Women on the Line

On this episode of Women on the Line we'll be speaking with Jessica Gerrard, Senior Lecturer in Education, Equity and Politics at the University of Melbourne, about her research looking at precarity and poverty for street vendors selling the Big Issue street press. The Big issue is a not for profit social enterprise which offers employment opportunities to people experiencing homelessness and othe...

Sociologist, sex work, and trans activist, Roberta Perkins passed away in June 2018. She was a key founder of a number of organisations and has left behind many books and archives. What was her life like and what is her legacy? Hear from Senior Lecturer at University Technology Sydney Eurydice Aroney. Check out Whores of Yore, NSW sex worker rights timeline, alluded to in the program. Further read...

Water management in the Murray-Darling Basin is extremely complex, defined by the differing and in some cases opposing needs of communities, agribusiness and the environment. This week on the program we look at the tension between the financial cost and the broader value of water in the Basin, and the impact this is having on the biggest river system on the continent. We hear from Mel Gray, Health...

It's been 28 years since the Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody. In Victoria, over 80 Aboriginal, health, human rights, housing, legal and women’s organisations are calling on Premier Andrews to abolish the offense of public drunkenness – a key recommendation of the Royal Commission. This petition was sparked by the December 2017 death in custody of Aboriginal mother, grandmother a...

Celine Yap speaks with Gillian Triggs, former president of the Australian Human Rights Commission, about her campaign to introduce a Bill of Human Rights into Australia. Thank you to 3CR's Refugee Radio, where this interview was originally broadcast.

This episode of Women on the Line is about Parenting with Disability. This show was part of 3CR’s special broadcast for International Day of People with Disability in 2018. Presented by Nicole Smith and featuring the voices of Jax Jacki Brown and Elvira Tarrant. Their stories speak of the deep injustice they experience, stigma and discrimination and the ways these impact parenting. And, like all p...

March 31st, is International Transgender Day of Visibility. A day for the celebration and recognition of trans people. In today’s show we’ll recognise the struggles and celebrate older transgender women and gender non binary people. In today’s society, older transgender people have frequently spent most of their life living as a gender that does not fit with their understandings of themselves. In...

This week on the program we bring you an interview with Aunty Sandra Onus speaking from the Djab Wurrung Embassy in Victoria, and also some coverage of the Melbourne School Strike 4 Climate held on Friday March 15.The Djab Wurrung Heritage Protection Embassy was founded in mid 2018 to lead a grass roots protection action to preserve Djab Wurrung heritage threatened by the Western Highway Duplicati...

Over the 2019 summer, music festivals - particularly those in NSW - have been put in the spotlight with a number of young people overdosing on substances. This prompted health and other professionals to renew their calls for pill testing. These calls were rejected by the New South Wales Government who instead decided to crackdown on festivals by introducing a raft of proposed changes to the indust...

A fledgling #NunsToo movement has entered the public sphere while a much disparaged global summit on child sex abuse has taken place at the Vatican. Here in Australia, Cardinal Pell has been convicted for child abuse - it's been a tumultuous fe weeks for Catholics internationally. Dr Kathleen McPhillips, a leader with the Interdisciplinary Trauma Research Network and the Vice-President of the Aust...

On this episode of Women on The Line we’ll hear from student strikers based in Melbourne, fighting for climate justice as part of the School Strike for 4 Climate Australia network. Disillusioned by the inaction on the climate emergency before us they've taken action into their own hands. These students are here to remind us we have just 12 years to massively reduce carbon emissions, before there i...

On the 3 of February at the 2019 Victorian Pride March, the Daniel Andrews Government announced that gay conversion therapy would be banned in Victoria - making this state the first in Australia to make this ban. In this episode of Women on the Line we look at how the announcement impacts the intersex and trans community. We chat with Sally Goldner from Transgender Victoria and later in the show w...

The Melbourne Accelerator Program also known as MAP was launched in 2012, as the first University-aligned startup accelerator in Australia. In February 2019, in collaboration with Startup Victoria, MAP hosted an event called the Female Founder Connection, a dynamic and vibrant night of networking especially for female founders. On this show, you will hear recordings of that event featuring a wide...

