There’s a Snake in my Caravan – Part 1
There’s a snake in my caravan and I don’t know what to do. A nasty dull-black sinuous thing that has made its home in the back of a large electric fridge that’s in storage, with other furniture, in the...
View ArticleThere’s a Snake in My Caravan – Part 2
If nothing else, I can claim to have done much to assist the establishment of a women’s refuge in Canberra. The physical presence of the Green Valley housewife, her baby, the nappies and disorder, and...
View ArticleAboriginal First, Woman Second – Part 1
In 1972 I was eighteen years old, pregnant, and living in a housing commission flat in Sydney with my mother. Before becoming pregnant I worked as an office girl for Willow Ware kitchen suppliers. I...
View ArticleAboriginal First, Woman Second – Part 2
My election as chairperson of the board of Queanbeyan Hospital upset a few people … The board wasn’t to meet again until February 1983, due to the Xmas break. That left me two months to prepare myself...
View ArticleAn ‘All-Women’s Garage’ in the Making
My parents are strong Catholics who were born and bred in Queensland, Australia. They have lived in Queensland all their lives and in spite of it all are surprisingly tolerant and considerate of other...
View ArticleFundamentalism vs Education: Women’s Struggle – Part 1
Malala Yousufzai, shot in the head on 9 October 2012 by a Taliban gunman, is reported to be ‘doing well’ at Queen Elizabeth Hospital, Birmingham, where she was flown after the attack. Her father says...
View ArticleFundamentalism vs Education: Women’s Struggle – Part 2
(Continued) – The ‘Montreal Massacre’ If more evidence is needed, upon entering a classroom where a male professor instructed 10 women and 48 men students, Lepine fired two shots into the ceiling,...
View ArticleFeminist Historical Novels: An important contribution to writing women into...
The Woman Reader (2012) by Belinda Jack is a wide ranging account of women’s historical writing. In her review of the work, Bee Wilson focusses on the pertinent question it raises: ‘Why for millenniums...
View ArticleSpecial Agent Christine Granville –‘The spy who loved …’
On this day in 1939, just a few months after the Nazi invasion of Poland that had marked the start of WWII, a determined Polish Countess and former beauty queen marched in to British secret service...
View ArticleTravelling Together, Then Alone – Part I
I was born Edith Amelia in September 1910 in Peckham, London. As I was not born within the sound of ‘Bow Bells’ I was not a Cockney. My Grandfather, who died before I was born, was a writer-at-law at...
View ArticleTravelling Together, Then Alone – Part II
Continued … The war was on. The girls joined the Land Army, Bill the navy, and Gladys evacuated to Horsham. The twins were stationed there. They lived their lives and we lived ours. It was all day at...
View ArticleBeauty in the Beholder’s Eye?
Body theorising gripped women’s studies for a time in the 1980s and 1990s. Books were written, papers delivered at conferences, newspaper columns and columnists pronounced upon the subject, theses were...
View ArticleUp In The Air – Women as Flight Attendants Seeking Equality
With the coming of flight, women made an impact as pilots through the exploits of the United States’ Amelia Earhart, Australia’s Nancy-Bird Walton and their ilk. When aircraft became accessible to...
View ArticleThrough Life in Pursuit of Equality – Part I
Before the early 1970s my life, outwardly, was that of a middle-class woman. Inwardly I was burning up, aware of being out of step with acquaintances and friends about the lack of women’s rights...
View ArticleFundamentalism vs Education: Women’s Struggle – Part 1
Malala Yousufzai, shot in the head on 9 October 2012 by a Taliban gunman, is reported to be ‘doing well’ at Queen Elizabeth Hospital, Birmingham, where she was flown after the attack. Her father says...
View ArticleFundamentalism vs Education: Women’s Struggle – Part 2
(Continued) – The ‘Montreal Massacre’ If more evidence is needed, upon entering a classroom where a male professor instructed 10 women and 48 men students, Lepine fired two shots into the ceiling,...
View ArticleThrough Life in Pursuit of Equality – Part II
During the 1972 Australian federal election, the publicity of the Women’s Electoral Lobby on the campaign to assess prospective parliamentary candidates’ awareness of feminist issues coincided with my...
View ArticleSexuality, Child Marriage, Adoption and Children
In January the Greenwich University Centre for the Study of Play and Recreation launched ‘Children and the Law’ as a new strand in its programme. The conference introducing the strand was supported by...
View ArticleSister, Black is the Colour of My Soul – Part I
I was born in spring in 1940, given my mother’s name ‘Lilla’. My grandmother died before we met, but I know her through my mother. As a small child I grew up secure in my family. I knew my father, I...
View ArticleSister, Black is the Colour of My Soul – Part II
My school days were the horror of my life. Big blanks hide memories too painful to recall. I can remember when I went to school who had come from afar I can remember when I went to school I used to...
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