8pm Thurs 17 February 2022

Venue: to be advised

Jeff Brownrigg is currently a visiting research fellow at the Australian Studies Institute (ANU) and Adjunct Professor of Cultural Heritage (University of Canberra). He has long experience investigating, writing and teaching about Australian cultural heritage. Indeed, his current work includes investigations of cultural life in Australia in the 1830s and 1840s.

He has published several books and journal articles on many remarkable Australians, often musicians. He is frequently invited to address community groups such historical societies. A recent address was the Inaugural Tim Fischer Oration.  In 2001 he was awarded a Commonwealth Federation Medal for service to community history. In 2010 he was selected by Toastmasters as the Communicator of the Year for the Canberra Region. He continues to lecture in the tertiary sector and to supervise and assess postgraduate theses. His latest book Heaven, Earth and Canberra: Shakespeare and the Ghosts of Australia’s National Film and Sound Archive was published in December 2021.

He has a long-standing, enduring passion for Italy in general and the Island of Sicily in particular. He is fond of opera, an enthusiasm nurtured in more than 20-odd years as Head of Sound and Radio Collections and other senior positions at Australia’s National Film and Sound Archive.

Jeff graduated with a BA (Hon) from La Trobe University, majoring in English, History and Spanish; and was awarded a PhD by the University of York with a thesis (Words and Music in Time) that cut across Music, English and Philosophy.

*Jeff Bronwrigg’s presentation was due to take place in September 2021 but it had to be postponed due to the ACT lockdown