A Podcast of One's Own with Julia Gillard

In this episode, Julia is joined by Sharon Bhagwan-Rolls, a leading Pacific feminist and peacebuilder who has spent more than three decades ensuring women’s voices shape the decisions that affect their lives, from local communities across the Pacific to the United Nations Security Council.Sharon reflects on the family and intergenerational women’s movement that shaped her activism, and how political upheaval in Fiji influenced her understanding of democracy, peace and women’s leadership. She and Julia discuss the vital role women play in peacebuilding and disaster response, why climate change must be understood as a human-rights issue, and how local women’s knowledge can inform decision-making on the world stage. They also look ahead to COP31 and explore the Pacific’s leadership in the global climate movement. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Sherele Moody is an award-winning journalist, anti-violence campaigner and founder of the RED HEART Movement and Australian Femicide Watch. For more than a decade, Sherele has tirelessly documented every woman and child who has been violently killed in Australia, telling their stories to ensure they are remembered for who they were, not defined by how they died or reduced to a headline or statistic. For Sherele, this work is deeply personal. As a young woman, she discovered that her stepfather had murdered two girls: five-year-old Sandra Dorothy Bacon and nine-year-old Stacey-Ann Tracy. Although she never met them, their stories profoundly shaped her life and work.In this deeply moving conversation, Sherele tells Julia about her childhood, the devastating truth she learned about her stepfather and how it led her into a life of journalism and activism. They discuss the RED HEART Movement, Sherele's work with families, the importance of remembering victims beyond the circumstances of their deaths, and what must change to create a safer future for women and children.Content warning: This episode contains discussion of childhood abuse, sexual violence, domestic and family violence, and the murder of women and children. Please take care while listening.If anything raised in this conversation affects you, or you’re concerned about someone you know, you can contact 1800RESPECT 24 hours a day by calling 1800 737 732, texting 0458 737 732 or visiting https://1800respect.org.au/. If you or someone else is in immediate danger, please call Triple Zero.Show notesThere are a number of different ways you can learn more about Sherele's work and how you can support it:Learn more about Sherele’s work and the RED HEART Movement here: https://australianfemicidewatch.org/Support this work by donating here: https://australianfemicidewatch.org/support/Shop RED HEART merchandise, with proceeds supporting Sherele’s work: https://australianfemicidewatch.org/shop-2/Find other ways to take action here: https://australianfemicidewatch.org/take-action/Listen to Sherele’s She Matters podcast here: https://australianfemicidewatch.org/podcast/And learn about the campaign for a Femicide Royal Commission and sign the petition here: https://australianfemicidewatch.org/campaigns/femicide-royal-commission/ Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this month's Book Club episode, Julia Gillard and her co-host Kathy Lette discuss Tell Me Everything, the latest novel by Pulitzer Prize winning author Elizabeth Strout.Tell Me Everything is Strout's 10th novel, and it returns readers to the fictional town of Crosby, Maine - where several of her novels have taken place. It also features many of the characters from her previous books, including Lucy Barton and Olive Kitteridge. In this story, the town lawyer Bob Burgess takes on a case defending a man suspected of killing his own mother. But, as Julia and Kathy discuss, the case is only one part of a sprawling story that examines love, grief, family, the importance of friendship and everyone’s search to find meaning in their life. Show notes:Tell Me Everything is published by Penguin and is available in all good bookstores.Learn more about Kathy Lette at https://www.kathylette.com/ Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this Book Club episode, Julia Gillard and her cohost Sarah Holland-Batt dive into Audition, the latest novel from Katie Kitamura.Audition follows an unnamed actress as she rehearses a play that blurs the lines between performance and personal history. When a mysterious young man appears, claiming to be her son, she’s drawn into a spiral of uncertainty that challenges her sense of self and reality.Together, Julia and Sarah unpack the novel’s themes of identity, motherhood, and the shifting boundaries between truth and fiction. They explore how the story's psychologically rich but uncanny style highlights the tension between who we are and who the world asks us to be.Join us for a thoughtful discussion on power, performance, and the quiet ways women resist being written into roles they didn’t choose. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this month’s book club episode Julia Gillard and Kathy Lette discuss Fundamentally, by Nussaibah Younis. It’s the British author’s debut novel and it follows the story of Nadia Amin - an academic disowned by her mother and dumped by her long-term partner, who accepts a job with the United Nations in Iraq to rehabilitate ISIS women so their home countries will take them back.While struggling to get the program off the ground amidst the opaque world of international aid, Nadia meets Sara, a fellow Londoner who was radicalised when she was just 15 years old.Julia and Kathy delve into the book’s dark humour and complex characters, and its exploration of faith, identity and family.Fundamentally is published by Orion, an imprint of Hachette Australia.https://www.hachette.com.au/nussaibah-younis/fundamentally-shortlisted-for-the-2025-womens-prize-for-fiction Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.