Catherine Waldby

Vale Heather Goodall It is with immense sadness that the AANZEHN shares the news that our friend and colleague Heather Goodall passed away peacefully on 29 January 2026, surrounded by her family. Heather was a powerhou…

A moving obituary from @libbydeq.bsky.social and Tom Griffiths:

lnkd.in/dJzT9UYV

Great job at The Australian National University: Research Fellow school of sociology.

Teaching Through Uncertainty This Viewpoint discusses the uncertainty that medical ethics and social medicine instructors face in regard to the rollback of diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives and university funding cuts.

A warning from @jama.com about damage to ethics and social medicine in the US, which we anticipated in our book Medicine on a Larger Scale, edited with @ahlie.bsky.social and Jeremy Greene, available open access from @portersqbooks.bsky.social Pity these authors didn't engage with it - but you can!

Shocked to learn of the death of Emma Johnston, the young vice-chancellor (president) at the University of Melbourne. I knew Emma at Sydney, vivacious and charming, a vibrant research leader. A marine ecologist, she was also committed to the humanities, due to undergraduate HPS training at Melbourne

View our fantastic December Special Issue: Reconceptualising Toxicity and Environmental Justice at link.springer.com/journal/4129...

Australia had the ‘gold standard’ on gun control. The Bondi beach terror attack may force it to confront its surging number of weapons There are now more guns in the community per capita than in the aftermath of the Port Arthur massacre, with at least 2,000 new firearms lawfully entering the community every week

Looks like we've become complacent since the gun restrictions of the 1990s - time for even more stringent rules. The worst gun violence in Australia in 30 years...

How we can make ANU a model for proper uni governance

www.reddit.com/r/Anu/commen...

The ANU Governance Project welcomes the final report of the Senate Inquiry into the Quality of Governance at Australian Higher Education providers, calling it a critical step toward restoring trust and accountability in Australia’s university sector.

www.anugovernance.org/pressrelease...

jobs.anu.edu.au/jobs/researc...

Research Fellow, Social and Ethical Dimensions of Applied Cryobiology - Canberra / ACT, ACT, Australia Classification: ANU Academic Level BSalary package: $118,632 - $134,507 per annum plus 17% superannuationTerms: Full-time, Continuing (contingent funded) This position is continuing (contingent funded...

jobs.anu.edu.au/jobs/researc...

Science diplomacy in a time of fractured institutions - CRASSH Centre for Research in the Arts, Social Sciences and Humanities

Join me in Cambridge for the CRASSH Symposium on Science Diplomacy — a chance to think with scholars across STS, HPS, sociology, IR & socio-legal studies. #STS @4sweb.bsky.social @joyzhang.bsky.social @samhistsci.bsky.social @hyoyoonkang.bsky.social www.crassh.cam.ac.uk/events/48677...

This is such an honour. Thank you to my fantastic colleagues and friends.

Lecturer/Senior Lecturer in Political Economy (Education Focused) - University of Sydney - Progress in Political Economy (PPE) The Discipline of Political Economy at the University of Sydney is advertising a continuing education focused position, to be appointed at either Lecturer or Senior Lecturer level. This position is pa...

JOB!
Permanent Lecturer / Senior Lecturer position (education focused) in Political Economy at the University of Sydney.

Proofs of the Afterword by @cwaldby.bsky.social and me for the social survey in global perspective book have arrived. Edited by Charlotte Greenhalgh, @clarecorbould.bsky.social and me, published in 2026 by @berghahnbooks.bsky.social

www.berghahnbooks.com/title/Greenh...

Feedback on ANU Governance Project Draft Report The ANU Governance Project Working Group are proud to present the Draft Project Report for community feedback and consultation. The Draft Project Report is available on our website or through THIS LINK. Using a process that has involved deep listening and a participatory and deliberative process across the ANU community, we have compiled a unique and valuable body of evidence that documents what’s wrong with governance at the ANU and charts a way forward to help rebuild trust and to deliver best practice governance. Over 600 ANU staff, students, and stakeholders have participated in this project, and in contributing constructively to the future of ANU. This includes 590 members of the community who participated in our survey, 75 who participated in one-hour small group discussions, and over 40 from across the university who participated in our project workshop. The ANU community told us there a critical need for change: Over 96% of survey respondents and all discussion group participants believe current ANU governance is not fit for purpose and should be reformed. Over 92% of survey respondents and all discussion group participants expressed dissatisfaction with current ANU governance. Over 93% of survey respondents said they were dissatisfied with current practices of transparency at the ANU. Over 93% of survey respondents said they were dissatisfied with accountability frameworks at the ANU. The ANU Community has proposed the following near-term steps forward for a reformed ANU: Council must direct Finance to produce and publish a current budget breakdown. Council must revise and publish selection criteria for Executive positions. Council meetings must immediately be made fully accessible to the community. Academic Board must regularly review and assess the financial decisions of senior executives and Council. Commence senior leadership listening tours with the ANU community. Additional recommendations forwarded by the community are summarised in the full report, including a proposal to co-design legislative reform of the ANU Act with the community. The Working Group invites the ANU community and stakeholders to offer feedback via this form on the draft report by midnight on Tuesday 7 October. This deadline has been extended in order to allow us more time to hear and incorporate community feedback ahead of the release of our final report on Monday 20 October.

