Dr Johanna Garnett

Senior Lecturer - Sociology and Peace Studies - School of HASS - School of Humanities, Arts, and Social Sciences

Phone: +61 2 6773 2896

Biography

Dr Johanna Garnett has been a Lecturer in Sociology and Peace Studies at UNE – Armidale for 8 years, and is the recipient of a range of awards and commendations for her research and teaching. Johanna was the Head of Department - Social and Philosophical Enquiry in the School of HASS until June 2023, as well as the Honours Coordinator and Unit Coordinator for a number of Postgraduate research units. She is currently the Discipline Convenor for Peace Studies. Johanna is well published for an early MCR and has presented her work at national and international conferences. Her research foci include social movements, every day politics, social and environmental justice, political sociology and the Sociology of youth and families. She has extensive fieldwork experience in Myanmar, South-East Asia where she is establishing an education and training facility based on permaculture and environmental peacebuilding with a number of Myanmar colleagues.

Qualifications

PhD UNE), Masters of Environmental Advocacy (UNE), BSocSci - Sociology (UNE), Cert IV Training & Assessment

Awards

2021 - School Citation for Education Excellence, HASS - UNE

2021 - South East Asian Centre, Sydney University, Writers Workshop Grant

2021 - Unit Commendations: PEAC373/573, SOCY354 and SOCY345/545 Trimester 1, 2021

2020 - CARES Award, HDR Supervision, UNE

2018 - Unit Commendation, CRIM301

2017 - Chancellor’s Doctoral Research Medal for Excellence in Research And International Impact, University of New England (UNE), Armidale.

2016 - Unit Commendation PEAC 373/573.

2016 - BREW Writers Retreat - Tambourine Mountain

2012 - Australian Postgraduate Award, UNE.

2011 - D R Grey Philosophy Award, UNE.

2010 - The Bell Prize for Sociology, UNE

Teaching Areas

Johanna coordinates SOCY 345/545 – Mixed Methods in Social Research, SOCY336 - Sociology of the Modern Family, SOCY301/501 - Changing Climate/Changing Lives and PEAC102 - Environmental Peace.

She has also coordinated SOCY313/513 – Australian Social and Public Policy, SOCY360/560 – Power, Inequality and Social Mobility, SOCY354 – The Sociology of Youth, PEAC373/573 - Globalisation as if People and Ecosystems Matter and PEAC352 Building Peace in Post Conflict Situations, PEAC354 - Post-Conflict Justice and Reconciliation Processes, PAIS361 Sex, Crime and Corruption. She has taught in HUMS103 - Controversies: Foundations of Critical Social Analysis, SOCY110 – Foundations of Society, HUMS102 - Learning Life-long Academic Skills, OORA200 - Working with Aboriginal People, PEAC304 -Environmental Security and Peaceful Futures, CRIM201 - Researching Crime, SOCY302/502 – Working with Organisations and SOCY356/556 – The State, Power and Violence.

She also supervises HASS500, HASS505, HASS506, HASS512 and HASS518 research projects as well as a number of international PhD students.

Primary Research Area/s

Myanmar, Youth, Social Movements, Critical Development

Research Interests

Johanna lived and worked in Myanmar (formerly Burma) for extended periods 2013-2019, teaching and assisting with the development of leadership and community initiatives for peacebuilding in a post-conflict situation. Johanna is sought after for her research in Myanmar and presents her work on critical education, social movements and alternative development at Australian and international conferences. Her prime concern is giving voice to the ‘voiceless’ or ‘silenced’; facilitating youth in their peacebuilding activities and promoting dialogue on structural, cultural and ecological violence facing agrarian communities, primarily in Myanmar but also in the Asia/Pacific region. Her work in peace studies is supported by her forty years’ experience in teaching and activism. She belongs to a global community of critical educators and activist scholars working towards a more ecologically sound and just global future. In 2019 she bought 9 acres of land with some Myanmar colleagues in order to establish the Myanmar Permaculture Institute. This was to be developed as a training centre and demonstration farm in late 2020 but due to COVID and the military coup of 1 February 2021 these plans have been put on hold.

Current Research

The Role of Civil Society in Responding to Cyclone Mocha 13 May 2023.

Monitoring and analysing the evolving activities being carried out by civil society organisations and youth groups in Myanmar in response to a devastating cyclone in Rakhine State.

