The symposium is based on Valerie's work on the collective mind. It is addressed to the whole of Oceania (Australasia and the Pacific) and particularly to indigenous interests. Indigenous here applies to everybody in their environmental context. 

The symposium hosted by Professor Kerry Arabena, Chair of Indigenous Health at Melbourne University, draws on the book The human capacity for transformational change. Harnessing the collective mind”. by Valerie A.Brown and John A. Harris (Earthscan-Routledge 2014).This book is set in a world undergoing radical cultural, environmental, political and professional change. It has found that both master-thinkers and visionaries have reframed the traditional division of parts and wholes, stability and change, individual and environment, and rational and creative thinking from opposites to patterns of dynamic relationships. This reframing of opposites as interconnected wholes leads to a realisation of the power of a collective mind. In all cultures.a collective mind can be accessed through asking the full set of introspective, physical, social, ethical, aesthetic, sympathetic, and finally, reflective questions. Resulting collective social structures already in practice include a collective language, a transformation science, a deep democracy, a common pool economy, a method of collective learning, and a shared identity. Together these offer a prototype of a collective world. Symposium%20flyer2.pdf