‘Reflexive/Reflections’ category
Explore working papers that centre reflexive, practice‑based engagements with Pacific worlds. These writings foreground positionality, lived experience, talanoa‑informed learning, and community‑based insights, inviting shared reflection and dialogue that strengthens Pacific knowledge.
Reflexive/Reflections — PARC Working Paper Series
The reflections/reflexive writing category creates space for reflexive, practice‑based, and relational writing that foregrounds how Pacific knowledge is lived, learned, and enacted. These working papers centre positionality reflections, talanoa‑informed learning, practice reflections, and community‑based insights, recognising reflexivity as a vital part of Pacific research and knowledge‑making.
Contributions in this category attend to the relationships, responsibilities, and contexts that shape research, creative practice, and community engagement. Authors reflect on learning journeys, methodological tensions, ethical considerations, and moments of insight that emerge through working with Pacific communities, knowledges, and ways of being. Reflexive writing at PARC values transparency, accountability, and care, and supports collective and intergenerational wellbeing by making visible the often unseen labour of thinking, relating, and learning.
Reflexive Papers
Teaching Pacific Knowledge in Australian Universities between Disciplines and Contexts
Ruth (Lute) Faleolo
This article explains how Pacific knowledge is being taught in Australian universities, even though most universities do not have proper Pacific Studies programs. Instead, Pacific content is often shared “in between” different subjects like Education, History, Migration Studies, Global Studies, and International Development. Drawing on my teaching across four universities, I show how these subjects have created small but important openings to introduce Pacific ideas—such as our ways of understanding wellbeing, our research methods, our material culture, and our migration stories.
Even though Pacific content is not always visible in official course outlines, Pacific knowledge is still being taught through creative and culturally grounded teaching approaches. This includes finding ways to decolonise and Indigenise lessons, and to bring Pacific voices and perspectives into classrooms that were not originally designed for us. By sharing these experiences, the article highlights both the challenges and the possibilities of keeping Pacific knowledge alive in Australian universities today, especially when working across many different disciplines and contexts.
Faleolo, R. L. (2026). ‘Teaching Pacific knowledge in Australian universities between disciplines and contexts.’ Pacific Australia Research Centre Working Paper Series, 2026-06. PARC, Australia. DOI: 10.13140/RG.2.2.25324.12160
Reflexive Brain Dumping: Insights from Practice as a PhD and Postdoctoral Pacific Researcher
Ruth (Lute) Faleolo
This working paper shares how a simple writing practice called “brain dumping” has supported the research journey of Dr Ruth (Lute) Faleolo, a Pacific researcher, during her PhD and postdoctoral work. Brain dumping involves freely writing down thoughts, feelings, and reflections to help make sense of research activities, decisions, and responsibilities, particularly when working within Pacific communities.
Drawing on reflections written between 2015 and 2023, the paper shows how brain dumping helped Dr Faleolo navigate cultural responsibilities, relationships, emotions, and ethical challenges that are often part of Pacific research but rarely written about. Rather than being just a personal habit, brain dumping became a culturally grounded way of doing research that honours Pacific values, ways of thinking, and accountability to community.
Overall, the paper offers brain dumping as a helpful and accessible practice for Pacific and Indigenous researchers who are working with and within their own communities, supporting wellbeing, reflexivity, and ethical research practice.
Faleolo, R. L. (2026). ‘Reflexive brain dumping: Insights from practice as a PhD and postdoctoral Pacific researcher.’ Pacific Australia Research Centre Working Paper Series, 2026-07. PARC, Australia. DOI: 10.13140/RG.2.2.19189.95202