Curtin University Gender Research Network Newsletter
15 September 2021, Issue 6
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Dear All,
We hope you are enjoying this exceptionally busy period.
On 4 September 2021 Samantha was fortunate to attend the Ride Against Domestic Violence quiz night with many GRN members. Thank you to Bianca Tabbakh for organising the event and to Robyn Westgate for generously sharing her story. With her expert knowledge of TV lawyers, Robyn was an invaluable member of the winning table for the quiz alongside Donna Chung, Darcee Schulze, Sanchia Tolomei, Lucille Rowland, Nat Belcher, Justin Owen, Alexandra Patterson, Gerry Patterson and Samantha. We wish the Curtin team a successful cycle.
Since the last newsletter we have hosted two firsts.
On 19 August 2021 we hosted the first GRN Advisory Group meeting at the Old Boy’s School on St. George’s Terrace. The meeting agenda was framed by the GRN Terms of Reference and we raised the questions of how gender is defined at Curtin and why gender matters at and across the university. We also discussed how data relating to gender is captured at Curtin, the mechanisms to do so and what is the value of capturing gender data accurately – or changing the systems we use to report on gender? The next GRN Advisory Group meeting will be held in late November on Curtin campus and we will report on gender research being undertaken in the university.
The second first was the launch of our seminar and workshop series on 31 August 2021 with a presentation by Prof. Jaya Dantas and Dr Siddier Chambers. Their joint presentation “Navigating the academic journey as a Culturally and Linguistically Diverse Communities woman” covered their impressive – and inspiring – lives and careers through a deep consideration of what gender as a lived experience means. As Dantas emphasised, focusing on experience is essential as identity is intersectional and gender identity shifts and transforms in response to context. For Chambers, the context through which gender identity was negotiated was everything and she made a pertinent call to stop asking those who are diverse to lean in and fit in. Chambers likened her migration experience to a chess game – riven with rules and competing interests and driven by strategy – but also one that with each arrival asked her to “set and reset”. Chambers asked us to reflect: Why that was the case? What institutional shift is needed for spaces to allow diversity, to be inclusive?
GRN members with Dr Siddier Chambers and Professor Jaya Dantas (third and fourth from left)
This week we were honoured to have the workshop with Mx Misty Farquhar OAM. Please see MistyFarquhar’s workshop summary and resources below, and this will soon be available through the website. Their workshop “Understanding Gender Diversity” workshop sits in the context of a wider national and international discussion around gender and binaries, which was pertinently raised last week in an interview with Judith Butler by queer historian Jules Joanne Gleeson. Butler's interview called on us to "rethink the category woman" and the embedded "heterosexual assumptions" in the use of the term. (Controversially, part of the interview discussing the relationship between trans-exclusionary feminists and the right was removed but that text is available here.) Similarly, in their response on Twitter to the ABC's 730 Report "Why Women Are Angry" (30 August 2021), Prof. Sandy O'Sullivan, Wiradjuri transgender/non-binary person, also drew our attention to how gender categories are applied and binary affect: “The 'Why Women Are Angry' segment from @abc730 is steeped in the idea that there are only two genders. This is not only problematic for those outside of the gender binary, but arguing for binary equality rather than equity will always leave people behind, especially women.” O’Sullivan’s critique is a timely reminder as the seminar and workshop series shifts to focus on gender and the (academic) workplace.
Thank you for your support and we look forward to seeing you at more events and to hearing what is useful. Finally, we’d really like to know if there are any recent Curtin produced gender research related publications we can circulate to members? Or events you would like to promote? Please send them in if you have them!
Kind regards,
Therese and Samantha
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Gender Research Network Events
GRN Seminar and Workshop Series: Understanding Gender Diversity summary (written by MX Misty Farquhar)
Heteronormativity suggests that sexuality, gender, and bodies must be aligned in a particular way for a person to be considered “normal” in western society; a man who looks and feels like a man, will be attracted to a woman who looks and feels like a woman. In this sense, gender, sexuality, and bodies are interconnected while they are also distinctly different. Heteronormativity relies on reductive binary categorisations of people and creates arbitrary systems of power and privilege. LGBTIQ+ people are deemed to be abnormal or deviant within this framework.
