Australian Women's History Network

📢Event Announcement Friday 6th March: No Panel, No Pressure, No Prep. Join AWGSA members & executive for an informal hour of conversation, reflection, and community. No presentations, no panels, & no preparation required, just show up as you are. Open to all women, gender‑diverse people, & allies.

Too many Indigenous women are killed by domestic violence. They are more than just numbers

Latest data show First Nations women are much more likely to be killed than non-Indigenous women. It demands action.

Former Harvard president Summers’ soft landing after Epstein revelations is case study of economics’ trouble with misbehaving men Despite repeated calls for the university to revoke his tenure, the economist held onto his teaching and academic appointments until he chose to retire.

Former Harvard president Larry Summers will retire with the title “president emeritus” after scrutiny over his ties to Jeffrey Epstein — a soft landing that, one economist argues, underscores academia’s tolerance of powerful, sexist men.

theconversation.com/former-harva...

First Aboriginal woman to receive PhD at Harvard remembered as 'trailblazer' MaryAnn Bin-Sallik was the first Aboriginal nurse graduate in Darwin and the first Aboriginal person to receive a PhD at Harvard University. Following her death at age 85, the Djaru Elder is being remembered for her work in Indigenous education, health and human rights.

MaryAnn Bin-Sallik was the first Aboriginal nurse graduate in Darwin and the first Aboriginal person to receive a PhD at Harvard University. Following her death at age 85, the Djaru Elder is being remembered for her work in Indigenous education, health and human rights.

📢 Event Reminder: “What do we do now?” TOMORROW! 25 Feb 12–1pm AEDT. Join us for an honest conversation about navigating feminist careers in and beyond the academy.

Open to HDRs, ECRs, independent scholars, pracademics, and scholar-activists.

Register here: events.humanitix.com/what-do-we-d...

A reminder that I help co-ordinate a writing group for early career scholars/PhD students working on global feminism (broadly conceived!).

We meet every second month over zoom and read someone's chapter or article and offer feedback.

You can join, drop me a line here! Reposts welcome.

Image of a flying airship with the words "Vote for Women".

On 17 February 1909 Muriel Matters, Australian-born suffrage supporter, organised an airship emblazoned with "Votes for Women" to distribute Women’s Freedom League leaflets over parliament for the state opening.

#WomensHistory #GenderHist #OTD

Image: Wikimedia Commons

Gender studies courses are shutting down across the US. The Epstein files reveal why | Joan Wallach Scott Texas A&M University is the latest school to end women’s and gender studies programs and teaching race. We know why

Gender studies courses are shutting down across the US. The Epstein files reveal why | Joan Wallach Scott

The Book That Taught the World to Orgasm and Then Disappeared: Shere Hite and the Hite Report by Rosa Campbell Historian Campbell debuts with a revelatory biography of sex researcher Shere Hite (1942–2020), best known for her 1976 publicat...

Over the moon 🌙 that 'The Book that Taught the World to Orgasm and then Disappeared' received a starred review from Publishers Weekly! 🌟 🔭 🌃

www.publishersweekly.com/9781685892319

Fired after gender lesson, former professor sues Texas A&M Melissa McCoul, arguing she was fired to appease political critics, is seeking to get her job back and other restitution.

New: Former Texas A&M lecturer Melissa McCoul is suing the university months after Texas A&M fired her over a gender identity lesson.

McCoul alleges that administrators knowingly violated her free speech and due process rights to appease political critics.

Grab a ☕ and revisit a History Australia Collection!
History in practice: Trove Special Section.
www.tandfonline.com/journals/rah...
Eight great articles from 18(4) 2021.

Consider this a friendly nudge: #SSW2026 lands 12–20 September. You know how the year goes… blink and suddenly you’re trying to plan an event in August. 👀

Beat future‑you to the punch: save the date and start brainstorming your ideas now.

More info: socialsciencesweek.org.au

What do we do now? — Pathways in and beyond the academy for early-career feminist scholar-activist-practitioners Join us for a critical discuss on carving out feminist futures—in, against, and beyond the university in this 1-hour

📢 HDR/ECR Event Announcement!

Join us for “What do we do now?” — a 1-hour online fireside chat for early-career feminist scholars, independent activists, and anyone navigating pathways in and beyond the academy on 25 Feb 12pm (AEDT)

Register here! events.humanitix.com/what-do-we-d...

