Professor Mary Louise Rasmussen

BA Hons (Uni Melb.) Grad Dip Ed. (UCAN) PhD (UniSA)
ANU College of Arts and Social Sciences

Areas of expertise

  • Gender, Sexuality And Education 130308
  • Sociology 1608
  • Culture, Gender, Sexuality 200205
  • Feminist And Queer Theory 440501
  • Sexualities 440506
  • Social Change 441004

Research interests

Feminist theories and gender studies; Queer theory and queer studies; Gender, sexuality and education; Social and cultural studies of health and wellbeing; Young people and sexuality; Queer Archives; Reproduction and climate crisis; Australian sexual publics.

My book with Celia Roberts, Louisa Allen and Rebecca Williamson, Reproduction, Kin and  Climate Crisis: Making Bushfire Babies, (Bristol University Press, forthcoming) is based on research into the 2019-20 bushfires in South Eastern Australia. 

While the forthcoming (Bloomsbury), Queer Generations: LGBTQ Growing up, Belonging and Sexual Citizenship, presents the experiences of two social generations of LGBTQ people in Australia (those born in the 1970s and those born in the 1990s) as they navigate a period of unprecedented social and political transformation. It draws on compelling narrative accounts and rich historical data to advance new theoretical perspectives on belonging and sexual citizenship.

Biography

Professor Mary Lou Rasmussen has undertaken research in the US, Canada, New Zealand and Australia. Her research focuses on building transdisciplinary understanding of sexuality and gender across diverse lifeworlds, taking account of issues related to sexual citizenship, cultural and religious difference and technologies of sexuality, education and health. She is co-editor, with Louisa Allen, of the Handbook of Sexuality Education (Palgrave).

 

Researcher's projects

Queer Generations: Belong and sexual citizenship among gender and sexual minority youth. 

Past student projects

The following students have completed research projects under my supervision.

 

PhD (ANU University Students)

 

Simon Copland - Reddit, The Manosphere and The Male Complaint (co-supervisor with Robert Ackland and Timothy Graham QUT)

 

Kerry Simple - Camp Studies, and Queer Theory, and drag queens, oh my! Camping the academy, queer methods, and the potentiality of camp 

(co-supervisor with Celia Roberts & Maria Hynes)

 

PhD (Monash University Students)

 

Linnette Etheredge

Exploring the intimate experiences of young people aged 11-14 through creative filmmaking.

(Deana Leahy and Sue Griesharber Primary Supervisors)

 

Brian Jeganathan - Awarded 2019

Cultural Worker As "Horizontal Intellectual" In A Militarized Postcolonial Site: Jacques

Ranciere's "Equality Of Intelligence" (Co-supervisor with Jennifer Bleazby)

 

Megan McPherson — Awarded 2018

Subjectivity, agency and affect in the undergraduate

university art studio crit (Co-supervisor with Anne Harris)

 

Genevieve Hall — Awarded 2018

Being, becoming and belonging as a human rights activist

(Associate supervisor with Libby Tudball)

 

Melissa Joy Wolfe — Awarded 2016

Girls' tales: experiences of schooling (Co-supervisor with Iris Duhn)

 

John Haycock — Awarded 2015

Revolution rock: A study of a public pedagogy of protest music (Associate-supervisor  Emily Gray – RMIT)

 

Corinna Peterken — Awarded 2015

Knowing in the making: Becoming-artist/academic with an inquiry into child art pedagogy (Co-supervisor with Jane Bone)

 

Emma Rowe — Awarded 2015

Geo-identity, school choice and collective campaigns for local public schools (Co-supervisor with Scott Bulfin)

 

Genine Hook – Awarded 2015

Gender, agency and the engagement of sole parent postgraduates in the Australian academy (Clare Hall – Associate Supervisor)

 

Cate Smith — Awarded 2014

The dominance of conservative Protestant values in an American small town: Institutional continuity between home, church and school (Co-supervisor with Joel Windle)

 

Kellie Sanders — Awarded 2013

Picturing Footballing Bodies: Gender, Homosociality and Sportscapes

 

