Heather Burke – The Conversation

A view looking up to the Windmill Way rockshelter with the archaeological excavation in progress. Lynley Wallis

November 19, 2025

Perfectly preserved rock art site reveals 1,700 years of Aboriginal string craft

Lynley Wallis, Griffith University; Christine Musgrave, Indigenous Knowledge; Heather Burke, Flinders University, and Roseanne George, Indigenous Knowledge

New research details Aboriginal craftsmanship – along with accompanying wall art – at a remote site in the Cape York Peninsula.

Entries in the Springsure Native Mounted Police Diary. Lynley Wallis

November 13, 2023

Our mapping project shows how extensive frontier violence was in Queensland. This is why truth‑telling matters

Lynley Wallis, Griffith University; Heather Burke, Flinders University, and Troy Meston, Griffith University

Frontier violence was widespread across colonial Queensland and has real life implications for contemporary Australia.

Ammunition found at a mounted police camp at Eyre Creek. Lynley Wallis

September 25, 2018

How unearthing Queensland’s ‘native police’ camps gives us a window onto colonial violence

Lynley Wallis, University of Notre Dame Australia; Bryce Barker, University of Southern Queensland, and Heather Burke, Flinders University

For 60 years, native police were deployed in Queensland to ‘disperse’ Aboriginal communities (a euphemism for systematic killing). Unearthing their camps is a key part of reckoning with the violence of those times.

Space can be at a premium in cemeteries … and when it runs out, reusing old graves is an option. William Murphy/Flickr

November 6, 2014

Losing the plot: death is permanent, but your grave isn’t

Lynley Wallis, Griffith University; Alice Gorman, Flinders University, and Heather Burke, Flinders University

Headstones at the Dudley Park cemetery in Payneham, South Australia, were recently bulldozed as part of the ongoing “recycling” of more than 400 graves. Some people were shocked to realise that gravesites…

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