Research Excellence
Faculty of Education and Arts
School of Creative Industries
Associate Professor Craig Hight
Creative Industries
The Faculty of Education and Arts welcomes Associate Professor Craig Hight, who joins the University of Newcastle (UON) to lead the development, management and delivery of a new suite of creative industries programs and courses.
Dr Gillian Arrighi
Drama, Theatre and Performance Studies
Dr Gillian Arrighi is interested in the circus, the role of children in the entertainment industry, and the arts/health nexus, particularly the impact creative engagement has on everyday life. Her research investigates the social significance of the growth of community-based circus and circus skills groups since the 1970s.
Dr Helen English
Music
Dr English's primary research interests lie in the areas of music practices in the 19th century, music and society, Australian music, social Justice and gender studies. She brings a distinct local focus to her work, which developed in her PhD, Music as a Resource for World-Building in Newcastle and its Townships, 1869-1879, which investigated what music afforded Newcastle settler communities in world-building through its effects on body, mind and emotions.
School of Education
Professor Jenny Gore
Teacher Education
Leading a new era of teacher education and professional development, pedagogy expert, Professor Jenny Gore, is building a world-class model of education excellence that helps support both teachers and students and is influencing government and educational bodies across Australia.
Associate Professor Tom Griffiths
Comparative and International Education
Associate Professor Tom Griffiths's research centres on comparative educational analyses, including historical and contemporary explorations of policy and practice in context, linked to a world-system level theoretical approach to systems of mass education, their structure, curricula and development.
Associate Professor Erica Southgate
Digital Learning and Equity
A/Prof Erica Southgate uses technologies such as virtual reality and designs computer games to enhance learning and equity in education.
Dr Rachel Buchanan
Equity in Education
Dr Rachel Buchanan works at uncovering and addressing the equity implications of the increased deployment of educational technologies in all levels of education.
Dr Narelle Eather
Physical Education
Dr Narelle Eather believes encouraging children to be more active is easier than people think - it's all about giving them the right tools.
Dr Scott Imig
Teacher Education
From marines to Masters' students, principals to preservice teachers, Dr Scott Imig is helping educators on both sides of the Pacific to engage in reflective practice and conversations about growth.
School of Humanities and Social Science
Professor Hilary Carey
History
Professor Hilary Carey's research into the anti-Transportation movement provides new insight into an important aspect of Australia's colonial history.
Professor Hugh Craig
English and Writing
As unlikely as it sounds, literary scholar Professor Hugh Craig has enhanced his appreciation of Shakespeare through statistical analysis.
Professor Philip Dwyer
History
Professor Philip Dwyer and his team are leading a fundamental rethinking of violence in the modern world.
Professor Catharine Coleborne
History
Professor Coleborne is an internationally recognised historian of health and medicine with an extensive portfolio of research, teaching, administration and academic leadership. Her research and publishing in the histories of mental health, families, illness, colonial worlds and medical institutions, as well as in law and history has attracted world-wide attention.
Professor Alison Ferguson
Speech Pathology
Professor Alison Ferguson is a speech pathology researcher whose specialty is communicative interaction. She explores novel communication strategies for people who have lost speech and language function.
Emeritus Professor Mel Gray
Social Work
Under the guidance of Professor Gray, the University of Newcastle was the only university in Australia to receive a '5' rating for social work research in the "Excellence in Research for Australia" (ERA) rankings which are administered by the Australian Research Council.
Professor Victoria Haskins
History
Professor Victoria Haskins' study of Indigenous domestic service policies across two countries is filling a gap in the historical narrative.
Professor Marguerite Johnson
Classics
Professor Marguerite Johnson is interested in how stories from Antiquity console us and connect us as humans through the falling in love, the heartbreaks, the sorrow and the celebrations.
Professor Roger Markwick
History
Professor Roger Markwick, Head of the School of Humanities and Social Science and founding member of the Centre for the History of Violence believes the way we frame our past is pivotal for our understanding of the present.
Professor Lyndall Ryan
History
The story of Professor Lyndall Ryan from Newcastle's Centre for the History of Violence began while documenting the history of Tasmania's convict system.
Associate Professor Mark Harvey
Linguistics
When it comes to language, how well do we actually understand the structure of syllables and words? Associate Professor Mark Harvey's 2015 Australian Research Council (ARC) Discovery Project aims to determine this through the documentation of a severely endangered Indigenous language.
