Jim Allen (archaeologist)

{{short description|Australian archaeologist}}

{{Use dmy dates|date=March 2022}}

{{Use Australian English|date=May 2017}}

Jim Allen is an Australian archaeologist specialising in the archaeology of the South Pacific.

Allen led the first professional excavation of a European site in Australia, the 1840s military settlement of Victoria, which was established at Port Essington at the northernmost point of the Northern Territory. He also worked on the Lapita culture, tracing the expansion of Polynesian settlement through its distinctive pottery style.[http://www.library.uq.edu.au/ojs/index.php/aa/article/viewFile/1610/1596 Departmental report, ANU Department of Prehistory, Research School of Pacific Studies] In the 1990s, he played a prominent role in the debate over the forced repatriation of Aboriginal remains.[http://www.australianhumanitiesreview.org/archive/Issue-April-1996/murray.html 'The Forced Repatriation of Archaeological Materials', Tim Murray and Jim Allen, Australian Humanities Review]{{Cite web|url=https://latrobeuniversitybulletin.com/2012/05/10/la-trobe-archaeologist-wins-rare-honour-from-us-academy-of-sciences/|title=Archaeologist wins rare honour from US Academy of Sciences|date=10 May 2012|website=La Trobe University Bulletin|access-date=19 July 2017}}[https://books.google.com/books?id=2P4sAQAAIAAJ Aboriginal Law Bulletin]. Issue 57. Aboriginal Law Research Unit; 1995. p. 76.Kathy Laster. [https://books.google.com/books?id=vT_otRidy2MC&pg=PA230 Law as Culture]. Federation Press; 2001. {{ISBN|978-1-86287-350-6}}. p. 230.

Allen was the Foundation Professor of Department of Archaeology at La Trobe University from 1985 to 1993. Prior to that, he taught in the department of prehistory at the Australian National University.{{Citation needed|date=July 2017}} From 1993, he was a professorial fellow of the Australian Research Council and research associate at La Trobe. In 2012 he was elected a foreign associate of the United States National Academy of Sciences.

In 2018, by then a Professor Emeritus, Allen co-authored a paper showing evidence of earlier-that- expected arrival of humans in Australia.[https://www.haaretz.com/archaeology/.premium-aboriginal-australians-shocked-by-volcano-37-000-years-ago-could-still-be-telling-th-1.8666254 "Aboriginal Australians Shocked by Volcanic Eruption 37,000 Years Ago Could Still Be Telling the Tale"]. Haaretz, 12 March 2020, by Ruth Schuster