Grace Karskens is an Emeritus Professor of History in the School of Humanities and Languages at the University of New South Wales. Her research areas include Australian colonial and cross-cultural history, Aboriginal history and environmental history. Grace is interested in promoting historical understanding and awareness to wide audiences. She began her career as a public historian, served as a Trustee of the Historic Houses Trust of New South Wales and is a founding member of the online Dictionary of Sydney. Her books include Inside The Rocks: The Archaeology of a Neighbourhood, the multi-award-winning The Rocks: Life in Early Sydney and The Colony: A History of Early Sydney, which won the 2010 Prime Minister’s Literary Award for non-fiction. Grace's latest book People of the River: Lost Worlds of Early Australia was published by Allen & Unwin in 2020. She was elected a Fellow of the Australian Academy of the Humanities in 2010 and a Fellow of the Royal Society of New South Wales in 2019. At present she is working with Darug people on the collaborative Dyarubbin: The Real Secret River project, funded by the State Library of New South Wales' Coral Thomas Fellowship.