Diane Bell

Biographical Information

Diane Bell is a feminist ethnographer with wide ranging interests in issues of justice for women and Indigenous peoples (Australia and North America), Indigenous religions and oral traditions, new age religions, feminist theory and practice, education and the media. Her publications span the fields of anthropology, art, education, history, law, media, peace and conflict studies, women's studies. Over the past twenty or so years she has undertaken extensive field work with Aboriginal people in various parts of Australia and more recently in the USA. She has worked on a number of land rights cases and matters of law reform, run a private practice, worked for statutory authorities and Aboriginal organizations, served on the boards of a number of feminist endeavours, taught in Australia and the USA. She was the founding Director of Women's Studies at Holy Cross College, Worcester, Ma, where she is the Henry R. Luce Professor of Religion, Economic Development and Social Justice.

Bibliography

BOOKS

Prophets of the New Age. (in progress)

Ngarrindjeri Wurruwarrin: A World that is, was, and will be. Spinifex Press Australia. (forthcoming 1998)

Aborigines and Australian Society. A Report to UNESCO, Paris. (co-authored with Genée Marks), 1990.

An anthropologist looks at Australian society. Professorial Series. Geelong: Deakin University Press, 1990.

1988: Still in Search of the Just Society. John Curtin Memorial Lecture. Canberra: Research School of Social Sciences, A.N.U., 1988.

Generations: Grandmothers, Mothers and Daughters. Melbourne: McPhee Gribble/Penguin, 1987.

Aboriginal Women: The Artistic Experience. (Co-authored with Penny Tweedie) Victoria: Women's Art Extension Register, 1983.

Questions of implementation and review. Report of a Working Seminar on the Aboriginal Customary Law Reference. Sydney: A.L.R.C., 1983, pp. 87-95.

Daughters of the Dreaming. Sydney: Allen and Unwin, 1983.

Women and the Religious Experience. Adelaide: Charles Strong Memorial Trust, 1982, pp. 1-25.

Comments on a visit of the Law Reform Commission to Central Australia, Field Trip No. 7, Central Australia. Sydney: A.L.R.C., 1982, pp. 43-48.

Law: The Old and the New. (Co-authored with Pam Ditton). Canberra: Aboriginal History for Central Australian Aboriginal Legal Aid, 1980.

EDITED BOOKS

Essential Readings: A Resource Book. Edited by Diane Bell and Renate Klein, a companion book to Radically Speaking (forthcoming 1998)

Radically Speaking: Feminism Reclaimed. (co-edited with Renate Klein) Melbourne: Spinifex Press, 1996.

Aborigines in Australian Society: A Resourceful Book. (co-edited with Ann J.Cahill) Center for Interdisciplinary and Special Studies, Holy Coss College, 1994.

Gendered Fields: Women, Men and Ethnography. (co-edited with Pat Caplan and Wazir Karim. London: Routledge, 1993.

Feminism and the Disciplines. (co-edited with Ann Cahill) Worcester: Center for Interdisciplinary and Special Studies, Holy Cross College, 1992.

This is My Story: The Use of Oral Sources. (co-edited with Shelley Schreiner ) Geelong: Centre for Australian Studies, Deakin University, 1990.

Why do we teach what we teach? (Contributing Editor.) Worcester: College of the Holy Cross, 1990.

Longman's Encyclopedia. (Australian Contributing Editor) Longmans, 1989.

Religion in Aboriginal Australia. (Co-edited with Max Charlesworth, Kenneth Maddock and Howard Morphy) Q.U.P., 1984.

ARTICLES

"Doing anthropology at home: a feminist initiative in the bicentennial year," On the Other Hand: Studies in Gender and Anthropology. Edited by Nurket Sirman and Kamala Ganesh. Delhi: Kanita, Sage, forthcoming).

"Not a celebration," in Commemoration and Critique: The Columbian Quincentary in Comparative Perspective. Ed. Pauline Smart. Duke University Press, forthcoming.

"First Nation Feminism," in Encyclopedia of Feminist Theories. Routledge, 1998.

"Religion in Oceania", in Encyclopedia of Women and World Religion. Macmillan, 1997.

"Desperately seeking redemption." Natural History (March 1997): 52-3.

"Australia." in Grolier Academic American Encyclopedia, 1996..

"White women can't speak?" Feminism and Psychology 6 (1996): 197-203.

"Women's business is hard work," in Readings in Ritual Studies. Ed. Ronald L.Grimes. Prentice Hall, 1996, pp.33-48.

