The author of a new book exploring the making of heroines throughout history asks whether Barbie can ever overcome her reputation as the plastic antithesis of feminist ideals.
In his 1972 novel The Stepford Wives, Ira Levin powerfully dramatised women’s suburban alienation and men’s resistance to feminist change. Michelle Arrow traces its enduring influence.
This book succeeds well in describing and criticising, through many examples, how whiteness works.
Young women members of the Charles Manson family kneel on the sidewalk outside the Los Angeles at Hall of Justice March 29, 1971, with their heads shaved.
Wally Fong/AP
What is the appeal of cults? How do they work? And what is the damage they do? A new book, by the creator of the podcast Let’s Talk About Sects, answers these questions and more.
Women use energy in different ways to men.
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Two radically inventive new works of Australian graphic nonfiction dig deep into 21st-century life. They balance critique with hopeful possibilities – of collective change and radical acceptance.
A new book by Manjula Datta O’Connor argues that family violence raises some culturally specific issues, but the problem is not limited any particular group.
Old women remain the butt of jokes; they are some of society’s most marginalised people. But age also invites us to become our most authentic selves, writes Carol Lefevre.
This brainy feminist romp of a novel, loved by Rachel Cusk and Maria Semple, is often compared to Brideshead Revisited. But Carol Lefevre says it’s more like a sexy, sweary version of Nancy Mitford in 1960s London.
Mitchell Library, State Library of New South Wales and courtesy SEARCH Foundation
Honorary (Senior Fellow) School of Culture and Communication University of Melbourne. Editor in Chief, Design and Art of Australia Online, The University of Melbourne