Youth and Environmental Peacebuilding Initiatives in Agrarian Communities – Myanmar

Aims to gain an understanding into community and grassroots environmental and sustainability projects being developed within Myanmar, particularly projects that have been initiated, and are being managed, by young adults. Aim is to gain a deeper understanding of the role grassroots individuals and communities are playing in sustainability and environmental peace building in Myanmar. This is important in light of serious environmental and food security issues in the country relating to globalisation and climate change.

Research Supervision Experience

Currently supervising PhD, MPhil and Masters students in a range of peacebuilding, social science and politics topics.

Current PhDs:

Women’s participation in the Myanmar Peace Process: A Feminist Analysis

COVID and experiences of aged care residents

Discursive Resistance - Social Movements in Iran

A study on the modern path to power in Australian politics via closed groups and populist social movements.

Socially Engaged Buddhism in Indonesia: Practices and Trends

Three PhDs, One MPhil to completion 2023

Ursula de Almeides - East Timorese diaspora and peacebuilding

Mahbub Prodip - Women’s Political Empowerment in India and Bangladesh

Nenneh Lahai - UN Women and the Promotion of Women’s Empowerment in Sierra Leone.

Mosmi Bhim – Authoritarian Regimes in Small Island States: The Anomalous Cases of Electoral Autocracies in Fiji, the Maldives and Seychelles.

Publications

‘Democracy Icon or Demagogue? Aung San Su Kyi and Populist Politics in Myanmar’, Book Chapter in edited book – Handbook of Populism in Asia and the Pacific, 2023.

Reimagining Space, Re-organiZing Lives: Environmental activism in Myanmar. Book Chapter in edited book - Youth Beyond the City: Thinking from the Margins. Edited by David Farrugia and Signe Ravn, Bristol University Press, 2022.

Kingsford, B. & Garnett, J. (2021), 'Plotting a Future: Alternative Food Initiatives in Australia during COVID-19', New Community Quarterly, 18(4) & 19(1), iss. 72 & 73.

Media: 'UNE department urges Australian Government to put 'maximum pressure' on Myanmar military junta', The Armidale Express, 23 April 2021, Vanessa Arundale.

Subedi, DB & Garnett, J 2021 How is Myanmar's Military Coup Revealing the Youth's Changing Political Culture? Australian Outlook, 18 February 2021, https://www.internationalaffairs.org.au/australianoutlook/how-is-myanmars-military-coup-revealing-the-youths-changing-political-culture/.

Subedi, DB & Garnett, J 2021. Myanmar's military has used surveillance, draconian laws and fear to stifle dissent before. Will it work again?”, The Conversation, 5 February 2021.

Subedi, DB & Garnett, J 2020, De-mystifying violent extremism in Myanmar: Confrontation and contestation around religion, development and state-building", Journal of Conflict, Security & Development.

Garnett, J 2020, Permaculture for a post COVID-19 world: A community initiative in Myanmar, Southeast Asia, New Community Quarterly,18/2, 70.

Garnett, J 2020, 'The wilderness experience in national parks: a case study of Boonoo Boonoo National Park, in Rethinking Wilderness and the Wild, Routledge.

Prodip, M & Garnett, J 2019, Emergency Education for Rohingya Refugee Children in Bangladesh: An analysis of the policies, practices and limitations. Book Chapter in edited book - Comparative Perspectives on Refugee Youth Education Dreams and Realities in Educational Systems Worldwide, Routledge, London.

"Your Place Or Mine? Environmental (In)justice in Myanmar and Australian Activism", Environmental Justice Journal, 11 (6), 2018.

Your Place Or Mine? Environmental (In)justice in Myanmar and Australian Activism, Environmental Justice Blog Series, EJ Series, Part 2, Sydney Environment Institute, Sydney University, 30 November 2017, http://sydney.edu.au/environment-institute/.

‘Grassroots Environmental Adult Education - Developing Environmental Peace Infrastructure in the nascent democracy of Myanmar’, Peace and Conflict Review, vol. 9, no. 1, pp., 80-91, 2016. http://www.review.upeace.org/images/PCR9.1.pdf (peer reviewed).

