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Caroline McMillen returns to UniSA

SA chief scientist Caroline McMillen has joined the council of the University of South Australia.

SA chief scientist Caroline McMillen has joined the council of the University of South Australia.
SA chief scientist Caroline McMillen has joined the council of the University of South Australia.

In today’s Higher Ed Daily Brief: new role for ex-VC, clever archaeology

McMillen comes back

Former University of Newcastle vice-chancellor Caroline McMillen can’t stay away from higher education. Now based in Adelaide — where she took up the post of South Australian chief scientist after her term at Newcastle ended last year — Professor McMillen has joined the council of the University of South Australia. It’s not a new institution to her. She used to be deputy vice-chancellor (research and innovation) at UniSA.

Lobbyist Ian Smith has also joined the UniSA council. Mr Smith, a former journalist and former staffer to Liberal politicians, is a managing partner of advisory firm Bespoke Approach and husband of former Australian Democrats leader Natasha Stott-Despoja.

Women in prehistory

Australian National University researchers have developed the first method for determining maternal mortality rates in prehistoric populations using archaeological records. It’s a difficult thing to measure because, when archaeologists dig up an ancient female skeleton, how can they tell whether or not the woman died in pregnancy or childbirth?

Their starting point was to work with modern populations and compare the maternal mortality rate with the distribution of age at death in the population. They found a strong correlation between the two in 46 different modern populations they studied.

This gave them confidence to apply the relationship to prehistoric populations and use age at death data — which can be determined from skeletons — to predict the maternal mortality rate.

Lead researcher Clare McFadden, a PhD scholar at the ANU School of Archaeology and Anthropology said she hoped the method would lead to more focus on women in prehistory studies.

“We have a lot of work on the male experience, including warfare, but now we can look at some of the female experiences, like what it was like to be a pregnant woman and new mother throughout prehistory,” she said.

Original URL: https://www.theaustralian.com.au/higher-education/higher-ed-daily-brief/caroline-mcmillen-returns-to-unisa/news-story/016b1b61d9c1c15c64fa124de50e9c4a