For gender diverse people in particular, the impacts of historical persecution, stigma, and discrimination grounded in heteronormativity is still apparent today. As such, it is imperative that universities work intentionally to become safer and more welcoming of gender diverse staff and students. Rather than simply illuminating the problems they face, new narratives must be created.
Seminar resources and further reading:
- Kate Bornstein (1990) Gender Outlaw: On Men, Women and the Rest of Us [Link]
- Nevo Zisin (2021) The pronoun lowdown: demystifying and celebrating gender diversity [Link]
- Minus 18, a website championing Australian LGBTQIA+ youth
- Little Pride Pin Shop [Link]
Please email to request a recording of the seminar.
GRN Seminar and Workshop Series with Global Campuses Brown Bag Seminar Series: Capitalising on Board Gender Diversity: The Mediating Effect of Board Capital Diversity on the Relationship between Board Gender Diversity and Firm Performance
The Curtin University Gender Research Network (GRN), along with the Global Campuses Brown Bag Seminar Series, invites you to an online seminar presented by Dr Tien Nguyen, followed by a discussion with Professor Linley Lord on women on boards research opportunities in Singapore.
Date: 23 September, 2:00pm-3:00pm AWST
RSVP: elizabeth.baca@curtin.edu.au
Recommended reading: Towards Board Gender Parity
GRN Seminar and Workshop Series: Changing the academic gender narrative through open access
Presented by Dr Katie Wilson (Curtin Open Knowledge Initiative). The scholarly literature continues to document systemic biases, disparities, disadvantages and deficits for women in research productivity, gaining tenure and promotion within academia. Institutional pressure leads women to conform and follow the apparently ‘excellent’ research practices embedded in institutions: to publish in ‘high impact’, prestigious, commercial journals. The narrative of gender bias persists with regard to the construct of research excellence and the way it is measured across the world. However, a small body of evidence shows an emerging gendered effect in the open access/open science scholarly publishing scenario. Analysis from some countries indicates that women can change the narrative of deficit and build advantage by taking the open route.
Reviewing the scholarly literature Wilson highlights examples of research dissemination through open access that provide a positive advantage for women in terms of the binary gender equation in academia. Wilson discusses the work of the Curtin Open Knowledge Initiative exploring relationships and correlations between academic workforce gender demographics and institutional research performance in Australian universities.
Date: 13 October, 1:00pm-2:00pm AWST
RSVP: elizabeth.baca@curtin.edu.au
GRN Seminar and Workshop Series: Teaching, Emotion and Gender
Presented by Drs Sally Lamping and Saul Karnovsky.
Date: Late October (date TBC)
GRN Seminar and Workshop Series: Career Break Management
Presented by Professor Helen Hodgson – ATHENA Swan Provost Fellow.
Date: November (date TBC)
GRN Seminar and Workshops Series: Gender Through the Ages
Presented by Dr Joanne McEwan.
Date: November (date TBC)
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Curtin Based Opportunities and Events
Diverse Academic Women’s Network (DAWN): Book project website launch
Dr Sender Dovchin, A/Prof Toni Dobinson, Dr Maggie McAlinden, Dr Qian Gong, Dr Tetiana Bogachenko, Ms Ana Tankosić, and Ms Stephanie Dryden have spent the last year co-ordinating and facilitating workshops for the Diverse Academic Women’s Network (DAWN), which received funding from the Department of Communities and RISP. The purpose of the DAWN project is to encourage the collaborative participation of culturally and linguistically diverse (CaLD) background, and low SES early and mid-career women in academia, providing a space for them to discuss their experiences. The aim of DAWN is to cultivate these spaces so that women in academia are provided opportunities to improve their participation in the workforce and promote publication outputs. With this in mind, the group have begun the process of writing a book proposal that involves the collaboration of DAWN members in writing autoethnographic book chapters that outline their experiences in academia and in life. The DAWN members are writing their book chapters collaboratively, which encourages peer mentoring and allows for early and mid-career women in academia to share their experiences and strengthen their collaborative practices. In addition to this collaborative book, Sender, Toni, Maggie, Qian, Tetiana, Ana, and Stephanie have created a website that provides further information about the DAWN project’s aims, peer mentoring, the book project, a blog, information about our previous workshops, and a monthly newsletter.
