Feminist Agenda

WINTER INSTITUTE FOR WOMEN

"A Feminist Agenda for the 21st Century"

11-18 July 2004 - James Cook University, Townsville

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COURSE COORDINATORS

COURSE... If not now, when?: Envisioning a legal system which prioritises the safety of women and children.

Ruth Busch is Associate Professor, Law School, University of Waikato (NZ). Her primary academic interests are Family Law and Domestic Violence law reform - the impact of domestic violence on child witnesses, on custody/access decision-making, supervised access, the development of coordinated multi-agency responses to domestic violence, and the appropriateness of restorative justice models to deal with dv offending. Ruth has worked as a Family Law practitioner in Canada and New Zealand and has published numerous articles in New Zealand and internationally. She was consultant to the NZ Justice Department on the drafting of the Domestic Violence Act 1995 and Guardian- ship Amendment Act 1995 and has been long-time legal advisor to the Hamilton Abuse Intervention Project and the (NZ) National Collective of Independent Women’s Refuges.

Ruth Busch

Susan Hawthorne

COURSE... Wild Politics: Looking at Feminism, Globalisation and Bio/diversity

Dr Susan Hawthorne is a poet, novelist, theorist, publisher and aerialist. The author of numerous books including Bird (poetry, 1999), The Falling Woman (novel, 1992/2003), Wild Politics (2002) and The Spinifex Quiz Book (1993) and many anthologies. She is a Research Associate at Victoria University in Melbourne, and Publisher at Spinifex Press. She joined the women’s movement in 1973 and all of her work has been informed by her activism and her involvement across a wide range of organizations and activities including the arts, politics, circus, international trade and violence. She is currently working on war and the torture of lesbians.

COURSE... Challenging the International Politics of Sexual Exploitation

Dr Sheila Jeffreys is a founding member of the Coalition Against Trafficking in Women Australia. She is an Associate Professor in the Department of Political Science at the University of Melbourne where she teaches sexual politics, lesbian politics and international feminist politics. She is the author of five books on the history and politics of sexuality including The Idea of Prostitution and Unpacking Queer Politics, 2003. She is completing her sixth book: Beauty and Misogyny: Harmful cultural practices in the west.

Sheila Jeffreys

Betty McLellan

COURSE... Feminist Ethics in the 21st Century: A Radical Analysis

Dr Betty McLellan is one of four women who formed the Coalition for a Feminist Agenda in Townsville and organised the very successful Townsville International Women’s Conference in July 2002. By profession, she is a Psychotherapist and, by passion, a radical feminist activist concerned primarily about the personal, social and political wellbeing of women. Her doctoral study and much of her subsequent writing focus on the conjunction between psychology and social ethics. She is Adjunct Associate Professor at James Cook University, facilitator of the f-agenda email discussion list and author of three books: Overcoming Anxiety (1992); Beyond Psychoppression: A feminist alternative therapy (1995); and Help! I’m Living with a (Man) Boy (1999).

COURSE... Bold Words, Bold Women: Writing as Subversive Power

Dr Gina Mercer is passionate about words and teaching. She has two degrees in literature plus one in adult education. Gina has enjoyed frequent publication of her academic and creative writing, publishing (amongst other things) four books: Janet Frame: Subversive Fictions (UQP, 1994 – literary criticism); The Ocean in the Kitchen (Five Islands Press, 1999 – poetry): Parachute Silk (Spinifex Press, 2001 – novel); and Postgraduate Research Supervision: Transforming (R)Elations (Peter Lang NY, 2001 – essays). She has been teaching creative writing, women’s studies and literature in universities and communities for 20 years. She has been a feminist activist since the age of 17 and plans to keep being one until she’s 87 (at least)!

Gina Mercer

Eileen Pittaway

COURSE... Lives in Limbo: an exploration of the experience of refugees and asylum seekers

Dr Eileen Pittaway is Director, Centre for Refugee Research, University of New South Wales, Sydney. She lectures in International Social Development. Eileen has been actively involved in refugee resettlement policy, with a focus on refugee women, and the women’s movement for over twenty years. Her major area of research has been rape in conflict situations. She participates in a range of United Nations meetings and her particular interest is in Human Rights and their use by women’s groups at local and global levels. In 2001 she received an award from the Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission for her work with refugee women. She is currently working on a research project in Kenya and on the Thai Burma border focusing on “international protection” in the context of the sexual and gender based violence experienced by refugee women.