Andrew McWilliam, BA, BLitt, PhD (ANU)
Fellow, Department of Anthropology

Email: andrew.mcwilliam@anu.edu.au

Biographical Statement

I am currently working on a number of research projects in Indonesia and East Timor. They include an ARC Discovery Project in collaboration with Daniel Fitzpatrick (Faculty of Law, ANU), 'Waiting for Law: Land, Custom and Legal Regulation in East Timor'; an ARC Discovery project with Kathy Robinson (Anthropology, RSPAS) entitled, 'Being Muslim in Eastern Indonesia: practice, politics and cultural diversity'; and an ARC Discovery project with Sue O’Connor (ANH, RSPAS) exploring cultural and environmental shifts in late holocene settlement patterns of East Timor.

Research Interests

Timor ethnography, minorities and governance in Indonesia and East Timor, customary land and resource tenures, indigenous religion, applied anthropology in economic development, Australian Aboriginal customary land interests and cultural heritage.

Key Publications

• 2008 'Fataluku Healing and Cultural Resilience in East Timor', Ethnos 73(2): 217-240
• 2007 Traditional Justice in Timor, TAPJA Special Issue. Vol 8(1) [co-edited with James J. Fox]
• 2007 'Customary Claims and the Public Interest: On Fataluku Resource Entitlements in Lautem', in Damien Kingsbury and Michael Leach (eds), East Timor: Beyond Independence. Melbourne: Monash Asia Institute Press:168-75.
• 2007 'Austronesians in Linguistic Disguise: Fataluku cultural fusion in East Timor' Journal of Southeast Asian Studies Vol 38(2), 355-375.
• 2005. ‘Houses of Resistance in East Timor: Structuring sociality in the new nation’. Anthropological Forum, 15(1):27-44.
• 2002. Paths of Origin: Gates of Life. A Study of Place and Precedence in Southwest Timor. Verhandelingen, 202. Leiden: KITLV Press.

Career Highlights

Research anthropologist, Aboriginal Areas Protection Authority (1995-2000); Technical advisor, Australian Agency for International Development (1997-2004); Research Fellow, Resource Management in the Asia Pacific Project (1999-2001); Senior Visiting Fellow/Adjunct Fellow, International Institute for Asian Studies (University of Leiden) 1998 & 2005, Visiting Fellow, Kahin Centre for Southeast Asian Studies, Cornell University 2007.