Dr Katharine (Kate) McGregor
| Lecturer in Southeast Asian History | |
|---|---|
| Telephone: | (+61 3) 8344 3379 |
| Email: | k.mcgregor@unimelb.edu.au |
| Fax: | (+61 3) 8344 7894 |
| Location: | Room 327 Bridge History, John Medley Building The University of Melbourne VIC 3010 |
| Academic Profile (click on the link for more information) | |
| Biography | |
| Research | |
| Publications | |
| Supervision | |
Biography
Kate McGregor has served as an editorial board member of the widely read magazine, Inside Indonesia. She is currently a councillor of the national Association of Asian Studies of Australia and secretary of the Indonesia Council. In 2001 she proposed and co-convened the first national Indonesia Council Open conference as a means of bringing together established academics and postgraduates working on Indonesia. This conference is now a biennial national event.
Kate is currently Convenor of the university-wide Indonesia Forum. The Indonesia Forum (IF) is an informal and open network of academics and administrative staff of the University who share a common interest and professional involvement in Indonesia. For the past ten years the IF has hosted major functions which have brought together the wider Melbourne Indonesian and Indonesia-interested community on campus.
Kate’s first monograph, History in Uniform: Military Ideology and the Construction of Indonesia's Past, was published by Singapore University Press in conjunction with KITLV and the Asian Studies Association of Australia in February 2007. The book examines military representations of the Indonesian past found in a variety of media including museums, monuments, commemorative days, films and written texts including the National History textbook. Based on extensive Indonesian archival records for museums, monuments and military histories in interviews with Indonesian history makers, propagandists and artists it examine how history is constructed and what choices are made about these representations and why. Military representations of the past are significant because of the military’s elevated position in Indonesian society and their dual defence and socio-political roles.
Kate is Chair of Ethics for the School of Historical Studies. She is also currently overseeing the development of a first year inter-disciplinary New Generation arts subject focusing on Asia to be taught for the first time in semester 2, 2008.
Research
Kate McGregor is a historian of Indonesia. Her research interests include Indonesian historiography, memories of violence, the Indonesian military, Islam and identity in Indonesia and more recently an examination of ‘cross-cultural’ responses to high profile criminal trials. She teaches in the areas of Southeast Asian history and Asian thematic history.
Kate is currently working on a project entitled Islam and the Politics of Memory in Post-Authoritarian Indonesia. This project, funded by an Australian Research Council Grant, examines how memories of violence shape personal and group identities. The analysis is based on two cases of violence in Indonesia including the 1965 killings of approximately 500,000 Indonesians. Memories of these killings have created parallel ambiguities and conflicts to the much studied memories of the holocaust in Europe, memories of settler violence in Australia and memories of the Partition in India, but we know far less about how constructions of this past have affected societal attitudes and identities.
Kate has recently commenced work on a collaborative project with Richard Pennell (also in the School of Historical Studies) entitled ‘Enemy Law: Cross-Cultural Responses to the Prosecutions of High Profile Foreign Criminals’. This project focuses on cases of individuals of one culture tried under the laws of another. We will examine both how defendants and prosecutors use ideas of culture in the trials and broader ideological and political intentions.
Publications
Books
- McGregor, Katharine E., History in Uniform: Military Ideology and the Construction of Indonesia's Past, Singapore University Press, University of Hawaii Press and KITLV and the Asian Studies Association of Australia, Singapore, 2007
Book Chapters
- McGregor, Katharine E. (2005). ‘Nugroho Notosusanto: The Legacy of a Historian in the Service of an Authoritarian Regime,’ in Mary S. Zurbuchen (ed.), Beginning to Remember: The Past in Indonesia's Present, University of Washington Press and University of Singapore Press, Singapore, pp. 209-232
- McGregor, Katharine E. (2004). ‘Museums and the Transformation from Colonial to Post-colonial Institutions in Indonesia,’ in Fiona Kerlogue (ed.), Performing Objects: Museums, Material Culture and Performance in Southeast Asia: Contributions on Critical Museology and Material Culture Series, Horniman Museum, London, pp. 15-30
Journal Articles
- Vickers, Adrian and Katharine McGregor (2005). ‘Public Debates about History: Comparative Notes From Indonesia', History Australia, Vol.2, No. 2. June, 44.1-44.13
- McGregor, Katharine E. (2003). ‘Representing the Indonesian Past: The National Monument History Museum from Guided Democracy to the New Order,' Indonesia, No. 75, April, pp. 91-122
- McGregor, Katharine E. (2002). ‘Commemoration of 1 October, Hari Kesaktian Pancasila: A Post-Mortem Analysis?’ Asian Studies Review, Vol. 26, No. 1, March, pp. 39-72
Published Conference Papers
- McGregor, Katharine E., ‘La Militarization du Passe Indonesien sous Suharto” (History in the Suharto Years: The Militarization of the Indonesian Past), Special Issue ‘Enseigner La Nation: Le Pouvoir de Manuels Scolaires,’ Outre-Terre: Revue Francaise de Geopolotique, October 2005. (Paper delivered at the May 2005 Enseigner La Nation (Teaching the Nation) World Comparative Conference held at La Sorbonne Paris)
Short Articles
- McGregor, Katharine (2005), ‘Remembering the Coup Attempt of 1965: Forty Years On’, Inside Indonesia, No. 84, October –December
- McGregor, Katharine, (2002) ‘Digging up the Past in Post-Suharto Indonesia,' NIASNytt (Bulletin of Asian Studies Produced by the Nordic Institute of Asian Studies), http://nias.ku.dk/nytt) No. 4, December
- McGregor, Katharine, (2001) ‘A Soldier’s Historian’, Inside Indonesia, No. 68. October-December
Recent International Conference Papers
- ‘Two Women Remember: Prison Memoirs from 1965 as Counter Narratives in Indonesia’, Association of Asian Studies Conference, March 22-25 2007 Marriot Hotel, Boston, USA
- ‘Madiun in the Discourse of 1965: We were the victims of the PKI’, International Association for Historians of Asia, Hotel Intercontinental, Manila, 22-24 November 2006
- ‘Remembering Tanjung Priok: Contemporary Discourses of Islamic Victimhood in Indonesia’, Asian Studies Association of Australia Conference, University of Wollongong, 26-29 June 2006
Supervision
Current Supervisions (Principal and Associate Supervisions)
- Justin Wejak, (PhD) The Catholic Church and Communism in Indonesia
- Vannessa Hearman, (PhD) Remembering the 1960s and the Left in Indonesia
- Nadia Wright, (PhD) Singapore’s Colonial Past: Images of Raffles and Farquar
- Mina Elfira, (PhD) Gender Relations in Padang Indonesia
- Jordan Winfield, (PhD) Buddhism and Authority in Burma
- Athalia Zwartz, (Hons) Ideas of Identity Amongst Islamic Youth in Melbourne
- Simon Miller, (Hons) An Analysis of Indonesian Responses to the issue of Terrorism 2001-2002
- Sally Wilkin, (Hons) A Critical Biography of Ganemy Kunoo, a Karen Guerilla
Completed Supervisions
- Nina Nurmilla, (PhD) Polygamy in Indonesia (2006)
- Hani Yulindrasari, (MA) Gender Discourse in Indonesian Parenting Magazines (2006)
- Jordan Winfield, (MA) Buddhism as a Source of Anti-colonialism (2006)
- Dhara Anjara, (Hons) The Princely State of Baroda in the Minority Administration (2005)
- Briony Wood-Ingram, (Hons) Petrus and the New Order Government (2006)