Organising Committee

Constellation by Gail Mabo. © Gail Mabo/Copyright Agency, 2021

Dr Robert Clarke

Robert is a senior lecturer who teaches in the English program in the School of Humanities at the University of Tasmania. He is the former Head of Discipline, English (2017–20), English; executive member of the Australian University Heads of English (AUHE), Executive Member for the Association for the Study of Australian Literature, and co-editor of JASAL: the Journal of the Association for the Study of Australian Literature. Robert is the Director of the Hedberg Writer-in-Residence Program.

He is the author of Travel Writing from Black Australia (2016), and editor of The Cambridge Companion to Postcolonial Travel Writing (2018), and Celebrity Colonialism (2009). His articles and reviews have been published in international peer-reviewed journals. He is the editor of the Journal of the Association for the Study of Australian Literature (JASAL).

Robert’s research foci include: travel writing, postcolonial studies, book groups, contemporary Australian fiction, representations of Aboriginality in writing. He has also published on the scholarship of teaching and learning in English Studies, and digital storytelling.

Fergus Edwards

Fergus is a PhD candidate in English at the University of Tasmania.  He holds an MA in Philosophy, Politics, and Economics from Oxford University, and an MA in English from the Open University.  His research focuses on the work of Tom Stoppard, with a particular focus on its engagement with the philosophy of ethics and the philosophy of language.  His paper on Stoppard and Wittgenstein’s philosophy of language is forthcoming in Philosophy and Literature, and he will be presenting a paper on Stoppard, Havel, and censorship to the Australasian Humour Studies Network.  Fergus has led international businesses at JPMorgan, UBS, and MUFG, and has run ultramarathons on seven continents. 

Sam Ryan

Sam is undertaking a PhD in Society and Culture at the University of Tasmania. He holds a Bachelor of Arts with Honours in Creative Arts from Victoria University. His research interests are centred around Australian poetry and genre. With over ten years’ experience in publishing and digital marketing, Sam is assisting the ASAL 2022 conference with website construction and general marketing advice.

We acknowledge the palawa/pakana and Gadigal people, the traditional custodians of the land upon which we live and work. We honour their enduring culture and knowledges as vital to the self-determination, wellbeing and resilience of their communities, and to shaping a just, inclusive and equitable Australian society.