The tennis world is abuzz with the glass-smashing news that Andy Murray has appointed former world number one Amelie Mauresmo as his coach. This time it’s not the glass ceiling that being cracked, but…
Executives from four major news providers – BBC, ITN, Channel 4 and Sky – have pledged to try to improve the number of women interviewed as experts on their programmes; and this summer will be the test…
Differences between the sexes are one of those endlessly intriguing cases, begging for explanation. People categorised as belonging to different sex categories seem to behave differently, make different…
Men and women may feel like they differ on much more than just the possession or not of a Y chromosome. How we react emotionally to a situation, remember events and navigate our way around the environment…
Julia Gillard and Helen Clark supposedly suffered from a problem with their leadership style - and so, it seems, does every other woman in a position of power.
AAP/David Foote
Historically, geographically, culturally – there are many points of comparison between Australia and its neighbour to the east, New Zealand. But there are notable differences. This week, The Conversation…
Female barristers have had to challenge the male-dominated professional norms of the Bar.
AAP/Gillian Ballard
Australian men and women in relatively equal numbers obtain undergraduate and postgraduate degrees in political science, law, medicine, business and economics. There is no shortage of women academics…
Hilary Mantel: unprecedented success, but not the whole story.
Dominic Lipinski/PA Wire
The Costa book awards shortlists have been announced and the one thing that dominates people’s first reactions has been the fact the fiction shortlist is made up entirely of women authors. Is the response…
An excerpt from Alison Bechdel’s comic strip, Dykes to Watch Out For (1985).
Wikimedia
Four cinemas in Sweden recently pledged to rate films based on whether they pass what is known as the “Bechdel test,” a means of evaluating gender bias in film, named after American graphic artist Alison…
Isolated, pigeonholed, marginalised: women in the UK press.
Stefan Rousseau/PA Wire
EDITOR’S NOTE: A correction was made to this article after publication. It was claimed that there were no female political correspondents at the Daily Mail. There were, in fact, three political correspondents…
With only one woman in Abbott’s cabinet, is it time to question the validity of the ‘merit’ argument?
EPA Image/Justin Lane
The presence of only one woman, albeit a high profile one, in Tony Abbott’s cabinet has prompted renewed calls for the introduction of quotas to ensure greater numbers of senior women in government. And…
If we weren’t all created equally with equal upbringings, should we scrap the concept of ‘merit’ in decision-making?
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Just one woman has been appointed to new prime minister Tony Abbott’s first Cabinet of 19. As a result, online forums have been abuzz with debate about gender representation in federal politics. A number…
Autism is believed to affect more men but women should also be in the picture.
VikaUshkanova
Autism reveals itself in different ways in women than in men, according to new research from the University of Cambridge. And this has the potential to great advance our understanding of the condition…
In most of our workplaces and institutions there are subtle, cumulative, insidious judgements and responses that serve to reinforce the powerful status quo of leadership.
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Accounts in the media over the past week explain, or rather rationalise, the downfall of our first female Prime Minister. One-time feminist warrior Eva Cox found that Julia Gillard failed to communicate…
Women need to play a greater role at the top of Australia’s art institutions.
Man in gallery image from www.shutterstock.com
One of my favourite paintings in the Art Gallery of New South Wales is Emanuel Phillips Fox’s Art Students. It’s particularly notable because all the Melbourne Art School students pictured are women. In…
Julia Gillard’s appearance is regularly commented on: is it just another way to talk about her gender?
AAP/Alan Porritt
Much has been written in the past few days about the legacy of the late British prime minister Margaret Thatcher, including many mentions of her hair. It is difficult to imagine similar attention being…
We’ve all seen the reports of studies demonstrating women’s inequality at work. It is well established that women are disproportionately under-represented in higher paid positions and industries, and that…
The public backslapping around the hiring of a pregnant Marissa Mayer as Yahoo’s CEO acknowledges this type of discrimination is alive and well.
AAP
The public praise heaped upon the struggling Yahoo for hiring a pregnant Marissa Mayer as its new chief executive shows a covert acknowledgement that this form of bias against women remains alive and well…