Reflecting on 2025: ANU Indonesia Institute

Dear colleagues and friends,

I write to you for the first time in my role as Director of the ANU Indonesia Institute. As the year finishes, some among us are mourning the victims of the terrorist attack in Sydney and the ongoing natural disaster in Sumatra. Our thoughts are with them and their loved ones as we disperse for the end of the university year. This season is often called festive, but the events of this week, this month, and this year have left mixed feelings. I would like to share some reflections on this past year, with a focus on the Institute and the community to which it belongs. I thank you in advance for your attention, and for your engagement with the Indonesia Institute, in whatever form that takes.

Condolences

2025 has brought sadness to the Indonesia community at ANU. Two senior members passed away this year: Anthony Reid in June and Anthony Johns in October. The two Tonys were pivotal figures in building Indonesian studies at the ANU. With diligence, passion and care, they nurtured generation after generation of students, scholars, teachers, and thinkers. Their intellectual contributions to the study of Southeast Asian history, literature, and culture have enriched everyone’s understanding of the region. You can read tributes by our members here for Tony Reid and for Tony Johns. The community also mourns Umar Assegar, who passed away in August. Umar was a distinguished Indonesian journalist who came to the ANU in 2008 to begin research on Indonesian Islam. Through his studies of Shia influence for an MPhil and anthropological fieldwork in a pesantren in Central Sulawesi for his PhD, Umar’s research stressed the human values of tolerance and openness in Indonesian Muslim communities. He is remembered by three ANU colleagues here. We are especially thinking of their families at the end of the year, as we continue to grieve for them.

What we did in 2025

As we farewell beloved colleagues, we welcome those who choose the ANU to study Indonesia at all levels. Students are the joy of the Institute. Several events in the Institute’s calendar are designed to connect students, who constitute the future of our field, with staff and with each other. The annual Indonesia Student Social in February, co-hosted with the ANU Indonesia Project, brought together undergraduates, postgraduate coursework and research students. In September, the Institute hosted students from around Australia for our Postgraduate Workshop, which combined skills sessions and expert panels with student research presentations. In November, the students gathered twice more to celebrate their achievements. Students of Indonesian language were generously hosted by His Excellency Dr Siswo Pramono, Indonesia’s Ambassador to Australia to a dinner at his residence, marking their year of committed effort. Students from across the Institute also gathered on campus to celebrate the end of the academic year.

Prizes

We are delighted to announce the awarding of the ANU Indonesia Institute’s inaugural Pustaka Emerging Talent Prize, which will be given annually to the student with the highest grade average in beginners Indonesian (Indonesian 1 and 2). The winner of this prize in 2025 was Jaspar Hawke was awarded the Institute’s inaugural Pustaka Emerging Talent Prize. Our congratulations to Jaspar, who demonstrated excellent communicative skills across reading, writing and conversing in Indonesian. In early 2026 we will award the Pustaka Highest Achiever prize to the student with the highest-grade average across their completed Indonesian language major.

Tony and Yohanni Johns Lecture

The Institute’s flagship Tony and Yohanni Johns Lecture, which Tony Reid was crucial in establishing, is just one of the countless legacies we thank them for. This August, the Lecture was delivered by Professor Michael Laffan of Princeton University, an alumnus of the ANU who was taught by Tony Johns. Michael’s lecture unpacked elements of the Hikayat Maryam wa Isa, a classical Malay text giving accounts of the miracles of Jesus from an Islamic perspective. Through close attention to the social and geographical details of this manuscript, Michael showed how textual study can offer rich insights into Indonesia’s cultural and religious links with the wider world. A recording of this inspiring lecture can be watched here.

