Visit Calendar All Space Considered (in-person) – October 2023
October 5, 2023
7:00 p.m. – 8:30 p.m.
Leonard Nimoy Event Horizon Theater

All Space Considered (in-person) – October 2023

Griffith Observatory's curatorial staff examines and explains the most-talked-about subjects in astronomy and space science. For October, the in-person program will take place October 5 and be broadcast online at a later date.

All Space Considered

Upcoming All Space Considered

Join Griffith Observatory’s curatorial staff as they examine and explain the most-talked-about subjects in astronomy and space science, generally on the third Thursday of each month. For more information, follow us on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook.

Topics this month are listed below.

To see previous All Space Considered programs, go to the main ASC page.

 

Paul Curnow - Aboriginal Skies

Our special guest this month is Mr. Paul Curnow. He will be sharing his research and experiences documenting aboriginal Australian astronomy. 

Aboriginal Australians have been looking at the night sky for thousands of years. During this time, they have been able to build up a complex knowledge of the stars and their movements. This connection with the night sky represents some of the earliest ponderings about the cosmos and was an effort to explain natural phenomena. Moreover, the stars were used for navigation, education, as a seasonal guide to the availability of foods, in addition to reinforcing cultural identity and spirituality. Come along and hear about some of the Aboriginal Dreaming stories; their ‘dark pattern’ constellations such as the ‘celestial emu’; the names they gave to the stars and the differences between the way the sky is viewed in comparison to the classical 88-constellations used by contemporary astronomers.

 

After 31-years, Paul Curnow [B.Ed] is South Australia’s longest serving planetarium lecturer. He has been a member of the Field Geology Club of South Australia since 1992. In 2002, he served as a southern sky specialist for visiting U.S. and British astronomers who were in Australia for the total solar eclipse. After three decades of research, he is regarded as one of the world’s leading authorities on Australian Aboriginal night sky knowledge; and in 2004, he worked in conjunction with the Lake Erie Nature and Science Center Planetarium in Ohio, on the creation of a show that features Indigenous Australian stories of the night sky. Moreover, from 2018-2023, he has served as a consultant on Indigenous Astronomy for the Australian Space Agency. In addition, Paul runs several popular courses for the public that focus on the constellations, planetary astronomy, meteoritics, historical astronomy and ethnoastronomy, which primarily deals with how the night sky is seen by non-western cultures. He appeared as the keynote speaker at the inaugural 2010 Lake Tyrrell Star Party in Sea Lake, Victoria and in 2011 was a special guest speaker at the Carter Observatory in Wellington, New Zealand. Since 2012 Paul has taken the role of Lecturer for the ‘Astronomy & the Universe’ course (EDUC2066); and between 2019-2021 for ‘Science’ (EDUC 2030) for the School of Education at the University of South Australia. Moreover, since 2021 he has been a member of the Andy Thomas Space Foundation Education Advisory Committee. Paul appears regularly in the media and has authored over 50 articles on astronomy.

Out to Launch

This month featuring the journey of OSIRIS-REx/Bennu