Rae Frances - Dean's Profile

Biography

Raelene Frances was born in Collie, Western Australia and is a graduate of the University of Western Australia (BA. Hons and MA) and Monash University (Ph.d). She has published on the history of work, women’s history, Aboriginal/European contact history, religious and community history and has also co-edited several collections of essays on Australian and New Zealand history. Her books include The Politics of Work, which won the Australian Historical Association’s Hancock Prize, and Women and the Great War (co-authored with Bruce Scates), which won the New South Wales Premier’s History Prize. She has recently completed a book-length history of prostitution in Australia, Selling Sex, which was short-listed for the Ernest Scott History Prize.

Rae Frances has taught Australian history, women’s studies, New Zealand history and Australian studies at universities in Melbourne, Perth and Auckland. She is the recipient of numerous teaching awards, including the Australian Award for University Teaching which she shared with her colleague Professor Bruce Scates. She has been President of the UNSW Branch of the National Tertiary Education Union, a member of UNSW Council and was Head of the School of History at the University of New South Wales before taking up the position of Dean of Arts at Monash in January 2007. She is currently a member of the Board of the Australasian Council of Deans of Arts, Social Sciences and Humanities.

Research Interests

Australian social and cultural history
Women’s and gender history
Labour history
History of war
Comparative and transnational history

Current Research Projects

A history of the League of Nations Traffic in Women and Children’s Committee
A chapter on the history of Prostitution and Empire for a 5-volume History of Sexualities edited by Julie Peakman for Berg Books
A collaborative project co-ordinated by Professor Alan Mayne of the University of Adelaide on Australia’s Inland Corridor
A collaborative article with Professor Melanie Nolan of Victoria University, Wellington, on women, gender and labour in Australia and New Zealand.

Bruce Scates (front left) and Rae Frances (front right) with a 2004 student group at the Blue Mosque, Istanbul, Turkey

Publications

Books

R. Frances, Selling Sex: A Hidden History of Prostitution, forthcoming UNSW Press, 2007.

R. Frances, White Slaves/White Australia: Prostitution and the Making of Australian Society, History Council of New South Wales, 2004.

B.Scates and R.Frances, Women and the Great War, Cambridge University Press, Melbourne, 1997.

R.Frances, The Politics of Work in Victoria, 1880-1940, Sydney, Cambridge University Press, March 1993.

‘This is an exemplary study … a landmark in the literature on the work process.’

Stuart Macintyre, Ernest Scott Professor History, University of Melbourne.

‘This excellent book represents the results of a truly extensive amount of original research in a clear, intelligent and analytical way. It helps to establish Australian women’s history and work history more generally on a much higher level of knowledge and analysis than before.’

Ann Curthoys, Manning Clark Professor of History, Australian National University.

R.Frances and B.Scates, Women at Work from the Gold Rushes to World War Two, Melbourne, Cambridge University Press, 1992.

Edited Books

R.Frances and B.Scates (eds), Women, Work and the Labour Movement in Australia and Aotearoa/New Zealand, (Special Issue of Labour History, November, 1991) Sydney, Australian Society for the Study of Labour History, 1991.

R.Frances and B.Scates (eds), The Murdoch Ethos, Murdoch, Murdoch University, 1989.