For further information, visit the website at: http://womensgrants.weebly.com/. If you are interested in joining the DAWN project, please contact us at dawnmembersgroup@gmail.com
LGBTIQ+ inclusion in the History of the Australian Defence Force
Drawing on a mix of oral history interviews, archival records, media reports and personal archives, this presentation by Noah Riseman, a Professor of History at Australian Catholic University in Melbourne, will provide an overview historical account of the changing policies, practices and lived experiences of LGBTIQ+ service members in the ADF, especially from the end of the Second World War to the present.
Date: 21 September, 6:00pm-7:30pm AWST. Further details and registration through Eventbrite.
Call for Contributions: The Charles Telfair Centre (Curtin Mauritius)
The Charles Telfair Centre is a multidisciplinary platform for cutting-edge knowledge sharing and debate in Mauritius. We offer a safe space where dominant discourses can be challenged and innovative ideas and perspectives scrutinised. We showcase rigorous analyses featuring best practices, pioneering initiatives, and creative solutions to support Mauritius and the region in their ability to respond to challenges and seize opportunities across social, economic and policy domains.
The Centre seeks to make knowledge pertinent to Mauritius and the Indian Ocean region more accessible and publishes weekly blogs. Anyone working in the Indian Ocean region who might be interested in contributing is welcome to contact Myriam Blin.
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External Talks and Events
Writing Gender – Writing and Society Research Centre
The Writing and Society Research Centre are partnering with the Sydney Review of Books and the Gender UNLIMITED* team at Western Sydney University to host a public webinar to explore the role of writing in generating new knowledge and understandings around gender. This event aims to bring together Humanities and Arts practitioners into national conversations over advancing gender equity in the Higher Education sector.
Date: 17 September, 8:15am-10:30am AWST. Details and registration through Eventbrite.
Women in Public Sector Leadership 2021 – IPAA WA
Women in the public sector are diverse. They have varied leadership and career expectations and aspirations. Women need to feel empowered to own their career paths and discover who they are as leaders. The COVID-19 pandemic presented many challenges to women in the workplace but at the same time opportunities for women in leadership to demonstrate their strong and inspiring leadership qualities. In 2021, the gender pay gap is narrowing, but it would take another 26 years to close. The time to take action is now.
This conference presents an opportunity to hear from exceptional leaders who are challenging themselves and their organisations to tackle gender boundaries now and delivering change sooner.
Date: 19 September, 9:15am-4:00pm. Further details, cost and registration through IPAA WA.
The Maternal Metamorphosis: Becoming a mother in Australia, 1945-2020 – 2021 Reese Lecture
This lecture, presented by Carla Pascoe Leahy from University of Melbourne, will consider changing cultural attitudes towards motherhood, changing psychological theories of maternal subjectivity, and mothers' own experiences, as remembered in oral history interviews. It will answer two questions of profound social importance: what happens to a woman when she becomes a mother, and has this transition become more challenging over the past 75 years?
Date: 21 September, 5:00pm-6:00pm AWST. Details and registration through King's College London.
Women in Senior Leadership Lecture – SAGE
Hosted by Professor Sarah Brough, ‘Women in Leadership’ will discuss empirically based strategies for increasing the number of women in senior roles across education and STEM focused industries. The panel will highlight various research and industry examples that show how to effectively increase female leadership positions in the workplace. Joining Professor Brough is Australian Research Council Laureate Fellow and ANU Professor Lisa Kewley, UNSW Athena Swan Academic Lead Professor Fiona Stapleton, and the Co-Associate Dean of EDI in UNSW Science Associate Professor Lisa Williams.
Date: 22 September, 12:00pm-1:00pm AWST. Further details and registration through Eventbrite.