Working Collectively Then and Now How did History Workshop Journal's editorial collective sustain its commitment to radical history over fifty tumultuous years? Sally Alexander and Jeffrey Weeks discuss.

How has the History Workshop Journal collective sustained its commitment to radical history over fifty tumultuous years?

Two HWJ veterans, Sally Alexander and Jeffrey Weeks, sat down to share their memories with @beckierutherford.bsky.social and @inoutofpractice.bsky.social🎙✊🏻

Looking down at a table with a potted jade, coffee and magazine: History, from the Royal Australian Historical Society. My fingers are touching the bottom left corner of the magazine.

The magazine is now open and you can see the title “an (un) ordinary farmhouse near Tamworth: refuge and danger in the family home” and there’s a photo of a woman outside on a mat with three young children and a car behind them on the other side of a fence

Publication alert! 🚨

“An (un) Ordinary Farmhouse near Tamworth: Refuge and Danger in the Family Home” has been published by the Royal Australian Historical Society.

I talk about gothic literature, family violence and how even unremarkable houses can be important

www.rahs.org.au/history-maga...

1. “Unreal and untrue: Refrigerator mother theory and the historic vilification of the mothers of disabled children,” by Kate McAnelly 2. “The Neptune: A Biography of Convict Women,” by Nichola Garvey 3. “Remembering Lyndall Ryan (1943-2024),” by Vera Mackie and the Australian Women’s History Network 4. “Camp Names and Vernacular: Queensland’s Lavender Language,” by Michael Stockwell 5. “The History of Objectifying Women: From Opium Use in the Japanese Empire to Contemporary Advertising,” by Ming Gao 6. “White Aprons, White Sauce, White … Supremacy? The culinary politics of internet ‘tradwives’,” by Lauren Samuelsson 7. “An Exercise in Biography-as-Frustration: The Enigma of Evdokia Petrov,” by Julie Kimber and Phillip Deery 8. “Histories of Birth Trauma and Obstetric Violence,” by Paige Donaghy 9. “‘You Can’t Wear A Red Ribbon If You’re Dead’: The Complex Rise of The Ribbon Project for People With AIDS,” by Caitlin Merlin 10. “‘Production-line baby-killing centres’: Vilification of Abortion in Queensland’s Recent History,” by Cassandra Byrnes

Congratulations to the authors of the top 10 most-read blogs for 2025! ✨

And a huge thanks to the #VIDAblog editorial team for all their stellar work in 2025.

@paigedonaghy.bsky.social | @dranastevenson.bsky.social | @veramackie.bsky.social

Read these blogs + more here ⬇️
www.auswhn.com.au/blog/

Intersectionality, resistance and history-making | Australian Women's History Network The following post presents reflections on intersectionality and history from a panel held at the 2016 Australian Women's History Network conference.

I still really love this piece about intersectionality, beautifully put together by @jordanas.bsky.social and bringing together some of my favorite thinkers www.auswhn.com.au/blog/interse...

The Gap in the Greenhouse Effect: Eunice Newton Foote and Climate Science in the 1850s | Australian Women's History Network In this blog, Harrison Croft examines the life and legacies of Eunice Newton Foote, highlighting her groundbreaking contributions to early climate science and humanitarianism.

Just in case you missed it (the world certainly did),
In the 1850s...
www.auswhn.com.au/blog/the-gap...
btw it was the masculinists' sexism & misogyny that let us down 😊

“Writers perform a crucial national service. For this service they are underpaid and undervalued. The Adelaide Writers’ Week Festival has just made them pay the price for a problem they didn’t create."

Read Leanne Minshull’s full piece on The Point: thepoint.com.au/opinions/260...

English Majors at Work English Majors at Work: Career and Life Pathways details the professional superpowers—the many marketable skills—gained from studying literature, creative writing, film, and popular culture. It prepar...

Very excited about this first online sighting of ENGLISH MAJORS AT WORK: CAREER AND LIFE PATHWAYS:

www.rutgersuniversitypress.org/english-majo...

Dec 31 deadline #CFP 4th Workshop on Women in the Archaeology of Greece. Theme: Women Archaeologists and War - Athens (École française d’Athènes/British School at Athens) - March 10, 2026 - www.efa.gr/call-for-pap...

Janet Frame (1924-2004), circa 1993. Image via Wikimedia Commons.

