AustLit

'Key figures in the history of the Australian Academy of the Humanities have at times referred apologetically to it appearing to be a kind of gentlemen’s club (see Donaldson, ‘Idea of an academy’ 22-4). While this is in some ways an appropriate representation of features of the Academy’s past, this paper seeks to show that it has always been a much more complex institution and has changed over time. Focusing on the first three decades of the history of the Academy, it traces the emergence of different ideas within this institution about the humanities cause—about what the humanities are and how they should be supported. By way of introduction, the paper considers ideas held by leading scholars in the Australian Humanities Research Council (AHRC), the Academy’s predecessor, as they began to formulate their views about what the humanities cause was and why an Academy was necessary to promote it. It then goes on to describe how the Academy in pursuing this project over its first three decades became increasingly enmeshed in a changing relationship with the government of the day. The Academy was to rely on its elite, club-like status to influence government but, as will be argued, the basis on which this elite status has been claimed was to shift over time. The paper concludes with a brief reflection on what this history suggests about how the Academy might respond to the challenges the humanities face today.' (Introduction)