The founder of the #MeToo movement is coming to Australia

Tarana Burke, the US-based founder of the #MeToo movement, is headed to Australia to help dissect the continuing aftermath.

Joining Burke in the task will be Tracey Spicer, the veteran journalist who is working to unmask sexual harassment in the Australian media.

Tracey Spicer

The pair have been announced among the line-up for the sixth All About Women festival at Sydney Opera House on Sunday 4 March 2018.

The annual festival of big ideas and extraordinary women will also feature dance/hip-hop collective, Haiku Hands who have curated a Block Party to close out the Festival.

Held in the lead up to International Women‘s Day on 8 March, All About Women (AAW) features 20+ events, including six solo talks and seven panel discussions, including:

• Contrarian, humourist and Vanity Fair Contributing Editor, Fran Lebowitz who makes her first visit to Australia to discuss cultural nostalgia and lead a panel on Women in the Age of Trump, which will examine resistance to the erosion of women’s rights and discrimination against communities of colour;

• Barbara Caine, Anne Summers, Rebecca Walker and Nakkiah Lui – each representing the different waves of feminism – take stock a century after women achieved suffrage and discuss what’s left to fight for, and how we can all fight together;

• The latest thinking on transgender politics, genderqueer and non-binary voices in feminism with CN Lester, Eddie Ayres and Jordan Raskopoulos;
• A panel on disability and intersectionality, featuring Kath Duncan and Samantha Connor;

• Bestselling author Barbara Kingsolver (whose novel The Poisonwood Bible tops Oprah’s list of favourite books), discusses her prolific writing career spanning 14 books and her advocacy for the ‘eat local’ movement;

• Kate Bolick, bestselling author of Spinster: Making a Life of One’s Own and ‘All the Single Ladies’ (The Atlantic), examines the steep decline in male employment and life prospects that now narrow a marriage-minded woman’s options;

• Mandy Len Catron, whose book How to Fall in Love with Anyone draws on 36 laboratory-designed personal questions, inspired by psychologist Arthur Aron’s study about accelerating the intimacy of strangers;

• Rebecca Walker, author, activist and daughter of radical feminist Alice Walker (The Color Purple), who coined the term Third Wave Feminism, turns her incisive mind to reclaiming the notion of beauty beyond physical conformity;

• Saudi-born Manal Al Sharif, who led the successful campaign for the right to drive in 2017, and is now championing other basic civil rights for Saudi women;

• Former political prisoner and human rights campaigner Wai Wai Nu on the Rohingyan refugee crisis in Myanmar and women as collateral damage of war;

• Ursula Rakova and Kathy Jetñil-Kijiner, warriors for climate justice, who are fighting for almost 6000 islanders facing forced evacuation as their low-lying Pacific homelands disappear under rising seas;

• Harriet Leigh from Archie Rose runs a workshop to design your own gin, while Alex Elliott-Howery from Cornersmith shows you everything you need to know about pickling; and

AAW was curated by Edwina Throsby, Head of Talks & Ideas at the Sydney Opera House (formerly the TEDxSydney Head of Curation and founder and producer of ABC TV’s Big Ideas).

All About Women is the highlight festival of the Sydney Opera House’s year-round Talks & Ideas program.

This article originally appeared on The Industry Observer, which is now part of The Music Network.