Sally Brockwell, BA (Hons) ANU, MA (ANU), PhD (NTU)
ARC Research Associate, Department of Archaeology and Natural History
Email: sally.brockwell@anu.edu.au
Biographical Statement
My doctoral research was into earth mound sites on the Adelaide River in the Northern Territory. My interest
in this topic is ongoing and I recently visited Weipa to look at earth mounds there. I am also involved in several
collaborative projects: ARC Discovery Project, Cultural and Environmental Shifts in Late Holocene East Timor: Evidence
for Climate Change? with Prof. Sue O’Connor (ANH, ANU) and Dr Andrew McWilliam (Anthropology, ANU); ARC Linkage
Project Rethinking Cultural Heritage in Southeast Asia: The Interface between Cultural and Natural Heritage in
Protected Areas with Prof. Sue O’Connor and Industry Partner Dr Denis Byrne (NSW Department of Environment and Climate
Change); The Anbarra Project with Dr Betty Meehan, analysing shell midden sites from the Blyth River, Northern
Territory; the Northern Territory Dating Project researching Holocene coastal settlement in NT and Climate Change
and Human Behavioural Variability in the Coastal Wet-Dry Tropics of Northern Australia?, both with colleagues from ANU,
NT Heritage Unit, Museum and Art Gallery of the NT, and the Universities of Sydney, Queensland and Washington, Seattle.
The department welcomes inquiries from potential research students who would like to develop projects on earth
mounds in Australia and the archaeology of East Timor.
Research Interests
Archaeology of northern Australia and Island South East Asia
Key Publications
- Models, mounds and mobility. Wetlands archaeology in the Top End: Some comparisons. In A. Anderson, Ian Lilley
and S. O'Connor (eds) Histories of Old Ages. Essays in Honour of Rhys Jones, pp. 327-42.
Pandanus, Canberra, 2001.
- (with A. Clarke and R. Levitus) Seasonal movement in the prehistoric human ecology of the
Alligator Rivers region, north Australia. In J. Allen, W. Ambrose, A. Anderson and A. Andrews (eds)
Histories of Old Ages. Essays in Honour of Rhys Jones, pp.361-80. Pandanus, Canberra, 2001.
- (ed. with P. Bourke and C. Fredericksen) Darwin Archaeology: Aboriginal, Asian and European Heritage. Charles Darwin University Press, Darwin, 2005.
- Earth mounds in northern Australia: A review. Australian Archaeology (63): 47-56, 2006.
- (with P. Bourke, P. Faulkner and B. Meehan) Climate variability in the mid to late Holocene Arnhem
Land region, north Australia: Archaeological archives of environmental and cultural change.
In P. Lape (ed.) Climate Change and Archaeology in the Pacific. Archaeology in
Oceania42(3): 91-101, 2007.
Career Highlights
Visiting Fellow, School of Archaeology and Anthropology, ANU (2003-2005); Post-doctoral Research Fellow, Department of Archaeology and Natural History, ANU (2005-2006).
