Prof Rae Frances - Researcher Profile

Rae Frances

Address

Faculty of Arts
Monash University, Clayton

Biography

Raelene Frances is the Dean of the Faculty of Arts and Professor of History at Monash University. She is a Fellow of the Australian Academy of the Social Sciences.

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 a former Board member of the Australasian Council of Deans of Arts, Social Sciences and Humanities and the Council for the Humanities, Arts and Social Sciences.

Research Interests

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

Keywords

Anzac Day, labour history, gender, work, prostitution, sex work, empire and prostitution, museums

Qualifications

HISTORY
Institution: Monash University
Year awarded: 1988
HISTORY
Institution: University of Western Australia
Year awarded: 1980
HONS HISTORY
Institution: University of Western Australia
Year awarded: 1978

Publications

Books

Frances, R., 2007, Selling Sex A Hidden History of Prostitution, UNSW Press, Sydney Nsw Australia.

Book Chapters

Frances, R., 2011, Prostitution: the age of empires, in A Cultural History of Sexuality in the Age of Empire, eds Chiara Beccalossi and Ivan Crozier, Berg Publishers, Oxford UK, pp. 145-170.

Frances, R., 2011, Traversing the margins, connecting worlds, in Outside Country: Histories of Inland Australia, eds Alan Mayne and Stephen Atkinson, Wakefield Press, Kent Town SA Australia, pp. 199-221.

Journal Articles

Scates, B.C., Frances, R., Reeves, K.J., Bongiorno, F., Crotty, M., Knapman, G.L., Seal, G.P., Becker, A., Reeves, A.P., Soutphommasane, T.E., Blackburn, K.P., Clarke, S.J., Stanley, P., Hoskins, A., Winter, J., Bridge, C., James, L.K., Wheatley, R.K., Riches, L.K., McCosker, A., Sleight, S.P., 2012, Anzac Day at home and abroad: towards a history of Australia's national day, History Compass [P], vol 10, issue 7, Wiley-Blackwell Publishing, United Kingdom, pp. 523-536.

Frances, R., 2011, Green demons: Irish-Catholics and Muslims in Australian history, Islam and Christian-Muslim Relations [P], vol 22, issue 4, Routledge, UK, pp. 443-450.

Frances, R., Nolan, M., 2008, Gender and the Trans-Tasman World of Labour: Transnational and Comparative Histories, Labour History, vol 95, Australian Society for the Study of Labour History, Sydney, pp. 25-42.

Frances, R., Kimber, J.M.B., 2008, 'Joy': Memorialisation and the Limits of Tolerance, Public History Review, vol 15, UTS Press, Australia, pp. 77-91.

Frances, R., 2007, Interrogating arbitration: reflections on work, nation and history, Labour History, vol 1, issue 93, Australian Society for the Study of Labour History, Sydney Australia, pp. 155-159.

Frances, R., Gray, A., 2007, Unsatisfactory, discriminatory, unjust and inviting corruption, Australian Feminist Studies, vol 22, issue 53, Routledge Journals: Taylor and Francis, UK, pp. 307-324.

Frances, R., 2004, 'White Slaves and White Australia: Prostitution and Australian Society, Australian Feminist Studies [P], vol 19, issue 44, Taylor and Francis, Australia, pp. 185-200.

Adams, S.P., Frances, R., 2003, Lifting the veil: the sex industry, museums and galleries, Labour History (Australia) [P], vol 85, issue November, Australian Society for the Study of Labour History, Sydney, Australia, pp. 47-64.