"Speaking out: domestic violence at home and abroad." Worcester Telegram and Gazette (June 25, 1995).

"Indigenous voices and visions: Implications for a global, gendered, environmental agenda." Pendidikan Tinggi-Higher Education: A journal on the culture and scientificity of knowledge. (Malaysia, 1995): 7-22.

"Discussions." Australian Aboriginal Studies. No.2 (1995): 34-37.

"In the tracks of the munga-munga," in Claiming our Rites: Australian feminist essays in religion. Ed. Penny Magee and Morny Joy. Sydney: Allen and Unwin, 1994, pp. 213-246.

"Representing Aboriginal women: who speaks for whom?" in The Rights of Subordinate Peoples. Ed. Oliver Mendelsohn and Uprenda Baxi. Oxford University Press, 1994, pp. 221-250.

"An accidental Australian tourist: a feminist anthropologist at sea and on land," in Implicit Ethnographies: In the Wake of Columbus. Ed. Stuart B. Schwartz. CUP, 1994, pp. 502-555.

"Mulymuly-Karrka," in Living the Land: Contemporary Art of Australia (Catalogue Essay) California State University, Fullerton, 1993, pp. 7-11.

"Women, war and new world orders," in Peace, Tradition and the Future as a Cultural Problem: How Do We Shape the Future of Planet Earth? Ed. Hans-Jurgen Hassler and Christian von Heusinger. Wurzburg: Konigshausen and Neumann Publisher, 1993, pp.45-6, 483-490.

"Aboriginal women's religion: A shifting law of the land," in Today's Woman in World Religions. Ed. Arvind Sharma. Albany: SUNY Press, 1993, pp. 39-76, 364-367, 403-7.

"Happy Dreamings: Leacock and Aboriginal Studies," in From Labrador to Samoa: The Theory and Practice of Eleanor Leacock. Ed. Constance Sutton. Washington: Association of Feminist Anthropologists and International Women's Anthropological Conference, A.A.A., 1993, pp. 57-65.

"Considering gender: are human rights for women too: an Australian case study?" in Human Rights in Cross-Cultural Perspectives. Ed. Abdullahi Ahmed An-Na'im. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1992, pp. 339-362.

"Aboriginal women, separate spaces, and feminism," in A Reader in Feminist Knowledge. Ed. Sneja Gunew. London: Routledge, 1991, pp. 13-26.

"Sheroes of mine," in Penguin Anthology of Contemporary Australian Women Writers. Ed. Dale Spender. Penguin, 1991, pp. 43-63.

"Intra-racial rape revisited: on forging a feminist future beyond factions and frightening politics." Women's Studies International Forum 14 (1991): 385-412.

"Letter to the editor." Women's Studies International Forum 14 (1991): 507-513.

"All the same but different." Southeast Asian Association for Gender Studies No. 1 (1991): pp. 1-3.

"The battle for hearts and minds: Aborigines and the Bicentennial." Law and Anthropology 5 (1990): 185-200.

"A reply to 'The politics of representation'." Anthropological Forum 6 (1990): 158-165.

"Speaking about rape is everyone's business." (co-authored with Topsy Napurrula Nelson) Women's Studies International Forum 12 (1989): 403-416.

"The politics of separation," in Dealing with Inequality. Ed. Marilyn Strathern. C.U.P, 1988, pp. 112-129.

"We are hungry for our land," in A Most Valuable Acquisition. Ed. Verity Burgman and Jenny Lee. Melbourne: McPhee Gribble/Penguin, 1988, pp. 29-41.

"Choose your mission wisely: Christian colonials and Aboriginal marital arrangements on the northern frontier," in Aboriginal Australians and Christianity. Ed. Deborah Bird Rose and Tony Swain. Adelaide, A.A.S.R., 1988, pp. 338-352.

"Writing about women for the bicentennial," in 1988 and All That. Ed. George Shaw. University of Queensland Press, 1988, pp. 19-22; 55-74.

"Gathered from Kaytej women," in Australians to 1788. Ed. D.J. Mulvaney and Peter White. Broadway: Fairfax, Syme & Weldon Associates, 1987, pp. 238-251.

"Giving in or giving them hell," in Different Lives: Reflections on the Women's Movement and Visions of its Future. Ed. Jocelynne Scutt. Penguin, 1987, pp. 156-166.

"Aboriginal Land Rights," in People and Events, Australians: An Historical Library. Broadway: Fairfax, Syme & Weldon Associates, 1978, p. 1.

