Against Erasure: Digital Witnessing of Manus Island Detention Centre
Overview
This project is developing a digital representation of dismantled immigration detention centre at Lombrom, Manus Island, Papua New Guinea (PNG), for completion November 2020. Importantly, this will be the first known 3D model of the detention centre, making a significant contribution to collective knowledge about the facility and the island on which it was based. The centre was effectively a prison for approximately 1500 men from 2013 until 2017. In 2016, the PNG Supreme Court ordered it to be ‘closed,’ as its existence breached the PNG constitution. The detention camp was dismantled, as if it had never existed. Yet twelve men had died there due to violence, homicide, self-harm, suicide or untreated medical concerns. Many experienced pain and torture during their detainment. The work will function as a testament to these men, and a testimony of their suffering. It will examine the processes enabling erasure, as if the violence that occurred there never happened.
Outcomes / activities
The project is producing a virtual, interactive site of the Manus Island Detention Centre for use in teaching and learning, and for research. Other outcomes will include publications on the experience of producing the site, and will critically engage with the ‘erasure’ of sites of historical harms.
Impact
The project will:
- provide a rich resource for researchers to engage with the manifestation and effects of Australian offshore processing sites
- contribute to public knowledge of the impact of Australia’s harsh border protection policies, especially in offshore sites inaccessible to the Australian public
- deliver an appreciation of the affective, physical and sensory dimensions of this site
- reflect the University’s value of engaged research which delivers public value.