PUBLIC TALK: The Deep History of Sea Country: colonisation, submerged landscapes and the archaeology of Australia�s coasts

A public lecture by Professor Sean Ulm, Australian Research Council Future Fellow and Director of the Tropical Archaeology Research Laboratory at James Cook University.

The sea is central to the lives of contemporary coastal Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people across Australia. Indigenous histories and archaeologies show the sea to be a vital source of subsistence, raw materials, spirituality and connection with other peoples. Coasts, and especially islands, were a focus of occupation in the past as in the present, with high population densities linked to sedentary lifestyles along much of the Australian coast. But what are the antecedents of these people-sea relationships? Nearly one-third of Australia’s landmass was drowned after the last ice age and generations of people were displaced by sea-level change.

In this lecture we will explore what we know, what we think we know and what we would like to know about the deep history of coastal occupation in Australia.

Sean Ulm is a 2016 UWA Institute of Advanced Studies Short Stay Visiting Fellow.