Aftermath of fire at Seacliff Mental Hospital, circa 1942. Image via Te Ara the Encyclopedia of New Zealand.

Dr Kate McAnelly (she/her/ia) is an early childhood teacher by profession, now working in Dunedin as a regional lecturer in early childhood education with the Open Polytechnic of New Zealand. Her research interests include inclusive early childhood curriculum, pedagogies and learning environments, disabled children’s childhood studies, the rights of children and families to an inclusive education, the histories and sociology of diverse childhoods and disabled womanhood, and the politics of inclusive education.

In our latest blog Dr Kate McAnelly discusses the historic institutionalisation of women at Aotearoa New Zealand's Seacliff Lunatic Asylum/Mental Hospital. #VIDA

Find it here: www.auswhn.com.au/blog/i-learn...

Anne Summers: Living in the Seventies | Australian Women's History Network Vera Mackie joins Michelle Arrow and Zora Simic in commemorating fifty years of Anne Summers' 1975 feminist blockbuster, Damned Whores and God's Police.

As we approach the end of 2025, historians @michellearrow.bsky.social and @zorasimic.bsky.social reflect on Anne Summers’ 1975 book, Damned Whores and God’s Police, fifty years later.

Read more here ⬇️
www.auswhn.com.au/blog/anne-su...

Yes, this is what Australia is - Overland literary journal Imagine though the possibility of a response which was not horrid. Which did not demand more violence be piled up. Which led us to other ways of being together, other horizons of possible futures. Ima...

“But it’s also that this land, this beautiful Aboriginal land, was not made to hold such grief. It can, and it does, but it shouldn’t have this burden thrust upon itself.”

@jordanas.bsky.social on the logic of violence that permeates Australia.

Melbourne poet Pi.O performs in front of the Melbourne offices of Meanjin during the Save Meanjin protest, 11 September 2025. Behind him, a man in jeans holds up a sign that covers his face. The sign reads, "Purely on financial grounds".

🚨JAS 49.4 now available 🚨

JAS editors: "the intellectual mission of #Meanjin lives on beyond its pages, and we commit JAS to similarly challenging and extending the nation’s mental life."

Thank you to @beneltham.bsky.social for permission to use the cover image.

tinyurl.com/yphjfn38

#OzStudies

Poster in support of Bjelke-Peterson and the National Party in Queensland. Queensland Museum Collection, H22289.

Satirical $15 Note (1983) showing a caricature of Bjelke-Petersen and his impact on rural Queensland. H46288 in the Queensland Museum Collection.

VIDA Commissioning Editor Michael Stockwell.

In our latest blog, VIDA Commissioning Editor Michael Stockwell explores the intersection between the Lutheran Two-Kingdoms Paradox and Rural Fundamentalism and its impact on Sir Joh Bjelke-Petersen’s approach to politics. #vidablog

Find it here: www.auswhn.com.au/blog/hillbil...

A Matter of Class? Higher Learning Opportunities for Women in Nineteenth-Century Britain | Australian Women's History Network This blog explores the higher learning available to women in Britain during the nineteenth century and how these opportunities varied drastically between the classes.

Check out a new #VIDAblog in our Women’s Education series! 🎓

Kaitlin Mills explores the higher learning available to women in Britain during the nineteenth century, considering how these opportunities varied drastically between the classes.

Read more here ⬇️
www.auswhn.com.au/blog/a-matte...

In this episode of HEDx, Western Sydney University Vice-Chancellor Professor George Williams discusses his new Vantage Point essay, 'Aiming Higher: Universities and Australia’s future'.

📖 Buy the essay: australiainstitute.org.au/store/aiming...
🎧 Listen now: podcasts.apple.com/au/podcast/e...

Zora Simic @zorasimic.bsky.social reviews ‘Germaine Greer, Celebrity Feminism, and the Archive’, by Anthea Taylor
Published by Routledge
tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

AHA Conference 2026 - The Australian Historical Association Monday 29 June–Friday 3 July 2026, Macquarie University The 45th Australian Historical Association (AHA) Conference will be hosted by Macquarie University.  The organising committee are excited to…

Exciting news: the CFP for the 2026 AHA Conference is live! We'll be meeting at Macquarie University, on Dharug Country in Sydney, to discuss and explore the theme of "Changing Minds". We'd love to see you there: all the details are at the link! theaha.org.au/aha-conferen...