Published on SBS Life, April 2016. The commodification of yoga is proof of a culture that empowers white people to tap into ‘otherness’ and convinces people of colour that rejecting difference is a way to fit in, writes Neha Kale. Kerrie* was the type of girl around whom I could never be sure where I […]
First published in Daily Life, August 2015 Nancy Larrick had a knack for asking timeless questions. In her landmark 1965 essay ‘Children’s books: Still an all-white world?‘, the American educator and founder of the International Reading Association surveyed 5,200 books published between 1962 to 1965 and found that only 6.4 per cent included African-American characters in […]
First published in Daily Life, June 2015 Back in 1913, C.A Jeffries and John Barr, two writers from The Bulletin, made a small but critical contribution to the diversity debate that has us scratching our heads more than a hundred years on. The pair wrote Australia Calls, a silent film directed by Raymond Longford, which cast members […]
First published in Daily Life, April 2015 The greatest myth about progress that it’s measured rather than felt. There’s a reason we feel joy at the prospect of using dark-skinned emoji in a text message, or a like a weight is lifted when Olivia Pope’s affair with president Fitzgerald Grant onScandal raises questions because Fitzgerald is married […]
First published in Daily Life, June 2015 Diversity isn’t about ticking boxes in the manner of a joyless bank clerk; it’s about recognising that there’s a life-affirming magic in being seen. It’s not a stretch to hope that coming across FKA Twigs, powerful and resplendent, in a bird of paradise gown at the March 2015 launch of […]
First published in Daily Life, February 2015 Cheryl Strayed knows that self-discovery is less about giving into endless pleasure than it is about tackling the thing that’s getting in your way. Near the start of Wild – the much-loved memoir that sees the 26-year-old Strayed hike America’s 2,650-mile Pacific Crest Trail to absolve herself of a grief […]
First published in Daily Life, January 2014 We’ve all been faced with the kind of question that’s designed not to find out what we really want but to tell us what we already know. For Mindy Kaling, the writer, creator and star of The Mindy Project, a sweet if occasionally patchy sitcom based on her alter-ego […]
First published in Daily Life, August 21, 2014 The only thing worse than being jolted out of a dream is the moment you realise that it’s devolved into a nightmare. In Palo Alto – a movie where washed-out colours, fleeting moments and a bittersweet soundtrack by Blood Orange’s Dev Hynes conjure a sense of teenage listlessness that feels […]
