An emerging major centre: Pacific archaeology at The Australian National University (1961–79)

[Extract] Pacific archaeology at The Australian National University (ANU) developed out of the (then) Research School of Pacific Studies (RSPacS), which was ‘geared to the systematic extension of knowledge by theoretical and empirical study of the vast Pacific region’ (Firth 1996:5; Stewart 2008). Although archaeology was not explicitly within the initial vision for the school in 1946 (Firth 1996:5), by 1959 an advertisement had been placed in the Canberra Times for a fellowship in ‘prehistory’ within the Department of Anthropology and Sociology. Cambridge graduate and formally trained medievalist Jack Golson took up the position in 1961, arriving at ANU from Auckland, where he was previously appointed and had conducted much pioneering Pacific archaeology (Jackson 2014; see also Furey, Chapter 31, this volume). The aim of Golson’s appointment was to ‘devis[e] a programme of research in the archaeologically underdeveloped fields of Australian and Southwest Pacific prehistory […] with a particular commitment to Papua New Guinea’ (Golson 2006:109). Eight years later, in 1969, the Department of Prehistory – the first dedicated archaeology department at ANU – was formed with Golson as foundation professor (Department of Prehistory 1970; see Figure 32.1)