Women's Lives, Women's Bodies: making Public Histories Webinar – History Council of Victoria
In this webinar, three historians draw on their research in different contexts and cultures and together explore women's lives and women's bodies. Liz Conor reflects on ‘Aboriginal maternity and racialised distortion in early exploratory prints’, Paula Michaels examines ‘Obstetric violence and traumatic birth in the Soviet Union’ and Charlotte Greenhalgh explores ‘An Intimate History of Pregnancy in New Zealand’.
Date: 23 September, 3:00pm-4:30pm AWST. Details and registration through HVC.
Lilith Symposium: Gender in Catastrophic Times
Join the Australian Women's History Network for keynotes by Associate Professor Paula Michaels and Professor Sandy O'Sullivan, as well as papers from a variety of scholars that consider how past societies have responded to and survived catastrophe. Registration details and full program available here. Please note all times are in Australian Central Standard Time, not Eastern.
Date: 23 September and 24 September, 10:30am-4:00pm AWST. Further details and registration through AWHN.
Stand Bi Us Forum 2021
This forum is first and foremost intended to be a safe space for bi+ people, that is, multi-gender attracted folk or people who are attracted to more than one gender. It is inclusive of those who use no labels for their attractions or labels other than bisexual, such as pansexual, polysexual, omnisexual, biromantic, panromantic, fluid, queer, and questioning. The forum is also for bi+ supporters from the LGBTIQA+ and general communities.
In short, wherever you are in the world, if you are bi+, want to know more about the lived experiences of bi+ people, and want to support bi+ people, then this forum is for you.
Date: 23 September – 26 September. Calendar and event details.
Feminist Responses to Climate Change | 2021, ECU Galleries
Feminst Responses to Climate Change: Unruly experimentations for unstable times is a suite of newly commissioned work by emerging and established artists responding to anthropocentric crisis in unruly ways. Forging new research practices to extend reparative possibilities for alternative climate futures via multispecies worldings, what has emerged are a set of ethical propositions for living well together in these uncertain times. A project of The Ediths, the exhibition shares work developed across three Western Australian research collaboratories: Water, Weather, and Waste.
Exhibition open 24 September – 14 October. Further details.
OU-APS Seminar: Intersectionality: how the multiplier effect divides and reduces student success
This seminar will feature examples of good work in practice where two or more protected characteristics meet to amplify the negative impact on student outcomes. The following presentations will be included:
- Rehana Awan, John Butcher and Darren Gray - The Open University: How do we talk about race, and mental health?
- Rebecca Breen and Danielle - University of South Wales: Being a student with Dwarfism and coming from a low income, single parent family - Higher Education from a different perspective.
- Catherine Pestano - The Open University: Change required to address The Change
- Andrew Potter, Diane Butler and Afua Acheampong - The Open University: Intersectionality in STEM: Gender and Ethnicity
Date: 30 September, 4:30pm-7:30pm AWST. Further details and registration through Eventbrite UK.
Monstrous Woman presented by Tempest Theatre
A radical feminist adaptation of Phaedra. "I was a woman, a mark for the world’s contempt." The story of Phaedra is one of lust and shame. Phaedra was the wife of King Theseus, an older woman with an all-consuming lust for her stepson Hippolytus. Monstrous Woman is a highly visual, metaphorical allegory investigating the Intersections between repressed desire and the older woman. The play rewrites the myth of the damaging effects of the sexual transgressions of mothers and the tides of fate.
Date: 3 November – 6 November. Further details and tickets through Subiaco Arts Centre.
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External CFPs, Submissions and Opportunities
Research Study: Experiences of female academics during the pandemic
You are invited to take part in this project if you are a female academic, to capture your views and experiences of the benefits/opportunities/impact/challenges you have faced during the COVID-19 pandemic that may have impacted your work in any way. The study also aims to capture your views on academic leadership and support.
The research will examine the experiences of academic women in higher education during the COVID-19 pandemic with a focus on teaching, learning and leadership.
To participate, please complete this online survey (estimated 10 minutes to complete).
Professor, Politics and Gender, The University of Vienna
The Faculty of Social Sciences at the University of Vienna is seeking applications for the position of Professor of Politics and Gender. The professorship is dedicated to the analysis of political processes, institutions, and norms from innovative, theory-based, intersectional gender perspectives. Areas of focus may include the comparative analysis of democratic transformations, the transformation of party systems, or of specific policy areas. With their research, the successful applicant will also be expected to contribute to a better understanding of gender as a category of power that structures society, politics, and the state.