Associate Professor Wayne Reynolds
History
Associate Professor Wayne Reynolds is on a quest to unearth the real story of Australia's nuclear ambitions
Associate Professor Alistair Rolls
French
Associate Professor is a leading expert on Twentieth and Twenty-First Century French Literature, the principal English-speaking scholar on the immortalized French writer Boris Vian and is paving the way forward in the field he calls Fetishism Criticism, a discourse which recognizes that two opposing narratives can co-exist while actually refuting each other.
Professor Ros Smith
English and Writing
Associate Professor Ros Smith examines the contribution of female writers to the culture of the early modern era.
Dr Kate Ariotti
History
Digging into the past and turning up surprising – and sometimes uncomfortable – truths, Dr Kate Ariotti is seeking to put names, faces and facts to the First World War prisoner of war experience.
Dr Michael Askew
Project Director of CSRRF
Project Director of CSRRF, Dr Michael Askew, coordinates the network's professional, systematic and academically rigorous service to government and industry.
Dr Hedda Askland
Sociology and Anthropology
University of Newcastle researcher Dr Hedda Haugen Askland examines the deep-rooted forces behind home, identity and belonging in exile and refugee communities.
Dr Rebecca Beirne
Film, Media and Cultural Studies
Dr Rebecca Beirne has devoted her academic pursuits largely to media studies and the representation of queer women in popular culture
Dr Tamara Blakemore
Social Work
Dr Tamara Blakemore's framework for social work practice is grounded in an understanding of the complex and connected contexts that prompt, facilitate, and constrain the wellbeing of children, families and communities.
Associate Professor Caragh Brosnan
Sociology and Anthropology
Dr Caragh Brosnan is a researcher in the sociology of health and illness. Her focus is on health care and its value to society, but more fundamentally, the moral and principled human decisions that lie behind the science that governs our health and wellbeing.
Dr Kit Candlin
History
An authority on all things American, Dr Kit Candlin is seeking to unearth – and solve – some of its history's most devilish mysteries.
Dr Julia Coffey
Sociology and Anthropology
Julia Coffey is a lecturer in sociology in the School of Humanities and Social Sciences. Her research is in the field of health sociology, with a focus on youth, the body, and gender.
Dr Nancy Cushing
History
Dr Nancy Cushing is an environmental historian who is examining the underlying beliefs and aims that led, by the end of the colonial period, to a typical Australian diet based around the heavy consumption of beef and mutton.
Dr Michael Franjieh
Linguistics
Linguistics researcher Dr Michael Franjieh is working to revitalise language and assist literacy levels by documenting some of Vanuatu's most severely endangered languages.
Associate Professor Jesper Gulddal
English and Writing
The University of Newcastle's Head of English, Dr Jesper Gulddal, has always been fascinated by travel adventure stories, but gone are the days when fictional characters were footloose and fancy free to navigate a plot's twists and turns on a whim.
Dr Daniela Heil
Sociology and Anthropology
Daniela Heil's anthropological expertise is helping to understand the impact of cultural differences on the health of indigenous communities.
Associate Professor Sally Hewat
Speech Pathology
Dr Sally Hewat, a University of Newcastle (UON) speech pathologist who specialises in the treatment of stuttering, is working to establish speech therapy in Vietnam – where, as a profession, it doesn't exist.
Dr Terry Leahy
Sociology and Anthropology
Dr Terry Leahy, a University of Newcastle sociologist, is behind a film documenting a permaculture project in Zimbabwe that has changed lives and boosted food security.
Dr Catriona Malau
Linguistics
Documenting small, regional languages can help them to not only survive, but thrive.
Dr Kathleen McPhillips
Sociology and Anthropology
Dr Kathleen McPhillips is looking into the murky world of child sexual abuse within the church culture.
Dr Christo Moskovsky
Linguistics
At the heart of a cross-faculty research project under way at Newcastle is the view to improving the quality of life of newcomers to Australia.
Dr Bill Palmer
Linguistics
A dedicated team of Newcastle linguists is committed to studying the practical, scientific and cultural significance of dying local languages.
Dr Elizabeth Roberts-Pedersen
History
Elizabeth Roberts-Pedersen is an ARC DECRA Fellow in the Centre for the History of Violence, where she is researching the impact of World War Two on the theory and practice of psychiatry
Dr Steven Threadgold
Sociology
Drugs, violence and laziness – if you believe everything you hear in the media, young people have a lot to answer for. However, sociologist and Newcastle Youth Studies Group co-convenor, Dr Steven Threadgold, is ardent about uncovering the entire picture and contributing to a better understanding of the next generation.
Dr Rachel Unicomb
Speech Pathology
Rachael Unicomb is a Lecturer and Researcher for the Speech Pathology (honours) program. She has a clinical and translational research interest in the communication of young children, in particular those with speech sound disorders and stuttering.