Annette Bromdal — Awarded 2013

The Phantom Category of 'Intersex' in Elite Sports: Knowledge about 'Disturbing' Female Bodies and Athletic Performances

 

Vikki Pollard — Awarded 2009

Altruism in teaching: towards a critical ontology of altruism

Recipient of Faculty of Education Postgraduate Publication Award

 

Claire Charles — Awarded 2009

Knowing girls: ‘objectification’, ‘girl power’ and ‘girls’ resistance’ at school

Recipient of Faculty of Education Postgraduate Publication Award

 

Karen Lambert — Awarded 2006

Place, sexualities and community

(Co-supervisors Prof Jan Wright & Dr Valerie Harwood - University of Wollongong)

 

EdD (Monash)

 

Bruce Fox — Awarded 2015

City as School: Learning Beyond the Classroom

 

 

Honours (ANU and Monash)

 

Lawrence Baker - Awarded 2023 

(First Class) ‘Housing Matters: Temporality, Materiality and (Re)making in the Share House 

 

Brock Manson - Awarded 2021

(First Class) Change the story, Queer the story:Tracing the recognition of LGBTQI

relationships in Australian intimate partner violence policy

 

Alistair Thomson - Awarded 2020

Possibilities and Practices Among Parents of Young Children that Both Work

 

Phoebe Cook - Awarded 2020

Secrets, Silences, and Spectres in the Enforcement of the Dispositif of Sexting in Australia’

 

Gabriela Falzon - Awarded 2019

CFMEU Women: Constructing Gender at Work 

 

Natasha Dubler - Awarded 2018

Agential Listening and the Sounwalk

 

Nida Mollison — Awarded 2017

(First Class) Watching Transparent: Politics and Televisual Methodology

 

Genine Hook — Awarded 2010

(First Class)  Teaching Australian Indigenous Studies on the other side of the Rabbit Proof Fence

 

Adrian Farrugia — Awarded 2012

(First Class) From Distress to Psychosis: Mapping the Rhizome of Australian Harm Reduction Drug Education

 

Theses Examined 

Adriana Haro, Disidentifying Masculinities: Queer Latinx Embodiment in Australia, University of Newcastle, PhD Thesis (2022) 

Jan Filmer,  Infrastructures of Intimacy: Queer (re)configurations of cultural space, University of Sydney, PhD Thesis  (2020)

Ruby Grant, Society and Culture, University of Tasmania — The Queer Sexual Citizen: Bisexual and Queer Young Women’s Sexual Health in Tasmania, PhD Thesis (August, 2018)

Justine Hotten, School of Justice, The negotiation of sexual consent between same-sex attracted women, PhD Thesis (October, 2017)

Aoife Neary, Department of Sociology, University of Limerick, Teachers and civil partnership in ireland: Ambivalent promises of legitimacy, PhD Thesis (August, 2014)

Kyra Clarke, Gender Studies, Faculty of Arts, University of Western Australia, “Getting Messy: Exploring Intimate Pedagogical Moments in Film and Television”, PhD Thesis. (June, 2014)

Fiona McLachlan, School of Physical Education, University of Otago, “Poolspace: The plight of public swimming pools”, PhD Thesis. (Feb, 2012)

Christina Gowlett, School of Education, University of Queensland. “SUBJECTification: An examination of senior subject selection at a ‘disadvantaged’ secondary school”. PhD Thesis. (Dec, 2011)

Leopoldyna McGee, School of Philosophy, Faculty of Arts, University of Tasmania. “Becoming Girl: The Subversive Narratives of Le Girl Sujet en Process/On Trial”, PhD Thesis (May, 2009)

Kellie Burns, School of Physical Education, University of Otago, “Blood, Sweat and Queers: (re) imagining global queer citizenship at the Sydney 2002 gay games”, PhD Thesis. (Oct, 2007)

 

Publications

Projects and Grants

Grants information is drawn from ARIES. To add or update Projects or Grants information please contact your College Research Office.

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Updated:  29 March 2024 / Responsible Officer:  Director (Research Services Division) / Page Contact:  Researchers