Chilla Bulbeck

The 'White Worrier' in South Australia: Attitudes to Multiculturalism, Immigration and Reconciliation

In his analysis of ‘paranoid nationalism’, Hage (2003: xii, 2) coins the figure of the ‘white worrier’ to identify how white Australians marginalized by the inequalities of economic rationalism and globalization displace their anxieties onto even weaker ‘others’, Aboriginal people and migrants, particularly refugees. Hage’s ideas are applied to the discourses used by young South Australians when they discuss Australian multiculturalism, immigration and reconciliation. Hage’s suggestion that white worrying is the response of the white working class male to his economic and ideological marginalization is only partially supported in this sample of young people. While those from non-English speaking and Indigenous backgrounds are much less likely to be ‘paranoid nationalists’, fear and loathing of the other are expressed across the socio-economic spectrum of young ‘white’ Australians, with exposure to a university education, either on the part of respondents or their parents, being the main antidote to hostile attitudes to the ‘other’.

‘Women are exploited way too often’:1 Feminist rhetorics at the end of equality

Being a woman doesn’t matter. We are all individuals who can invest in ourselves and do whatever we desire. It has become a truism of women’s studies that feminism is a dirty word. Indeed, more people in the United States believe that the earth has been contacted by aliens than believe that the term feminist is a compliment. The ‘I’m not a feminist, but . . .’ tag denotes that while some women reject the label feminist they do endorse many of the political struggles and goals of the women’s movement. The feminism that is rejected is the image of the radical, ball-breaking, man-hating, victim feminist. The feminism that is endorsed is liberal feminism or, in its more recent manifestations, entitlement feminism and free enterprise feminism. In the 1990s, the so-called generation debate between the women’s liberationists and their putative daughters swirled around these issues. Older feminists accused these daughters of self-interested engagement with a capitalist world and acceptance of women’s sexual subjugation through pornography, the fashion industry and sex work. Younger feminists accused their putative mothers of laying down the law concerning a homogeneous, victim feminism which allowed no deviation for personal talents and preferences, allowed no fun to play with a girl’s heterosexuality. Instead of assuming that ‘the political struggles which worked in the 1970s are still appropriate and effective’ today, young feminists have a more personal politics in which gender is not a central aspect of their political identity. Second-wave critics deplore this personal politics as a selfcentred individualised program of ‘entitlement feminism’, ‘free market feminism’, and self-help or therapeutic feminism. Given the unpopularity of the feminist label, it is hardly surprising that ‘postfeminism’ is a familiar tag to describe these new forms of feminism. Even the conservative Australian Prime Minister John Howard claims that ‘we are in the post-feminist stage of the debate. . . . Of course women are as good as men.’ Young feminist, Ingrid FitzGerald criticises this ‘post-feminist era’ in which women’s freedom is measured in ‘consumerism and liberal individualism’ and is available ‘on the open market’. Commodity feminism was famously captured in the Spice Girls’ ‘girl power’ and is discussed by Susan Hopkins Australian Feminist Studies, Vol. 20, No. 46, March 2005

Ambivalent globalization, amorphous vulnerable nationalism Considering debates about nation and national positioning within the global from the point of view of young Australians

Debates about nation and national positioning within the global exemplified in the Australian culture, history and literacy ‘wars’ have tended to be definitive and apparently oppositional in tone. Yet these debates have proceeded in the absence of a concretized notion of Australian identity and do not adequately address the complexities of political identification and allegiance. Despite intense concerns in these ‘wars’ about the views of young people and the role of their schooling, young people do not necessarily have less well-developed conceptions of Australia’s place in a globalizing world than their elders. Our research on young people’s responses to globalization, global cultural products and national identity offers some suggestive new directions for considering these issues and the school curriculum, directions which are built upon the actual ways in which young Australians express uncertainty about US—Australian relations, while simultaneously identifying with American cultural products.

Sexual dangers: Chinese women's experiences in three cultures—Beijing, Taipei and Hong Kong

Abstract This paper explores some of the different approaches to sexuality issues such as rape, prostitution, and abortion in Beijing, Taiwan, and Hong Kong in late 1991 and early 1992. Through a comparison with the rhetorics of feminism in the United States, the currency of notions like ‘rights,’ ‘harmony,’ ‘freedom,’ and ‘welfare’ in the Chinese and American womens movements are investigated.

Gender studies at Griffith University

Abstract The opposition to the introduction of a womens studies concentration area (a related set of courses) at Griffith University reveals the close links between opposition by the Right to feminist demands for change, (for example for womens reproductive and occupational choices), and opposition to the introduction of tertiary womens studies courses. The history of this battle at Griffith University also reveals the universitys retreat from a commitment to the professional autonomy and competence of the womens studies planning team to a politicisation of the universitys internal decision-making process.

The Iron Ore Stockpile and Dispute Activity in the Pilbara

It is a conventional wisdom among workers in the Pilbara iron ore mining industry that management engineers disputes when the stockpiles are high and settles disputes when stockpiles are low. This paper investigates the evidence for a relationship between iron ore production and dispute activity. It is concluded that the limitations of the data and the complexity of the issues involved do not allow such a simple for mulation of the relationship between production and industrial conflict.

Engendering Origins : Theories of Gender in Sociology and Archaeology

Abstract Feminist knowledge and its impact on other academic disciplines arose in the 1970s, but it has had an uneven impact in different disciplines. We argue that gender as a theoretical concept has challenged both sociology and archaeology but analyses of gender practices and embodiment which challenge the homogenous categories of ‘women’ and ‘men’ have made much less impact in archaeology – particularly the archaeology of deep time. The paper concludes by suggesting that feminist archaeology’s exploration of the origins of gender offers critical insights concerning the ways in which feminist sociologists define their theories with and against the ‘Western folk model’ of sex and gender.

Less Than Overwhelmed By Beijing: Problems Concerning Women's Commonality And Diversity

(1996). Less Than Overwhelmed By Beijing: Problems Concerning Womens Commonality And Diversity. Australian Feminist Law Journal: Vol. 6, No. 1, pp. 30-38.

Australian liberalism and corporatism

George Brandis, Tom Harley and Don Markwell (eds), Liberals face the Future: Essays on Australian Liberalism, Melbourne, Oxford University Press, 1984, pp. 386,

LIVING IN CONNECTION

14.99 (paper) and Katharine West, The Revolution in Australian Politics, Melbourne, Penguin Books, 1984, pp. 116,