ALIA is delighted to be part of a cross-sectoral stakeholder advisory group for AustLit.

AustLit is the national database of Australian writers, literature, criticism and the publishing landscape, collaboratively created by librarians and university researchers. It is led and hosted by the University of Queensland, and operates as an ongoing collaborative project between researchers across Australian universities and the National Library of Australia. AustLit is a world first in its attempt to compile a comprehensive record of a nation’s creative writing and associated critical works.

AustLit's databases are hold authoritative bibliographical and production information for works of fiction and poetry, writing for the theatre, biographical and travel writing, writing for film and television, criticism and reviews in Australia. This makes AustLit an important piece of humanities research infrastructure in Australia, supporting scholarly research and researchers.

AustLit also hosts BlackWords, which is a database that provides access to a vast record of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander writers and their publications. It also contains a historical calendar, information trails and teaching resources for educators to embed Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander perspectives in the classroom.

The purpose of the Stakeholder Advisory Group is to provide strategic advice to the AustLit director and, as representatives of sectors and organisations, to provide liaison between AustLit and its key stakeholders. Generally, this Group doesn’t provide advice on technical or budgetary matters although it discusses matters of sustainability.

For more information about ALIA’s role on the AustLit Stakeholder Advisory Group, contact [email protected] or Associate Professor Maggie Nolan [email protected]