Nationality Australian Name Elizabeth Grant Spouse(s) Leonard Cohen Role Anthropologist | Children Todd, Paul and Timothy Website Official website | |
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Occupation Architectural anthropologist, Academic | ||
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Elizabeth Grant (born 1963) is an Australian architectural anthropologist and academic working in the field of Indigenous Architecture at the University of Adelaide. She researches, writes and speaks on architecture and design for Indigenous peoples and prison architecture and reform. She is a regular guest on the Australian Broadcasting Corporation's Radio National and ABC Local Radio. She regularly writes and reviews architectural projects for architectural magazines such as Architecture Australia, the journal of the Australian Institute of Architects, the Australian Design Review and others.
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Personal life
Grant was born and raised in Mount Gambier, South Australia. Her German immigrant father, Berthold Enderl valued education highly due to interrupted schooling and experiences growing up during World War II in Regensburg and encouraged his children to study and work hard. He stated "education is the only thing that cannot be taken away from you."
Grant appeared with her eldest son, Todd on the third season of The Amazing Race Australia.
Education
Grant's early schooling was in Mount Gambier, prior to taking up studies at the University of Adelaide. Grant was awarded an undergraduate degree in architecture from the University of Adelaide and was a collegian at St Ann's College during her studies. Grant later studied and was awarded a Graduate Diploma and a Masters Degree in Environmental Studies. Her master's thesis examined the development of Aboriginal housing at Oak Valley after land rights were granted under Maralinga Tjarutja Land Rights Act. She was awarded a Doctor of Philosophy in Architecture from the University of Adelaide on her thesis entitled 'Towards Safer and more congruent environments for Aboriginal Prisoners.' The doctoral thesis was supervised by Professor Terence Williamson and Dr Paul Memmott and examined Aboriginal people's preference for prison environments as a mechanism to reduce negative behaviours such as deaths in custody in prison environments. It was the first empirical study of its kind.
Career
Grant has carried out research on the design of various environments for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples and her work has led to changes in the way prisons, courts, pre-schools and other environments are designed for Indigenous users nationally and internationally. Her research on the design of prisons for Indigenous prisoners is highly significant and has led to new standards and guidelines for the design of custodial environments for Indigenous prisoners. This body of research was recognised by the International Corrections and Prisons Association and honoured in their 2015 awards. Grant is also a Churchill Fellow and investigated the design of correctional facilities for Indigenous prisoners in the United States New Zealand, Canada and Denmark as part of her fellowship. She has been a visiting scholar and senior research fellow at a number of universities including The University of Cambridge and The University of Queensland. Her research builds on work of the Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody, of which key recommendations are yet to be actioned.
Grant specializes in Indigenous architecture and in particular, institutional architecture (prison and court architecture) and Aboriginal housing She works as a consultant to develop Indigenous design briefs and has been a member of the design teams on numerous architectural projects. These have included: