Boyer Lectures

In his fourth lecture, Noel Pearson addresses the educational barriers facing young Indigenous people, and the critical need to raise literacy and numeracy rates through transformational school programs.

In his third lecture Noel Pearson argues that Indigenous Australians have become trapped in the 'bottom million' of the nation when it comes to economic development. He describes the ongoing effect of welfare dependency, or 'passive welfare', which he says is not just a problem afflicting Indigenous communities, it's a human problem.

In his second lecture, Noel Pearson reflects on the words of 1968 Boyer lecturer W.E.H. Stanner who said that Aboriginal people seek, 'a decent union of their lives with ours but on terms that let them preserve their own identity'. Pearson traces the long process that led to the final proposal for a Voice to parliament enshrined in the constitution. He identifies a speech by John Howard in 2007, which Pearson says offered 'the core rationale for constitutional recognition', and began the 15-year process to a referendum. 

Noel Pearson argues the case for why a Voice to parliament, enshrined in the constitution, is so important to Indigenous people, ‘to be afforded our rightful place’.

In this fourth and final lecture, John Bell discusses how William Shakespeare imagined a different world and encouraged his audience to do the same.

In this third lecture of the Boyer series, John Bell discusses Shakespeare's Women and how through his female characters he imagined a better world.

In this second lecture of the Boyer series, John Bell discusses what Shakespeare can teach us about governance, about politics and power.

In the first lecture of the 2021 Boyer series, John Bell opens our eyes and our ears to how relevant William Shakespeare is in today's world and what he can teach us through his own observations from four hundred years ago.

In the third Boyer lecture, Dr Andrew Forrest discusses how inequality manifests in our modern capitalist system — through intergenerational dependence on welfare, lack of access to finance, a lack of policy focus on early childhood development in vulnerable communities and through modern slavery.

In the second of his 2020 Boyer Lectures, Andrew Forrest mounts a passionate defence of our oceans. Dr Forrest argues the key issues facing our oceans — deoxygenation, overfishing and plastic pollution — are our fault, and it's us who must fix them. He says it's philanthropic and government interventions, at a scale not yet seen, that will save our seas.