A summary Powerpoint presentation by David Martin at the CNTA 2020 Annual Conference, The High Court Kobelt decision and the intersection between law and anthropology: ‘culture’ and ‘agency’ may also be of interest in relation to the issue of ‘cultural expertise’ discussed by David Trigger.

The podcast of David Martin’s presentation is below. It sketches out some of the challenges for anthropological expert opinions being accepted by the Court, demonstrated in a decision on an Aboriginal consumer protection matter ultimately brought before the High Court. His experiences outside Native Title in this and another Aboriginal consumer protection case suggest that an interpretation of ‘culture’ beyond the ‘traditional’ will be useful, even necessary. However, standard anthropological methodologies, including reasoning from the more particular to the general, or from the general to the particular, may be challenged in the Court or by Judges themselves, and Courts may pick and choose from elements of an anthropological account. It is all the more necessary to provide systematic, interlinked evidence, although my attempt to do so in the Kobelt matter appeares to have been largely unsuccessful.