Dr Dany Breelle

Dany was born in France and educated in Paris. She taught history and geography for 11 years within French National Education. She completed a PhD at Flinders University in 2003.

Currently she is Associate Researcher in the School of Humanities at Flinders University.

Her recent research interests focus on the scientific and geographical aspects of Matthew Flinders’ voyage in the Investigator, as well as geographical aspects and the broader national culture, polity and society behind the French voyages of discovery to Terra Australis/Australia. Another of Dany’s research interests focuses on the ways the conceptions and methodologies of French geographers informed the development of their work in French Indochina.

She has several publications on these various projects.

 I have been working on four topics.

• Understanding the work of the two geographers Charles Boullanger and Pierre Faure who accompanied the Baudin expedition,
• The scientific and geographical aspects of Matthew Flinders' voyage in the Investigator.
• The British and French connections of Australian toponymy.
• The conceptions and methodologies that French geographers developed in French Indochina, their French and colonial links as well as their connections with the discourse and practices of Vietnamese scholars until today.

I am working more specifically on a book that investigates the French toponyms bestowed upon the Australian coast following the d’Entrecasteaux and Baudin expeditions. The contents of the book should allow readers to follow the progress of these two expeditions along large parts of Australia’s coastlines and provide a detailed account of the events and circumstances that led to the naming of the localities visited. This information fills an obvious blank in the early colonial history of the continent.