The 2018 Nobel Peace Prize was awarded to Denis Mukwege and Nadia Murad "for their efforts to end the use of sexual violence as a weapon of war and armed conflict,"In this show, we speak with Nikki Marczak, a genocide scholar and survivor advocate. Nikki is a member of the Australian Institute for Holocaust and Genocide Studies and co-editor of Genocide Perspectives V. Nikki was formerly Deputy Di...

Today’s Women on the Line looks at sexual and gender based violence in international development and humanitarian organizations. The interviewees are Hendrica Okondo, who has 20 years of experience in humanitarian contexts within UN organizations; Robin Yaker, who has worked for the International Rescue Committee and Raising Voices; and Sarah Douglas, who is the deputy chief of peace and security...

Invasion Day, commonly known as Australia Day in this country is a time for mourning, a time for struggle. On this show we will be looking at the intergenerational trauma created by a system and a culture which will not recognise sovereignty, that is rather intent on genocide. In this episode we hear from Lidia Thorpe representing  Grandmothers Against Removal in Victoria. Lidia speaks to us about...

The 41st African Studies Association of Australasia and the Pacific (AFSAAP) Conference was held in November 2018 at the University of New South Wales in Sydney. In this show, we hear a presentation from the conference by Rene Sephton, a PhD candidate within the School of Global Urban and Social Studies at RMIT University.  This presentation looks at the concept or philosophy of Búmùntù from the p...

The field of philosophy has long been a hostile environment for women. Feminist thought has been slow to infiltrate the significant back catalogue of ideas and theories that have shaped how we understand ourselves and western societies. Until recent years, when students and contemporary thinkers have engaged with philosophy, often in academic settings, there’s been limited exposure to women thinke...

December 10 is Human Rights Day, and this week on Women on the Line we look at a human rights issue that is very close to home: the rising number of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children in out of home care in Australia, and what this means for these young people, their families and communities. Recent changes to legislation made by the state government in NSW will have serious consequenc...

To commemorate World AIDS Day and International Day for Persons With A Disability 2018, we speak with Suzanne, an HIV and disability advocate with a background as a healthcare professional in different local and international health contexts. We discussed the relationship between disability, sexuality and HIV. 

On this week on Women on the Line look at mental health issues that LGBTIQ+ young people and rural and regional young people are facing today.  We chat with Mel Gaylard, secondary school teacher who is committed to creating safer schools for LGBTIQ+ young people. Later in the show we hear from Pauline Neil – founder of Live4Life, a health promotion organisation addressing youth suicide in rural an...

World Antibiotic Awareness Week occurs annually in November aiming to draw attention to the role of effective use of antibiotics in preventing and containing antimicrobial resistance (AMR). In Melbourne, the National Centre for Antimicrobial Stewardship and Safer Care Victoria are hosting aforum featuring a number of Australian clinical and research groups in a dynamic program covering all facets...

In this week’s Women on the Line, we speak to Nyah and Romy, two young people who’ve spent many weeks organising a ‘Children’s March for Nauru’ in Melbourne. We talk about refugee advocacy and what it’s been like to get involved in activism and campaigning. Later in the show, we also chat to Gabrielle de Vietri from the Artists Committee who initiated working with children and young people for thi...

On this week on Women on the Line we hear a live recording of ‘All the Feels’ – a mental illness and health fundraiser for In Sickness and In Stealth art collective. The event was held on National Mental Health Day, 10 October, at Loop Projection Bar in Melbourne. ‘All the Feels’ launched the second In Sickness and Stealth zine and featured a lineup of live music, poetry, visual art and zines. Art...

Women on the Line speaks with Larissa McFarlane, activist and artist based in Melbourne about disability pride and it's power against structural systems and attitudes which marginalise people with disability. We'll speak with Larissa about the recent re-installation of the Disability Pride mural which was removed last year by the local council, receiving national media at the time.  We'll hear fro...