"Aboriginal women and customary law," in Indigenous Law and the State. Ed. Bradford W. Morse and Gordon R. Woodman. Holland: Foris, 1987, pp. 297-314.

"Exercising discretion; sentencing Aborigines for murder in Northern Territory," in Indigenous Law and the State. Ed. Bradford W. Morse and Gordon R. Woodman. Holland: Foris, 1987 , pp. 367-396.

"Have anthropologists had their day in court?" AAS Newsletter No. 28 (1986): 18-27.

"Matters for considerations by the Association of Professional Anthropologists: Contracts." Bulletin, Australian Association for Applied Anthropology No. 6 (1986): 4-30.

"Anthropology at the cross roads," in Ockham's Razor, from ABC Radio's Science Series. Sydney: ABC, 1986, pp. 49-54.

"In the case of the lawyers and anthropologists." Journal of Intercultural Studies 7, (1986): 20-29.

"In the case of the lawyers and anthropologists." Legal Services Bulletin 11 (1986): 202-6.

"Central Australian Aboriginal women's love rituals," in Women's Work. Ed. Eleanor Leacock, Helen Safa & contributors. Mass, Bergin & Garvey Pubs, 1986, pp. 75-96.

"Topsy Nelson: teacher, philosopher and friend," in Fighters and Singers. Ed. Diane Barwick, Isobel White and Betty Meehan. Canberra: Allen & Unwin, 1985, pp. 1-18.

"Academia's lost tribe." Australian Society 4 (1985): 37-8.

"Aboriginal women and land: learning from the Northern Territory experience." Anthropological Forum 5 (1984-5): 353-363.

"The impact of resource development: after land rights what forgiveness?" Anthropological Forum 5 (1984-5): 459-463.

"A case for the courts? Aboriginal women and land." Australian Social Weflare Impact 14 (1984): 28-30.

"Going it alone: practicing applied anthropology." Anthropological Forum 5 (1983-84): 176-181.

"The Warumungu Land Claim: a fight for land." Aboriginal Law Bulletin No. 6 (1983): 8-9.

"Women also dream." Hemisphere 27 (1983): 372-6.

"The last stand." Australian Society 2 (1983): 25-27.

"Consulting with women," in We Are Bosses Ourselves. Ed. Fay Gale. (Canberra: A.I.A.S., 1983), pp. 24-8.

"Sacred sites: the politics of protection," in Aborigines and Land Rights. Ed. Nicolas Peterson and Marcia Langton. (Canberra: A.I.A.S., 1983), pp. 278-293.

"Aboriginal women's changing role in health maintenance," in Body, Land and Spirit. Ed. Jan Reid. (St. Lucia: U.Q.P., 1982), pp. 197-224.

"Tennant Creek: a rich tradition." Living North (1981): 2, 58-60.

"Women's business is hard work." Signs 7 (1981): 314-337.

"Outstations: reflections from the Centre," in Service Delivery to Remote Communities. (Darwin: N.A.R.U. Conference, 1981), pp. 29-36.

"Desert politics: choices in the 'marriage market'," in Women and Colonization: Anthropological Perspectives. Ed. Mona Etienne and Eleanor Leacock. (New York: Praeger, 1980), pp. 239-269.

"Aboriginal women in Australia: land and law." ARC Newsletter, USA 4 (1980).

"Genealogy: tracing family history." Co-authored with Diane Barwick and Francesca Merlan, in Handbook for Aboriginal and Islander History. Ed. Diane Barwick, Michael Mace and Tom Stannage. (Canberra: Aboriginal History, 1979), pp. 37-46.

"Land rights: recent events and legislation." Co-authored with Anita Campbell and Diane Barwick, in Handbook for Aboriginal and Islander History. Ed. Diane Barwick, Michael Mace and Tom Stannage. (Canberra: Aboriginal History, 1979), pp. 87-99.

"Women in Aboriginal society: resources for research." Co-authored with Diane Barwick. Handbook for Aboriginal and Islander History. Ed. Diane Barwick, Michael Mace and Tom Stannage. (Canberra: Aboriginal History, 1979), pp. 179-187.

"Women and the land." Identity 3 (1979): 23-31.

"Women artists." Lip 3 (1978).

"Single women's camps." Women's Refuge Newsletter No. 2.

"For our families: the Kurundi walk off and the Ngurrantiji venture." Aboriginal History 2 (1978): 32-61.

Jump to one of these related pages: