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- PMSEIC appointment
CHASS welcomes PMSEIC appointment
1 March 2005
CHASS today (Wednesday) welcomed the appointment of a humanities specialist to the Prime Minister's Science, Engineering and Innovation Council (PMSEIC).
Professor Iain McCalman, former President of the Academy of the Humanities, has been appointed to PMSEIC for three years.
Professor Malcolm Gillies, President of CHASS (the Council for the Humanities, Arts and Social Sciences) hailed the appointment as historic. He said that Iain McCalman will make an outstanding member of PMSEIC.
"He's a world-class historian with a popular touch," he said. "Iain McCalman has written books and TV scripts, and took part in a televised re-enactment of Cook's voyages to Australia .
"He will be a breath of fresh air in discussions at PMSEIC."
Professor McCalman will join the Prime Minister, eight other Cabinet Ministers, and 16 non-politicians on Council. Most of the non-politicians are appointed as Presidents of their organisations.
Professor Gillies said the appointment was welcome recognition that people from the humanities had a role to play in the national innovation system.
"PMSEIC has been dominated by science and engineering until now, and perhaps this is understandable," Professor Gillies said.
"But the middle name of the Council is "Innovation". The role that other disciplines play in the innovation process has tended to be overlooked.
"There is a growing recognition that the humanities - in conjunction with the arts and social sciences - are important partners in this process," he said. "CHASS will continue to press for the ex officio appointments from non-science disciplines."
Iain McCalman has been appointed in a personal capacity.
Professor Gillies said that CHASS had nearly completed a report documenting the commercial experiences of researchers in the humanities, arts and social sciences, that shows the value of their work. The report will be released soon.
(Iain McCalman is in the US for the next month, working as Mellon Visiting Professor of History at Caltech.)
- For more information, please contact:
- Toss Gascoigne
- Executive Director
- Council of the Humanties, Arts and Social Sciences
- Phone: +61 2 6249 1995
- director@chass.org.au
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