The recent election of José Maria de Vasconcelos, or Taur Matan Ruak as he is known, to the Presidency of Timor-Leste is not good news for women in that country. Adding yet another member of the male military…
The poster for Secretary is up on my wall at work. I actually paid to see A Dangerous Method purely for Jung’s novel approach to therapy (and God do I hate period films.) While I probably won’t read all…
People often ask me whether natural selection continues to operate on modern humans in industrialised societies, even though technology has liberated so many from hunger and early death. My answer is always…
Today is the 101st anniversary of International Women’s Day, a day celebrated around the world to mark the legal, political, social and economic achievements of women. The change in corporate governance…
Alongside sketchy rationales like postponing the whole rat race thing, a pivotal reason that I got my PhD was to avoid the Miss/Ms conundrum. As first world a problem as is imaginable, but it plagued me…
As one of the few women to have run a political party in this country Cheryl Kernot is well aware of the role gender plays in the Australian political landscape. In the wake of Bob Brown’s claim this week…
La Trobe University’s Dr Jan Schapper recently completed a study into signage and writing on women’s toilets in Australia. The research, just published in the international journal, “Gender, Place and…
The recent plan to see women take on frontline combat roles in the Australian military from 2016 removes one of the last formal barriers to women’s participation in all realms of work. Unsurprisingly…
There is a profound silence in conflict. Women’s voices are absent. They are excluded from decision-making and peace processes across the world’s trouble spots. This exclusion not only perpetuates political…
While Saudi women celebrate their hard-earned right to vote in next year’s Municipal Council elections, the frenzy of international media interest highlights just how mysterious this country remains. Women…
A stroll down the personal growth aisle of the bookstore tells us, among other things, Why Men Don’t Listen and Women Can’t Read Maps. The answer, as authors Alan and Barbara Pease delightedly inform their…
Why are there fewer women working in science than men? Things have certainly improved, with participation in many branches of science at undergraduate and graduate levels now broadly balanced between the…
Women who are raped, sexually assaulted, bashed by a partner or stalked are much more likely to develop mental health problems than women who do not experience gender-based violence, a study has found…
No one is too surprised today if a young woman becomes a doctor, lawyer, or executive. But eyebrows are raised just about as much today as in decades past if a couple features a tall woman and short man…
In a decision hailed as ground breaking Fair Work Australia has recently determined that gender is a key factor in women’s low pay. Essentially the argument is that workers in the female dominated community…