ANU colleagues and students - please share this post if you can:

The ANU governance project has extended our deadline to comment on the Draft report to next week - 7 October.

Here's a link to a feedback form, which also contains the link to the draft report:

docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1F...

1/At Macquarie Uni we are losing 50% of our units in my faculty. This is on top of cuts in 2020. We estimate by next year my faculty will be teaching 80% fewer subjects than pre Covid. Disciplines being cut do not have declining enrolments. @jennaprice.bsky.social @michaelwestbiz.bsky.social

ANU people - please share! The ANU governance project has a media release about the presentation by the Interim Vice Chancellor's speech on Thursday here: drive.google.com/file/d/1oGH5...

anugovernance-davidpocock.nationbuilder.com/here_s_how_w...

1 / 1 Letter in support of Meanjin’s future As members of the Publishing and Communications program’s staff at the University of Melbourne, we strongly support the continued existence of Meanjin Quarterly. From direct involvements with the journal during the past 25 years and more, we personally attest to the formative role Meanjin has played in the development of writers, editors and publishers, and an independent Australian cultural voice. The creative labour of thousands resonates deeply in the fabric of this cultural institution founded by Clem Christesen in Meanjin/Brisbane in 1940. We call on the University of Melbourne to recognise the rich and continuing social, political and literary value of Meanjin by ensuring its future. The journal is a living resource for our teaching, and vital to our students. Its publications fill our reading lists with ideas from the best minds of our time. It has uplifted many of our students through publication, internships, partnerships and employment, and its connection to the University is part of what makes our writing and editing programs valuable and comparable to other leading universities on the international stage. We believe the University’s enduring purpose of benefiting society compels it to take swift action to preserve the journal and sustain its continued publication, preferably within the University itself. At the very least, the University should do all it can, acting in good faith, to transfer the journal’s cultural and IP assets to another institution prepared to save it. Culturally, the University of Melbourne has benefited immensely from its support of the journal since 1945; the extinction of the journal would be its enduring loss but an even greater loss to the community the University serves. Signed by: Sybil Nolan Tim Coronel Matt Holden LJ Maher Fiannuala Morgan Sharon Mullins Beth Driscoll Claire Parnell Nicola Redhouse Hollen Singleton Bec Kavanagh

Re #MeanjinJournal, a letter from myself and some of my colleagues to The University of Melbourne. #Meanjin is such an important part of Australia's literary ecosystem and losing it would be culturally and industrially devastating. #AusLit #AustralianWriters #Publishing #Unimelb

When Bell resigned, staff cheered. The ANU drama and a broken university sector The downfall of now-ousted ANU boss Genevieve Bell is just a microcosm of a broader crisis in Australian university governance.

An ANU all-staff meeting erupted into cheers when it was announced that Vice-Chancellor Genevieve Bell was stepping down, writes Ben Eltham.

This moment is a chance to rebuild ANU into a democratic, accountable and thriving institution that has the trust and confidence of its community once again.

It must not be wasted.

ANU's crisis runs deeper than the leadership. Here's how we save the university If we get this right, it could be a model for other universities.

“dialogue is the antithesis of either top-down or bureaucratic decision-making. It acknowledges the place of risk in the interactions between participants, as they make themselves vulnerable by engaging with a wide range of people...”

ANU Governance Project

www.canberratimes.com.au/story/906463...

UTS told to pause staff cuts because of ‘psychological harm’ risk The workplace regulator has intervened in a redundancy process at the University of Technology Sydney in what experts say is rare but could become more common.

As the only university covered by federal law, why can’t we see a similar intervention at ANU?

I hear constantly from staff about the huge toll on from the almost year long shambolic process of cuts at the ANU.

We need an immediate pause to forced redundancies.
www.afr.com/companies/en...

ANU at a crossroads: between the social body and the iron cage - Overland literary journal The organic solidarity on display across ANU gives the institution its moral clarity and counterweight to a bureaucracy that risks becoming a case as hard as steel. In the last six months, ANU staff, ...

A gut-wrenching read from a brilliant scholar, on the crisis at ANU. It speaks to the broader sickness in our universities (including my own).

FYI @frankbongiorno.bsky.social @hannahforsyth.bsky.social @capandgown.bsky.social @joshuablackjb.bsky.social

overland.org.au/2025/08/anu-...

The country holds round tables on productivity while the university sector is underfunded and suffers from poor neoliberal governance without accountability right at the top. One doesn't need a uni degree to understand stagnant productivity if one doesn't invest in knowledge and innovation.

@thesaturdaypaper.com.au your headline is grossly inaccurate: the VC intends to continue with more than 100 further forced redundancies. This includes through cruel spill and fill processes scheduled for later this year.

Regulator demands ANU defend its council members' conduct A federal government investigation into the Australian National University demands the university defend the conduct of its council members amid concerns they have failed to competently oversee its op...

Regulator demands Australian National University defend council conduct amid governance concerns

www.abc.net.au/news/2025-08...

Bishop should stand aside from ANU role amid bullying claim, senator says ACT independent Senator David Pocock says he is concerned the issues facing the Australian National University are affecting its staff and students and calls for more transparency.

David Pocock: Julie Bishop should stand aside as ANU Chancellor www.abc.net.au/news/2025-08...

Beyond distressing to experience and watch this unfold