Reading Publics

Join Torika Bolatagici, Roger Osborne and Jodi McAlister in discussion for the non/fictionLab's Public Forum Series.

Reading is one of the most mysterious and intriguing practices, especially as it's primarily thought of as a solo or private activity. Reading communities offer people opportunities for sociability and connection. Text-centred forms of sociability both engage with, and offer resistance to dominant forms of identity, including narratives of national belonging. Torika Bolatagici, Roger Osborne and Jodi McAlister will discuss their research into text-centred cultures and communities to offer insights into the affective pleasures and challenges offered by reading. Convened by Brigid Magner and Linda Daley.

Panellists

Jodi McAlister’s research interests include representations of romantic love and popular genre fiction. She is also an author, and her new novels Libby Lawrence is Good at Pretending and Here For The Right Reasons will be released in 2022.

Roger Osborne’s research concentrates on Australian literature and British Modernism seen through the lens of book history, magazine culture, and scholarly editing. Roger’s work on the trans-national nature of Australian print culture has been published widely. He is a Chief Investigator on the ARC-funded Special Research Initiative, 'Read all about it: Digital participation in Australian Newspapers'.  The project aims to transform understandings of Australian literary history by using innovative digital methods to discover, curate and investigate tens of thousands of unrecorded novels, novellas and short stories in 20th-century Australian newspapers. 

Torika Bolatagici is a Fijian-Australian artist working across a range of media including photography, video, projection, publication and installation. Her work shifts between the languages of documentary, archival recovery, re-enactment and abstraction to explore the tensions and intersections between race, gender, power, commodification and globalisation. Her Community Reading Room project engages with reading communities commonly excluded from mainstream literary practices, collections and spaces.  She teaches in the School of Art at RMIT University.

The non/fictionLab is supported by Writing and Publishing @ RMIT.

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Acknowledgement of Country

RMIT University acknowledges the people of the Woi wurrung and Boon wurrung language groups of the eastern Kulin Nation on whose unceded lands we conduct the business of the University. RMIT University respectfully acknowledges their Ancestors and Elders, past and present. RMIT also acknowledges the Traditional Custodians and their Ancestors of the lands and waters across Australia where we conduct our business - Artwork 'Luwaytini' by Mark Cleaver, Palawa.

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aboriginal flag
torres strait flag

Acknowledgement of Country

RMIT University acknowledges the people of the Woi wurrung and Boon wurrung language groups of the eastern Kulin Nation on whose unceded lands we conduct the business of the University. RMIT University respectfully acknowledges their Ancestors and Elders, past and present. RMIT also acknowledges the Traditional Custodians and their Ancestors of the lands and waters across Australia where we conduct our business.

More information