Christine Boulan-Smit, PhD (ANU)
Visiting Fellow, Resource Management in Asia-Pacific Program

Email: boulan-smit[at]attglobal.net

Biographical Statement

I was born in Southern France and studied in Paris (EHESS), Brussels (ULB) and Canberra (ANU). I have worked in various fields (visual & performing arts, ethnocinema, linguistics, communication, anthropology) in Northern and Eastern Europe, PNG, Latin America and South East Asia. My current focus is on applied anthropology in Indonesia & Peru.

Research Interests

Mining industry - the exploration phase: innovative strategies to enhance social stability around future projects (early participatory assessment and community mapping, capacity building for good governance, socially sustainable pilot projects, etc); the contemporary relevance of traditional narratives and oral history; field research methodology and the use of Visual Anthropology.

Key Publications

• 'Traditional territorial categories and constituent institutions in West Seram: The Nili Ela of "Wele Telu Batai and the Alune Hena of Ma'saman Uwei" in Thomas Reuter (ed.) Sharing the Earth - Carving up the Land: Territorial categories and institutions in the Austronesian world, Pandanus Press, Canberra, 2006.
• 'When the Elephants Fights the Grass Suffers: decentralisation and the Mining Industry in Indonesia', Journal Anthropologi Indonesia 68, 2002.
• 'Founding Communities: Departures, arrivals, returns and resettlements in West Seram' in Jukka Siikala (ed), Departures: How societies distribute their people,TAFAS 46 – The Finnish Anthropological Society,Helsinki, 2001.