Collaborations

The Institute proudly promotes the Australian National University's cutting-edge research on Indonesian politics. In the year since President Prabowo Subianto’s inauguration, the Institute has hosted three expert panels on his leadership: The Prabowo Presidency: An Early Assessment in March (co-hosted with the University of Melbourne), Indonesia’s Foreign Policy under Prabowo in July, and Achieving Indonesia Emas: Prabowo’s Impact in October (co-hosted with the Australia-Indonesia Youth Association). On 11 December, the Institute hosted its annual online seminar for International Human Rights Day. Eighty years after Indonesian independence, the seminar brought together four experts to analyse the historical development of human rights in Indonesia and the current landscape. The Institute launched the latest Indonesia Update book The Jokowi Presidency: Indonesia’s Decade of Authoritarian Revival, in connection with the ANU Indonesia Project’s 60th anniversary celebration in July. Together with the Embassy of the Republic of Indonesia, we held an on-campus screening of the documentary film The Last Accord: War, Apocalypse and Peace in Aceh (2025). The Institute also collaborated with the East Asia Bureau of Economic Research to host a delegation from the Indonesia Business Council. We are grateful to all participants who generously contributed their works, knowledge and experience at these events.

Research Grants

ANU Indonesia researchers continue to be highly competitive on the national scene. Particularly exciting is the success of several of our early-career scholars in securing major research grants in 2025. Dr Eve Warburton was awarded the prestigious Westpac Research Fellowship, for her project examining how the demand for critical minerals like nickel and lithium are reshaping politics and economics across the Asia-Pacific. Dr Elly Kent was awarded an ARC Linkage Grant, together with colleagues from the University of New South Wales, the University of Melbourne, the Australian War Memorial and the National University of Singapore, for a project titled Picturing conflict: war and art in Southeast Asian cultures, which aims to write the first history of Southeast Asian war art. Dr Shimona Kealy was awarded an ARC DECRA Fellowship for a project exploring when and how humans first crossed Wallace’s Line, with a focus on Lombok’s role in these movements. I was fortunate to also be awarded a DECRA to study religious transformations in early modern Indonesia from the 15th to 17th century.

Note of Thanks

At the same time, this year has been one of anxiety and stress for the ANU community as a whole. We feel deeply for our academic and professional colleagues all across the university who have been affected by institutional change. The restructuring of the College of Asia and the Pacific in late 2024 created an administrative distance between our members, including the rehousing of the ANU Indonesia Project in a new College. It is gratifying to see how our collegial relationships have powerfully endured in the spirit of generosity and mutual care throughout these challenges. I end by giving thanks to colleagues whose support has been vital to the Institute this year.

In the first place, I thank the Dean of the College of Asia and the Pacific, Professor Helen Sullivan, for her exemplary leadership and ongoing support for the Institute. Her vision for the Australian National University's long-term future as a centre of expertise on all aspects of Indonesia, including its languages, inspires confidence and enthusiasm. The Institute’s activities depend on the extraordinary professionalism and good humour of the CAP Partnerships team, including Christine Sullivan, Yanhong Ouyang, and Hatizah Rashid. Without them, none of this would be possible. We are most grateful to the ANU Indonesia Project, including its director Budy Resosudarmo and project manager Kathryn Whitney, for their collaborations throughout the year.

The Institute relies on the guidance of its Advisory Board, whose diverse perspectives and experiences are crucial to our efforts in building a thriving intellectual community at the ANU and beyond. I thank all Board members for their service, with special acknowledgement of Professor Wayan Arka and Dr Ines Atmosukarto who have stepped down from the Board, and a warm welcome to Dr Laura Arnold and Dr Eve Warburton who have recently joined.

I am immensely grateful to the Deputy Directors of the Institute, Dr Elly Kent and Ms Nurkemala Muliani, for their dedicated service. Thanks to their tireless efforts and strategic approaches, the Institute is exceptionally well-placed to nurture the community of Indonesia scholars, thinkers and practitioners, for years to come.

Finally, I owe a great debt of gratitude to Dr Eve Warburton, my predecessor as Director. Her leadership over the last three years has positioned the Institute as crucial institution in the broader community of Indonesian studies in Australia. I thank her especially for her outstanding support in the first months of my tenure, which has gone well beyond the call of duty.

I wish you all a safe, healthy and restful end to 2025, and I look forward to being in touch again soon with news of the Institute’s plans for the year ahead!

Kind regards,

Jarrah Sastrawan

Director, ANU Indonesia Institute