaged in and how our knowledge is used and represented to the world. The principles for ethical research should not be seen as a burden on researchers and policy makers but a way of opening up meaningful engagement and the potential for impact and transformation. So folks, allow me to conclude this part of my address and my observations and I want to acknowledge some suggestions from a few of my NCRS Indigenous HDR scholars for this bit. Now, some of our own mob as research academics complain about having to get ethics clearance for working with my mob. Now, this is not a healthy attitude. Indeed, I believe it's highly important for us to be rigorous in our research and that includes doing that work ethically and getting the necessary clearances to do so. And for us, it's probably more important going through our ethics clearances as an Indigenous researcher when you're researching your own mob. It's more important that everybody's mob for that matter. And also, sometimes the waters aren't so clear and Indigenous researchers still has to fit in with their own mob and even as a researcher, that may be very difficult and that forms part of a special and different complexity that confronts the Indigenous researcher in the field that a white fellow may not necessarily encounter. Researching your own mob therefore demands something greater rigour and a robust ethical clearance process that embeds your objectivity and impartiality and also enables you, the Indigenous researcher to professionally carry out the work at hand. Another problem, issue is the pressure you might get from senior academics. Not necessarily to discard ethics but to cut corners and it may confront you, not just Indigenous researchers but non-Indigenous researchers as well. In the end, it rests with you. Remember, if it doesn't feel right it probably isn't right. There on the side of caution, great caution. It's your research after all and life has its complications for most people doing research. Most people doing research and that's I think a little more difficult for Indigenous researchers. They get a little bit of extra pressure in my belief and we need to give them time to deliver and we need to be vigilant but we're not pressed to deliver when we're not ready but to do so. You know, what will deliver is nurture, care and patience. Now, before I get to the next and concluding part, thank God they're saying, of my address I have to say something about the people at the NCIS. Now, it's impossible for me to mention everybody that's ever worked at NCIS since its establishment and if I tried I'd be bound to miss someone and then I'd be very, very deep in the custom. But what I want to say is that I'm very proud of the journey we've made together at the NCIS and what the Centre has now become thanks to the hard work of many of our academic and professional staff our HDRs our honorary fellows I don't know what they're called now there they used to be called adjokes, that was easy but they're now called honorary fellows on it. Every one of them have made a valued contribution to building the Centre and in creating and sharing our success. We're now recognised as a leading centre in the country not just at ANU people want to come and work with us people want to come and study with us just today I turned down a potential scholar because we've reached our full supervisory capacity but like we always do I'm confident we will find a way but I want to thank all of the people who've been associated with the NCIS for your commitment your dedication to our work and your professionalism in making what NCIS now is and I know I'm leaving when the place is in pretty good shape. Associate Professor Wood as Brian has mentioned is stepping in as interim director and I wish him well and I hope the Centre thrives and multiplies so to conclude now to the long yard now when I speak to people lately and they find out that I'm going to retire there's one question they ask me without exception what are you going to do in your retirement there's really any variation in the question same words are used and pretty much every time in the same order yeah, no variance no variance, not at all my response has usually been what do you mean what I'm going to do I'm retiring I'm going to have a rest exactly but they position I yeah but what are you going to do in your retirement and I said I'll be retired can't I retire what I have to do stuff and you know I say I just want to might smell the roses I might drive my car out west and stay at cheap motels and visit the western plain zoo and forget about folks like you um exasperator they usually say well you have to do something when you retire and I say why the response has usually well how the hell are you going to stay relevant hmm got me there I say momentarily but you know I might think momentarily but it's still I'm still able to think thankfully but now I then ponder the deeper assumptions in the question how are you going to stay relevant you know assumption number one there's actually already relevant assumption number two well you're useless as a human if you're not relevant and assumption number three that if you're not going to do anything in retirement then you're irrelevant no no they say I'm still relevant and we're in the knitting faculty but folks you know I'm yearning to be blissfully irrelevant in the long yard where I can smell the roses grava tomatoes visit the giraffes and dubba and have a beer down at tradies so as slim dust he put it he put it better than me he said he's looking kind of jaded and his sight is not the best and the hair around his muzzle turning grey he's seen a hundred mustas and I think it's only fair that we leave him in the long yard here today so leave him out there in the long yard do not rush him leave him out there with his mate the Baldi Grey so folks if anybody asks what's Dodson doing in his retirement tell him he's gone to the long yard with Slim's words I'm looking forward to being turned out in the emeritus faculty paddock the relevancy rocks thank you