Anne Brewster - Böcker

This book is the first to examine gender and violence in Australian literature. It argues that literary texts by Australian women writers offer unique ways of understanding the social problem of gendered violence, bringing this often private and suppressed issue into the public sphere. It draws on the international field of violence studies to investigate how Australian women writers challenge the victim paradigm and figure women’s agencies. In doing so, it provides a theoretical context for the increasing number of contemporary literary works by Australian women writers that directly address gendered violence, an issue that has taken on urgent social and political currency.By analysing Australian women’s literary representations of gendered violence, this book rethinks victimhood and agency, particularly from a feminist perspective. One of its major innovations is that it examines mainstream Australian women’s writing alongside that of Indigenous and minoritised women. In doing so it provides insights into the interconnectedness of Australia’s diverse settler, Indigenous and diasporic histories in chapters that examine intimate partner violence, violence against Indigenous women and girls, family violence and violence against children, and the war and political violence.

This book is the first to examine gender and violence in Australian literature. It argues that literary texts by Australian women writers offer unique ways of understanding the social problem of gendered violence, bringing this often private and suppressed issue into the public sphere. It draws on the international field of violence studies to investigate how Australian women writers challenge the victim paradigm and figure women’s agencies. In doing so, it provides a theoretical context for the increasing number of contemporary literary works by Australian women writers that directly address gendered violence, an issue that has taken on urgent social and political currency.By analysing Australian women’s literary representations of gendered violence, this book rethinks victimhood and agency, particularly from a feminist perspective. One of its major innovations is that it examines mainstream Australian women’s writing alongside that of Indigenous and minoritised women. In doing so it provides insights into the interconnectedness of Australia’s diverse settler, Indigenous and diasporic histories in chapters that examine intimate partner violence, violence against Indigenous women and girls, family violence and violence against children, and the war and political violence.

Reading Aboriginal Women's Life Stories is an important discussion of books that have shaped our understanding of contemporary Indigenous Australian literature.

This book explores how working-class experience is represented in contemporary Australian literature and theatre and asks whether working-class stories continue to be underrepresented in the contemporary Australian literary scene. The book examines a wide range of examples from published Australian fiction, creative non-fiction, poetry and theatre that has working-class content, and considers what kinds of representations are present in these works. Is the nuance of working-class life being included? Do the authors challenge stereotypes? What kinds of stories are privileged? Who is writing about working-class people? And what can we learn about working-class Australia from reading contemporary literature? The book also takes an intersectional approach and considers how contemporary Australian authors and playwrights such as Melissa Lucashenko, Michael Mohammed Ahmad, Tony Birch and Alana Valentine show the intersections of class with race, ethnicity, gender and sexuality.