Shandell Cummings
Research Associate, The University of Western Australia (UWA)
shandell.cummings@uwa.edu.au
Bio:
Shandell is a Research Associate based at UWA Albany campus.
Prior to commencing this role and undertaking her PhD, Shandell worked in many organisations that delivered outcomes for Aboriginal communities on the south coast. These roles varied from natural resource management to suicide prevention in vulnerable communities to First Nations art. These roles were focused on supporting community capacity.
Shandell’s most recent academic role has been as an Albany campus tutor in Indigenous units, along with also providing support to the delivery of biodiversity units. Since 2020, she has also supported the ‘Walking Together’ team working with Noongar Elders and cultural responses to contemporary biodiversity conservation based at UWA Albany.
The focus area of Shandell’s research will be on Merningar boodja (Menang peoples’ country) looking at:
- Indigenous community driven and led responses to conservation biology
- marine landscapes/research and the application of TEK (traditional ecological knowledge)
- 2-way science and collaborative approaches that focus on Indigenous methodologies.
Teaching overview:
Since 2021, Shandell has been delivering Indigenous tutorials based at Albany, which have included INDG1150, INDG1160, INDG2300, INDG2500, INDG3300 and INDG3400. She also provides support to delivery of Biodiversity on Country (ENVT5310).
Qualifications
2020: BA (Anthropology & Sociology and Indigenous Knowledge, History & Heritage), UWA
Presentations and publications:
- Cummings S and Lullfitz A (2022) Join the Dots – Inclusive landcare practices. TEDxKinjarling 29 January 2022.
- Cummings S and Lullfitz A (2021) Two-way learnings for conservation in a global biodiversity hotspot. Ecological Society of Australia Conference, Online November 2021.
- Cummings S and Lullfitz A (2021) First Nations people and plants of southwestern Australia. John Glover Symposium, UWA Crawley 4 September 2021.
- Cummings S and Lullfitz, A (2020) Noongar and Western scientific understandings of two south coast cultural plants. Great Southern Great Science Symposium. Albany WA 14 August 2020.
- Lullfitz A, Woods J, Knapp L, Cummings S and Hopper SD (2023) ‘WA’s Christmas tree’: what mungee, the world’s largest mistletoe, can teach us about treading lightly. The Conversation.
- Ecological Society of Australia Podcast, Ecology Matters, 2022 with Alison Lullfitz.
- Lullfitz A, Knapp L, Cummings S and Hopper SD (2022) First Nations’ interactions with underground storage organs in southwestern Australia, a Mediterranean climate Global Biodiversity Hotspot. Plant and Soil. 476, 1-2, p. 589-625 37 p.
- Lullfitz A, Knapp, L, Cummings S, Woods J and Hopper SD (2023) Talking Mungee – a teacher, provider, connector, exemplar: what’s not to celebrate about the world’s largest mistletoe, Nuytsia floribunda. Plant and Soil.