Contributions to Books

R. Frances, 'James Law, industrialist', Australian Dictionary of Biography, Supplementary Volume, Melbourne University Press, 2005, pp. 228-229.
R. Frances, Commentary: Changes in the Nature of Work and Employment Relations: An Historical Perspective, in R.Callus and R.Lansbury (eds), Working Futures: The Changing Nature of Work and Employment Relations in Australia, Federation Press, 2002, pp.46-50.
R. Frances, Gender, Federation and Working Life, in G. Patmore and M.Hearne (eds) Working the Nation: Working Life and Federation, 1890-1914, Pluto Press, Sydney, 2001, pp. 32-47.
R. Frances, Printing Workers, 1890-1940, in M.Lyons and J.Arnold (eds), A History of the Book in Australia, 1891-1945: A National Culture in a Colonised Market, Queensland University Press, St. Lucia, 2001, pp.116-126.
R. Frances, Prostitution, in G. Davison, J. Hirst and S. Macintyre (eds), The Oxford Companion to Australian History, Melbourne, 1998, pp.530-1.
R. Frances, A History of Female Prostitution in Australia, in R. Perkins, et.al., (eds) Sex Work and Sex Workers in Australia, Kensington, UNSW Press, 1994, pp.27-52.
R. Frances, Fringe History, in B. Attwood (ed.), Labour Histories, Clayton, Monash University History Series, 1994, pp.51-64.
R. Frances, B. Scates and A. McGrath, Broken Silences?: Aboriginal Workers and Labour Historians', in Terry Irving (ed.), Challenges to Labour History, Kensington, UNSW Press, 1994, pp.189-211.
R.Frances, May and Bob Brodney, in J.Ritchie (ed), Australian Dictionary of Biography, Melbourne University Press, Melbourne, 1993.
R.Frances, Shifting Barriers: Twentieth century women's labour patterns, in Kay Saunders and Raymond Evans (eds), Gender Relations in Australia: Domination and Negotiation, Sydney, Harcourt, Brace and Jovanovich, 1992, pp. 246-265.
R.Frances, Writing a Gendered Labour History, in J.Martin and K.Taylor (eds), Culture and the Labour Movement, Palmerston North, Dunmore Press, 1991, pp.62-76.
R.Frances and B.Scates, Editorial, in R.Frances and B.Scates (eds), Women, Work and the Labour Movement in Australia and Aotearoa/New Zealand, Sydney, Australian Society for the Study of Labour History, 1991, pp.vii-x.
R.Frances, Gender, History and Industrial Relations, in G.Patmore (ed), History and Industrial Relations, Sydney, ACIRRT, 1990, pp.30-42.
R.Frances, Bob Solly: Union Organiser and Politician, in J.Ritchie (ed), Australian Dictionary of Biography, Vol. XII, Melbourne, Melbourne University Press, 1990.
R.Frances, Alfred Russell Wallis: Union Secretary and Industrial Relations Commissioner, in J.Ritchie (ed), Australian Dictionary of Biography, Vol. XII, Melbourne, Melbourne University Press, 1990.
R.Frances and B.Scates, Editorial, in R.Frances and B.Scates (eds), The Murdoch Ethos, Murdoch, Murdoch University, 1989, pp.2-8.
R.Frances and B.Scates, Unmasking the Monument:: the Other Side of the Pioneer Myth, in R.Frances and B.Scates (eds), The Murdoch Ethos, Murdoch, Murdoch University, 1989, pp.221-245.
R.Frances, Never Done But Always Done Down: Paid and Unpaid Labour in Australia 1788-1988, in V.Burgmann and J.Lee (eds), Making a Life: A People's History of Australia, Melbourne, McPhee Gribble, 1988, pp.110-125.
R.Frances, The Victorian Clothing and Boot Trades, 1850-1940, in E.Willis (ed), Technology and the Labour Process: Australian Case Studies, Sydney, Allen and Unwin, 1988, pp.173-208.
R.Frances, Harrison Ord: Public Servant, in G.Serle (ed), Australian Dictionary of Biography, Vol.XI, Melbourne University Press, 1988.
R.Davidson (now Frances), Dealing with the “Social Evil”: prostitutes and police in Western Australia, 1895-1924, in K.Daniels (ed), So Much Hard Work: Prostitution in Australian History, Sydney, Fontana/Collins, 1984, pp.162-191.
R.Davidson (now Frances), “As good a bloody woman as any other bloody woman ...”: Prostitutes in Western Australia, 1895-1939, in Patricia Crawford (ed), Exploring Women's Past, Melbourne, Sisters Publishing Co., 1983. Republished by George Allen and Unwin, Sydney, 1985, pp.173-208.

Articles/Papers in Academic Journals

R. Frances, White Slaves/White Australia: prostitution and the making of Australian society, Australian Feminist Studies, vol. 19, no. 44, July 2004, pp. 185-200.
S.Adams and R. Frances, 'Lifting the veil': the representation of sex work in Australian museums and galleries', Labour History, no. 85, November 2003, pp.47-64.
R.Frances, 'Confessions of a promiscuous researcher: Inaugural Friends of the Noel Butlin Archives Annual Lecture', Labour History, no. 83, November 2002, pp.195-204.
R. Frances, One hundred years of women's wage-fixing, Journal of Interdisciplinary Gender Studies, vol. 5, no. 2, December 2000, pp. 84-93.
R. Frances, White Australia and the White Slave Traffic: Gender, race and citizenship, International Review of Social History, no. 44, 1999, Supplement, pp. 101-122.
R.Frances, Gender and Labour Markets, Journal of Industrial Relations, September, 1998, vol. 40, no. 3, pp. 401-408.
R.Frances, Australian Prostitution Since World War II, Australian Studies, (London), November 1996, pp.130-140.
R. Frances, J. Kealey and J. Sangster, Women's Work in Australia and Canada, 1880-1980, Labour History, no. 71 and Labour/Le Travail, (Toronto) no. 38, Fall 1996, pp. 54-89 (I contributed the Australian material for this article while the two other authors jointly contributed the Canadian).
R. Frances, Australian Prostitution in International Perspective, Australian Historical Studies, No. 106, April 1996, pp. 127-141.
R.Frances and B.Scates, Is Labour History Dead? The Verdict in 1992, Australian Historical Studies, no. 100, April 1993, pp.470-482.
R.Frances, Women, Work and Technology, Arena, No.96, (1991), p.173-6.
R.Frances, Marginal Matters: Gender, Skill, Unions and the Commonwealth Arbitration Court - A Case Study of the Australian Printing Industries, 1925-1937, Labour History, No.61, (November 1991), pp.17-29.
R.Frances and B.Scates, Honouring the Aboriginal Dead, Arena, No.86, (Autumn 1989), pp.32-51.
R.Frances, Celebrations of Community: Murals and their Messages, in Studies in Western Australian History, No. X (December 1988), pp.121-7.
R.Frances, Christianity on the Coalfields: a Case Study of Collie in the Great Depression, Studies in Western Australian History, No.IX, (October 1987), pp.115-126.
R.Frances, “No More Amazons”: Gender and Work Process in the Victorian Clothing Industry, 1890-1939, Labour History, No.50 (May 1986), pp.95-112 (Special commemorative edition of the journal devoted to the 'new labour history').
R.Frances, Comrades or Doormats? Women in Coalmining Communities, Lilith, Vol. 1, No.2, (Winter 1985), pp.77-86.
R.Frances, M.Roper and B.Scates, What Rough Beast? A Review Article, Journal of Australian Studies, No. 15, (November 1984), pp.72-79.