2012 NIDEA Seminar Series
RSVP to Dr Yaqub Foroutan (foroutan@waikato.ac.nz)
Thursday May 24, 2012
1:10 - 2:00pm
S.1.02
Professor Linda Briskman (Swinburne University of Technology, Australia)
Indigenous Populations and Asylum Seekers in Australia: Human Rights Perspective
Abstract:
Increasing evidence in Australia reveals extreme levels of disadvantage for Indigenous populations, particularly those who were removed from their families and communities, and refugee populations, predominantly those emerging from immigration detention centres. The paper argues that interdisciplinary perspectives supplement the field of demography in analysing the reasons why such disadvantage persists. Using the concept of ‘racialised banishment’, the findings from qualitative and ethnographic research in Australia are presented to examine how both Indigenous peoples and asylum seekers/refugees have been excluded from the nation state through removal to sites of isolation (reserves, missions, immigration detention); by denial of normative state rights (liberty and economic and social rights); and through the denigration of cultural, spiritual and religious identities (Indigenous relationship with land and Muslim asylum seekers). The paper poses the question of how exclusionary trends might be reversed to overcome disadvantage and to reinstate rights to both population groups.
Speaker's Bio:
Professor Linda Briskman is a human rights academic and activist. Her work spans the domains of Indigenous rights and asylum seeker rights and she has published extensively in both areas. Linda convened the People’s Inquiry into Immigration into Detention in Australia and is committed to ensuring that asylum seeker voices are heard in the public domain. Publications include Social Work with Indigenous Communities (2007) and the co-authored Human Rights Overboard: Seeking asylum in Australia which won the 2008 Australian Human Rights Commission Award for Literature (non-fiction). Linda is currently working with Yaghoob Foroutan and Douglas Pratt from the University of Waikato on developing an international project on religious and racial intolerance.
Thursday April 26, 2012
1:10 - 2:00pm
K.3.19
Professor Raymond J.G.M. Florax (Purdue University, USA & VU University Amsterdam, The Netherlands)
Agriculture, Transportation and the Timing of Urbanization: Global Analysis at the Grid Cell Level
Abstract:
This paper addresses the timing of a location’s historical transition from rural to urban activity. We test whether urbanization occurs sooner in places with higher agricultural productivity and lower transport costs, using worldwide data that divide the earth’s surface at half-degree intervals into over 60,000 cells. From an independent estimate of each cell’s rural and urban population history, we identify the date at which each cell achieves various thresholds of urbanization. Controlling for unobserved heterogeneity across countries through fixed effects and neighbors’ urbanization using spatial techniques, we find that the date at which each cell passes each urbanization threshold is positively associated with its suitability for cultivation, having seasonal frosts, more access to navigable waterways and lower elevation. Aggregating cells into countries, an earlier urbanization date is linked to higher per capita income today.
Speaker's Bio:
Raymond J.G.M. Florax holds degrees in economics and sociology, and is professor in the Department of Agricultural Economics at Purdue University, in the US. He is also associated with the Department of Spatial Economics at the VU University in Amsterdam, The Netherlands. In Amsterdam, he formerly directed the department’s MASTER-point research group engaged in research on meta-analysis in spatial, transport, and environmental economics, and coordinated a research program on the use of energy efficient technology in small and medium sized enterprises. At Purdue University he directs a research group focusing on “Space, Health and Population Economics” (SHaPE). His research deals with spatial data analysis, spatial and environmental modeling, and meta-analysis. He has published widely on these topics. He has served a ten-year tenure as editor-in-chief of the journal “Papers in Regional Science,” and is a fellow of the Spatial Econometrics Association (SEA), the Tinbergen Institute (TI), and the Wageningen School of Social Sciences (WASS).
Thursday March 22, 2012
1:10 - 2:00pm
J.G.17
Dr Tahu Kukutai (NIDEA, The University of Waikato)
Theorising the Global Māori Diaspora
Abstract:
With the increased political and scholarly attention given to New Zealand’s diaspora and the implications of the so-called ‘brain drain’ has come a renewed interest in Māori living overseas. The last decade has seen the emergence of a small but important body of work on Māori transnationalism, much of it focused on the estimating the size and structure of the Australian-resident Māori population. While researchers are beginning to pay attention to the demographic and policy implications of international Māori migration, there remains something of a black hole when it comes to theorising the flow of indigenous people, resources and ideas from Aotearoa to other parts of the world. This paper blends insights from theories of diaspora, transnationalism and indigeneity to develop a syncretic framework within which to investigate the global Māori disapora. It focuses on three key questions: How useful is the concept of a global Māori diaspora? What distinguishes indigenous diasporas from others kinds of diasporas? How might a theory of Māori transnationalism generate new ideas about about indigeneity, migration and disaporic communities? The possibilities for theoretically-informed investigations of Māori diaspora are illustrated using national census data on Māori living in Australia, the United Kingdom and Canada, as well as data on Māori expatriates from the 2011 Every Kiwi Counts survey.
Speaker's Bio:
Tahu Kukutai (Waikato-Tainui, Ngāti Maniapoto, Te Aupōuri) is a Senior Research Fellow at the National Institute of Demographic and Economic Analysis (NIDEA) at the University of Waikato. She holds a PhD in Sociology from Stanford University and a Masters in Demography from the University of Waikato. Tahu has studied Māori population dynamics for much of her academic career. Her research spans multiple levels, from action-based research in rural Māori communities, to comparative projects examining Indigenous demographic change and well-being internationally. Tahu was recently awarded a Royal Society of New Zealand Marsden Fast Start grant to investigate ethnic classification in censuses around the world for the past 25 years. She is a former Fulbright recipient and serves on numerous committees representing Māori and academic interests.
Thursday February 16, 2012
1:10 - 2:00pm
S.G.03
Dr Marion Burkimsher (The University of Lausanne, Switzerland)
Are Women in Europe still Having Babies?
Abstract:
New Zealand’s total fertility rate has been hovering around the mystical ‘replacement value’ of just over two children per woman for many years. However, over in Europe the total fertility rate reached ‘lowest-low’ levels in several countries, not much above one child per woman, causing some alarm among policy-makers. However, since roughly the turn of the millennium, fertility rates have started to rise again in most – but not all – European countries. This presentation will look at the trends and complex interrelationships of the timing of childbearing and family size, together with the influence of migration. The differences between the patterns of timing and number of children born in Eastern Europe and Western Europe will be highlighted. The value of detailed statistics by birth order will be highlighted with examples from Switzerland. Some of the international datasets available will be presented, for example the Human Fertility Database and Generations and Gender Survey. And so to answer the question posed in the title: Yes, women are still having babies in Europe – more than they used to – though still not as many as in New Zealand.
Speaker's Bio:
Dr. Marion Burkimsher is a Geographer at heart, though she has followed a varied course through her career, from surveyor to linguistic editor to author. Her PhD studies in Glaciology (at the University of Manchester) can be compared to her more recent MSc in Demography (at the University of Geneva), as both glaciers and population are dynamic systems, with independent inputs and outputs. She is currently an independent researcher affiliated to the University of Lausanne, Switzerland. Cross-country comparisons and quantitative analyses using large databases are her current interests, with a focus on fertility trends and religious trends. For more details: http://www.unil.ch/webdav/site/issrc/shared/2._Chercheurs/Burkimsher_Marion/MBurkimsher_pres_affilies.pdf.