Application due 29 September. Further details.
Call for Stream: The 12th International Interdisciplinary Conference (GENDER, WORK AND ORGANIZATION: A (de)colonial view beyond the borders)
GWO Bogota 2022 will take place for the first time in Latin America, with a multicampus venue approach at Universidad Nacional de Colombia, Universidad Cooperativa de Colombia and Universidad Santo Tomas. The main theme of the conference is A (de)colonial view beyond the borders, aiming to broaden the discussion on the relationships between intersectional perspectives, including gender, race, social class, identities, among other social markers, and to understand the work and organization both inside and outside institutions, especially in the post-pandemic context. It focuses on debates on how to evaluate the quests and fights for the achievement and preservation of political, social and economic rights of different actors, as well as, to face the challenges that organizations have to move beyond measuring and evaluating professional acts and actions, and to understand the social and political contexts of people's lives and the inequalities they face.
Please email your stream proposal and call for abstract/papers (no more than 1,500 words length total, as Microsoft Word attachment - NOT PDF) to gwoconference2022@gmail.com before 30 September. Please explain if your stream will ask for abstracts or for full papers. Note: An open stream will be available for abstract/papers that do not fit into the approved streams.
ANROWS Sexual Harassment Research Program
The 2021–2024 ANROWS Sexual Harassment Research Program will produce high-quality, innovative, relevant and translatable evidence that drives policy and practice and is of national interest. Funding is available for high-quality research projects that provide a robust evidence base for policy decisions in the area of sexual harassment, with a focus on sexual harassment in the workplace.
Applications due 11 October. Further details.
Australian Gender Economics Workshop 2022
AGEW invites the submission of research papers from both junior and senior researchers on any topic related to gender economics. Both applied and theoretical papers that meet high standards of methodological rigour are invited. Papers should apply an economic framework and gender should be a core element of the analysis. Papers should also demonstrate real world relevance and applicability to addressing issues of social or economic concern.
Submissions due 31 October. Further details.
Magarey Medal for Biography
The Magarey Medal for Biography is awarded biennially to the female person who has published the work judged to be the best biographical writing on an Australian subject. The 2020 Medal will be awarded for a book published in 2020 or 2021. For the 2022 round, the Magarey Medal will be administered by the Association for the Study of Australian Literature (ASAL).
Applications close 31 January, 2022. Further details.
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Rule Breakers: Women in STEMM series
In August, a six videos was launched showcasing Rule Breakers: Women in STEMM, an Athena Swan initiative. This week features Dr Brioni Moore, the fifth of six Curtin women in STEMM (in no particular order), who are rebelling against the status quo in STEMM and empowering women to pursue careers in science. Brioni also took part in Rule Breakers, a story-collecting project carried out in collaboration with the Centre for Stories.
Watch the Rule Breakers: Women in STEMM series
All about Yves: Notes from a transition by Yves Rees
What happens when, aged 30, you understand you're transgender? This was the question that confronted Yves Rees, a historian whose life was upended by gender transition in 2018. Then known as a woman called Anne, Yves was forced to grapple with the sudden knowledge that they were not, in fact, female at all. But when you've lived a lie for so long, how do you discover who you really are? And how do you re-learn to live in the world as a different gender?
All About Yves tells their moving journey of re-becoming, at the same time laying bare the messiness of bodies, gender and identity. It shares the challenges and joys of being transgender in Australia today, and reveals how trans experiences like Yves' can teach all of us about what it means to be human.
via Booktopia.
Media release: Ground-breaking WA strategy to combat sexual violence
The Office of Women's Interests and the Office for the Prevention of Family and Domestic Violence in the Department of Communities have started work with the Department of Justice to develop the Sexual Violence Prevention Strategy over the next two years.
Learn more.
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Newsletter and Submission Deadline Calendar
13 October 2021 [11 October 2021]
10 November 2021 [8 November 2021]
8 December 2021 [6 December 2021]
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