Dr Madeline E Fowler
Madeline E. Fowler is a maritime archaeologist whose research centres on Aboriginal maritime landscapes in Australia. Her extensive collaboration with the Narungga community addressed neglected narratives at Burgiyana (Point Pearce Aboriginal Mission) and underscored the need to decolonise Australian maritime archaeology by representing and engaging Indigenous peoples and communities in research.
Biography
Dr Madeline Fowler is a Senior Research Fellow in Archaeology at the University of Southampton.I am a maritime archaeologist with a focus on Aboriginal maritime landscapes and decolonising maritime archaeology. I am currently contributing to the ERC-funded ACROSS project (Australasian Colonisation Research: Origins of Seafaring to Sahul) by exploring ethical practices for engaging Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities in the study of the submerged landscapes of Australia’s deep past.
I completed my PhD at Flinders University, Australia, in 2015 and continue to have a strong partnership with the Maritime Archaeology Program at Flinders University as an Associate Lecturer. My doctoral research addressed neglected Aboriginal narratives by working with the Narungga community to record the maritime cultural landscape of Point Pearce Aboriginal Mission (Burgiyana) in South Australia. I continue to work closely with Narungga community members and scholars, a relationship which began in 2012. My former posts include Project Officer in the Coastal & Marine team at Wessex Archaeology, UK, (2016) and Senior Curator Maritime Archaeology at the Queensland Museum Network and James Cook University, Australia, (2017–2018). I am a Dive Master and have worked on maritime archaeology projects in Australia, New Zealand, the United Kingdom, Denmark and Israel. I currently hold the position of Reviews Editor for the Journal of Maritime Archaeology and am on the Board of the Advisory Council on Underwater Archaeology (USA).
Education
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PhD, Flinders University, Adelaide, 2015
Areas of Research / Professional Expertise
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Maritime archaeology
Indigenous archaeology
Community-based archaeology
Submerged landscapes
Maritime cultural landscapes
Websites
Books
Articles
The ‘very stillness of things’: object biographies of sailcloth and fishing net from the Point Pearce Aboriginal Mission (Burgiyana) colonial archive, South Australia
Published: May 07, 2016 by World Archaeology
Authors: Madeline Fowler, Amy Roberts, Lester-Irabinna Rigney
This article details the discovery of early twentieth-century sailcloth and fishing-net samples pertaining to the lives of Aboriginal peoples on Point Pearce Aboriginal Mission (Burgiyana). Biographies for the samples are explored, from which it is argued that these objects may have many viewpoints assigned to them. The sailcloth and fishing-net samples allow the telling of complex stories from the past and present.
Seeing Narungga (Aboriginal) land from the sea: A case study from Point Pearce/Burgiyana, South Australia
Published: Jan 01, 2015 by Bulletin of the Australasian Institute for Maritime Archaeology
Authors: Madeline Fowler, Amy Roberts, Fred Graham, Lindsay Sansbury, Carlo Sansbury
This paper presents a consideration of viewpoints of the land from a seaward perspective as a method within the maritime cultural landscape approach. In addition, three case studies are reviewed which employed a ‘seeing land from the sea (river or lake)’ method (which included studies of the various subfields of archaeology, i.e., maritime, Indigenous and historical).
A report on the exhibition 'Children, Boats and "Hidden Histories": Crayon drawings by aboriginal children at Point Pearce Mission (Burgiyana) (South Australia), 1939'
Published: Jan 11, 2014 by Bulletin of the Australasian Institute for Maritime Archaeology
Authors: Amy Roberts, Madeline Fowler, Tauto Sansbury
This paper reports on a recent exhibition ‘Children, Boats and ‘Hidden Histories’: Crayon drawings by Aboriginal children at Point Pearce Mission (Burgiyana) (South Australia [SA]), 1939’. The exhibit was displayed in the South Australian Maritime Museum (1 Feb–31 July 2014) and was curated by Roberts, Fowler and Sansbury (Fig.1). The exhibition featured nine framed crayon drawings (facsimiles) as well as a large interpretive panel.
'They camped here always': 'Archaeologies of attachment' in a seascape context at Wardang Island (Waraldi/Wara-dharldhi) and Point Pearce Peninsula (Burgiyana), South Australia
Published: Jan 01, 2014 by Australasian Historical Archaeology
Authors: Madeline Fowler, Amy Roberts, Jennifer McKinnon, Clem O'Loughlin, Fred Graham
This research employs the concept of 'archaeologies of attachment', with its emphasis on material culture and intangible heritage, and applies it to an Indigenous Australian seascape - an approach rarely or thoroughly combined in maritime studies. The seascape investigated is the Wardang Island (Waraldi/Waradharldhi)/ Point Pearce Peninsula (Burgiyana) area in South Australia. This region (and the wider Yorke Peninsula area) is the traditional country of the Narungga people.
Combining Indigenous and Maritime Archaeological Approaches: Experiences and Insights from the ‘(Re)locating Narrunga Project’, Yorke Peninsula, South Australia
Published: Sep 05, 2013 by Journal of Maritime Archaeology
Authors: Amy Roberts, Jennifer McKinnon, Clem O’Loughlin, Klynton Wanganeen, Lester-Irabinna Rigney, Madeline Fowler
This paper details the unique pairing of Indigenous and maritime archaeological approaches in the ‘(Re)locating Narrunga Project’. Narrunga was a ketch built by the Narungga Aboriginal community at Point Pearce Mission (Yorke Peninsula, South Australia) at the turn of the twentieth century and later sunk in the 1940s.