Melville Thomas is Senior Lecturer and the longest serving lecturer at the School of Indigenous Studies with over 25 years of teaching experience. Currently Melville is Coordinator of the Indigenous Knowledge, History and Hertitage Major. Melville graduated from The University of Western Australia with a Bachelor of Arts in History and a Bachelor of Laws in 1996 and a Master of Laws by Research in 2002 on the human rights foundation of international law. His LLM thesis was supervised by prominent High Court Barrister and UWA Law academic Dr Peter Johnston. Melville has written about Indigenous rights, International Law jurisprudence, parliamentary privilege and minority rights. He is the author of two books: Gay Humanism and Higher Education - A Rights Based Approach (2019) and Meaning in International Law - From Pericles to Trump (2020). In "Meaning in International Law", which draws on classical, medieval and modernist human rights texts, Melville argues for a more effective international legal order post Covid19.

In 2020 Melville was recipient of a Senior Fellowship with the Higher Education Academy for his service to the Discipline of Inidgneous Studies.

Melville has worked in various capacities at the School of Indigenous Studies: Co-ordination of the Aboriginal Pre-Law Program (2007-2011); Co-ordination and teaching in the Advanced Diploma in Indigenous Legal Studies (2013-2016). He has also acted as the School’s Associate Dean of Research. Melville's other teaching roles at UWA include teaching in the UWA Aboriginal Orientation Course on socio-legal subjects; and he has tutored Constitional Law at UWA's Faculty of Law.

Mel is the convenor of the Social Justice Forum of The Australasian Law Teachers' Association Journal.

In 2009 Meville, with Profs. R Bartlett and J Milroy, won the prestigious ALTC Neville Bonner Award for the UWA Indigenous Pre-Law Programme. The Indigenous Pre-Law programme led the nation with over 60 Indigenous lawyers from UWA joining the legal profession.

INDG1150 - Aboriginal Encounters - Strangers in Our Backyard

INDG3400 - Indigenous Peoples and Global Issues

INDG2200 - Advanced Indigenous Legal Studies

Teaching Awards

2021 - Nomination for Teaching Excelllence

2020 - Awarded a Senior Fellowship - The Higher Education Academy

2018 – Semester 2: Students’ Guild Choice Awards for INDG1150 – Aboriginal Encounters: Strangers in our Backyard

2016 – Excellence in Teaching Award, School of Indigenous Studies, UWA

2009 - Neville Bonner Award for Indigenous Education in Australia with Professors Milroy, Morgan and Bartlett

1999 – Jan Brennan Memorial Award for TAFE Teaching (West Coast College of TAFE, Carine Campus)

Indigenous Knowledge, History and Heritage Major Coordinator 2016-

Indigenous Law Coordinator 2000-2016

Chair, School of Indigenous Studies Teaching and Learning Committee 2018-2022.

Academic Board Member 2020-2022

Selected Publications: Books, articles, conference proceedings 

2022

ABC Education Digi-Book

MA Thomas, et al A History of Aboriginal Rights in Western Australia (ABC Education) Output: Didgibook

2020

Book:

MA Thomas Meaning in International Law - From Pericles to Trump Authorspress, 1-174. A1 research output

2019

Book:

MA Thomas, Gay Humanism and Higher Education - A Rights Based Approach, Authorspress, New Delhi, pp. 1-134. A1 research output

Articles/chapters Sole author (peer reviewed C1)

MA Thomas, ‘Aboriginal Resistance to Imperialistic and Nationalistic Ideologies’ in KBS Krishna Ed Homogeneity in Heterogeneity – Memory and Resistance in Aboriginal Literature from Around the World, Authorspress, New Delhi, 2018, pp. 52-72 B1 research output

MA Thomas, ‘Critical and Indigenous Peoples’ Perspectives of Universal Human Rights’ The Cultural and Literacy Nationalism of Fourth World, 1, December 2015, 2, pp. 147-158. C1 research output

MA Thomas, 'Representations of Justice and Human Rights in Literature, Drama and Popular Culture', The Journal of the Independent Scholars Association of Australia (ISAA), 12, 1, 2013, pp. 51-65. C1

MA Thomas ‘Cosmopolitanism, Law and the Challenge of Globalisation’ Journal of the Australasian Law Teachers Association, vol 1, 2012 Output category: C1 research output

MA Thomas ‘A Legal Positivist Mind with a Natural Law Heart’ (Book Review: Pamela Burton’s From Moree to Mabo: The Mary Gaudron Story, UWA Publishing, 2011) Journal of the Independent Scholars of Australia Association vol 1, 2011 REVIEW ARTICLE

MA Thomas, ‘Law and Gay Identity’ Australasian Law Teachers Association Refereed Conferecne Papers 1, (2007) E1 research output

MA Thomas ‘The Search for the Foundation of International Law’ Outskirts 2005 (UWA) vol 12, Online Journal at: http://www.chloe.uwa.edu.au/outskirts/archive/volume12) E1 research output

MA Thomas ‘Indigenous Jurisprudence and Legal Education in the 21^st Century’ ISAA Review: The Journal of the Independent Scholars Association of Australia, November 2005, vol 4, pp. 6-13  C1 research output

Co-author

MA Thomas, J Milroy and R Bartlett ‘Teaching and Learning the Law: The University of Western Australia Indigenous Law Program’ Indigenous Law Bulletin, 2010, vol 7 (19) Output category: C1 (DEST: .67 points)

MA Thomas and B Farmer ‘Aboriginal Law Students at the University of Western Australia’ Indigenous Law Bulletin, 2005, vol 11, p 6-11. Output category: C1 (DEST: .50 points)

H Goodwin, A Stuart and MA Thomas ‘Imprisonment for Contempt of the Western Australian Parliament’ The University of Western Australia Law Review Vol 25 (1), July 1995, pp. 189-201.Output category: C1.