UNE professor on the Council of the Australian Academy of the Humanities

January 03, 2007

The University of New England's Professor Majella Franzmann has been elected to the six-member governing council of the Australian Academy of the Humanities.

Professor Franzmann, an international authority on early Christian and other religious writings in the Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek, Coptic and Syriac languages, was elected as a Fellow of the Academy in 2001. Her election as councillor for a three-year term took place at the Academy’s Annual General Meeting late last year.

“I am looking forward to using my insights from this regional university [UNE] to help rebuild interest in – and funding of – the humanities on a national level," Professor Franzmann said.

"In today's academic environment," she explained, "research with potential financial rewards, such as scientific research and development, is favoured by public and private funding bodies. The task of promoting research and attracting funding in the traditional areas of study known as 'the humanities' is a contemporary challenge, but vital – especially to the continued prestige of regional universities as holistic tertiary education institutions."

"I am particularly interested in playing a part through the Council in the national discussion about the quality and impact of research and scholarship in the humanities," Professor Franzmann said.

"I am also interested in advancing the discussion about increasing collaboration between researchers in the humanities. The tradition of the 'lone researcher' in their lonely office must be broken down. If the humanities are to achieve growth within Australian universities, researchers will have to broaden their approach to the possibilities of multi-disciplinary, national and international collaborations. The Academy has already begun to foster collaboration through its new 'e-Humanities' project, which features a central searchable database, into which researchers can enter information on their projects."

The Academy of the Humanities, established in 1969, currently has 432 Fellows who are elected to membership within these disciplinary areas: Prehistory and Archaeology; Asian Studies; Classical Studies; English; European Languages and Cultures; History; Linguistics and Philology; Philosophy, Religion and the History of Ideas; Cultural and Communication Studies; the Arts.

Posted by Jim Scanlan at January 3, 2007 03:31 PM