This seminar examines concepts of rights that arise as the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) is translated into the local vernacular of Pintupi-Luritja, a Western Desert language. The semantic properties of English and possible equivalent Luritja concepts are juxtaposed in the translation context and the limitations and possibilities of the universal human rights discourse are reimagined. This then sets up the core challenges and possibilities of the local uptake of this discourse. As the title ‘The Act of Translation: Emancipatory Potential and Apocryphal Revelations’ of the chapter in a forthcoming book from which this seminar draws inspiration suggests, the context within which human rights are engaged with is fundamental. Interrogating the assumptions embedded in the language of the Declaration is also to interrogate the foundations of the secular modern person. Can this rights-bearer accommodate the ideals of the relational spiritual Anangu person? The anthropological literature on this relational or socio-centric person is discussed. Re-visiting this early ethnographic subject is essential if we are to re-consider this distinction in terms of a continuum, rather than a dichotomy. And thus also to encourage a local dialogue with human rights. 

Biography:  After 10 years working with the two major NT Land Councils, Sarah joined the ANU in 2002 as a Post-Doctoral Fellow on the CAEPR ARC Linkage Project with Rio Tinto and CEDA; “Indigenous community organisations andminers: Partnering sustainable regional development?”. Sarah continued at CAEPR for 6 years, including as Social Science Coordinator for the Desert Knowledge CRC. Sarah has published on a diverse range of issues in the Indigenous Australian context, including; extractive industries and sustainable development, Aboriginal community governance and service delivery in remote settlements, social exclusion, marginality and post-coloniality, gender violence, the ethical governance of intellectual property and collaborative knowledges, and challenges for human rights implementation. Sarah’s most recent position at the ANU was ARC Future Fellow ending in 2016, which resulted in the book Remote Freedoms: Politics, Personhood, and Human Rights in Aboriginal Central Australia (in press, Stanford University Studies in Human Rights Series). Sarah is currently a Senior Fellow at the University of Queensland’s Centre for Social Responsibility in Mining where she is returning to her earlier interests in applied development anthropology. Sarah is currently also a CAEPR Visiting Fellow.