‘The Economics of Happiness – in Myanmar’, New Community Quarterly, vol. 14, no. 1, iss. 53, 2016. New Community Quarterly Association, Auburn (peer reviewed).

‘Saving the World with Organic Agriculture: Grassroots Permaculture Education in Myanmar (Burma), Food Studies; an Interdisciplinary Journal, pp. 39-51, 2016. (peer reviewed).

‘An Eco-Farm in Myanmar (Burma): Saving the World with Organic Agriculture’, Local Futures, Economics of Happiness, Blog, online, 2015. <http://www.localfutures.org/?s=myanmar>.

‘New Actors on the Global Stage – Environmental adult education and activism emerging from within Myanmar (Burma)’, Paper presented at Australian Political Studies Association (APSA) Conference, 28 September – 1 October 2014, Sydney, NSW, Social Science Research Network, http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2488880 (peer reviewed).

‘Mining for development – destructive and divisive: Eco-villages as an alternative form of development’, Commentary, International Journal of Rural Law and Policy, Special edition 1, Mining in a Sustainable World, 2014. http://epress.lib.uts.edu.au/journals/index.php/ijrlp/issue/view/303.

‘Why an Education for the Environment is an Education for Peace’ (with Vanessa Bible), Nucleus: Peace and Politics Issue, September 2013, p. 19.

Presentations

The Role of Civil Society in Natural Disasters: Cyclone Mocha, Myanmar, The UNE Asia Pacific Network Research Showcase, 15 June 2023, UNE - Armidale.

The #StopAdani Movement – People Power versus Coal Power, paper presented at the International Political Studies Association (IPSA) Conference, 21-25 July 2018, Brisbane.

Grassroots and Genocide: It’s all about the land, 2017, seminar presentation, UNE Humanities Research Days, 5-6 December 2017.

A Green Path towards Ecologically Sustainable Development, 2017, paper presented at Australian Myanmar Institute (AMI), Progress towards Myanmar’s Sustainable Development Goals, Yangon University, Myanmar, 27-30 November 2017.

Your Place Or Mine? Environmental (In)justice in Myanmar and Australian Activism, 2017, paper presented at Environmental Justice Conference 2017: Looking Back, Looking Forward, Sydney University, Sydney, 6-8 November 2017.

Convergence: Youth and everyday politics in Myanmar, Indonesia and Australia, 2017, paper presented at Indonesia Council Open Conference (ICOC), Flinders University, Adelaide, 3 - 4 July 2017 (invited).

Mediating climate change across cultural boundaries: an exploration of empirical knowledge and embodied responses, 2017, paper presented at Mediating Climate Change Conference, Leeds University, 4-6 July 2017 (presented via skype).

New Actors on a Global Stage: Grassroots Responses to Globalisation in Myanmar, 2017, paper presented at International Indonesian Forum for Asian Studies (IIFAS) conference

Borderless communities and nations with borders: challenges of globalisation, 8-9 February 2017, Universitas Islam Indonesia, Jogjakarta, Indonesia.

Saving the World with Organic Agriculture; how is grassroots environmental adult education contributing to development in Myanmar?, 2016, paper presented at ‘Intersections of Knowledge’, Inaugral University of New England (UNE) PhD Conference, 19-20 January 2016, Armidale, NSW.

‘Grassroots Environmental Adult Education: Developing Environmental Peace Infrastructure in the nascent democracy of Myanmar’, paper presented at UNE Peace Conference, Sydney, 27 August 2015.

‘Environmental Peace; Paving the Way to a Greener Future’, paper presented at Australian Political Studies Association (APSA) Conference, 30 August – 02 September 2015, Canberra, ACT.

‘New Actors on the Global Stage – Environmental adult education and activism emerging from within Myanmar (Burma)’, paper presented at Australian Political Studies Association (APSA) Conference, 28 September – 1 October 2014, Sydney, NSW.

Mining for development – destructive and divisive: Eco-villages as an alternative form of development’, paper presented at Mining in a Sustainable World Conference, University of New England (UNE), 13-15 October 2013, Armidale, NSW.

‘Why an Education for the Environment is an Education for Peace’, paper presented at Harmony Day Conference, 21st September 2013, UNE, Armidale, NSW.

Memberships

The Australian Sociological Association (TASA)

The Australian Political Studies Association (APSA)

The Permaculture Institute of Australia