Susie Latham

Bio: Susie Latham is an academic researcher from Curtin University. The author has contributed to research in topics: Islamophobia & Human rights. The author has an hindex of 4, co-authored 6 publications receiving 110 citations.

Human Rights Overboard: Seeking Asylum in Australia

Abstract: In 2005, in the wake of the Cornelia Rau scandal, a citizen’s inquiry was established to bear witness to events in Australia’s immigration-detention facilities. Until then, the federal government had refused to conduct a broad-ranging investigation into immigration detention, and the operations within detention centres had been largely shrouded in official secrecy. The People’s Inquiry into Detention (as it came to be called) heard heartbreaking evidence about asylum-seekers’ journeys to Australia, their refugee determination process, and their life in and after detention. In total, around 200 people testified to the inquiry, and a similar number of written submissions were received. Human Rights Overboard draws together, for the first time, the oral testimony and written submissions from the inquiry in a powerful and vital book that stands as an indictment of Australia’s refugee policy. Clearly and comprehensively presented, the book is a haunting journey guided by voices from every side of the fence: former and current immigration detainees, refugee advocates, lawyers, doctors, psychiatrists, and former detention and immigration staff. Taken together, their stories record a humanitarian disaster that sounds a warning to current and future policy makers, both here and overseas. With a foreword by prominent humanitarian lawyer Julian Burnside, Human Rights Overboard is an essential book that will resonate for years to come. 577 Views 0 Downloads Privacy Policy Emergency Contact Library Contacts Copyright © University of Western Sydney ABN 53 014 069 881 CRICOS Provider No: 00917K Removing Australia from Australia’s Migration Zone! This means that anyone who arrives anywhere in Australian territory without a visa no longer has any ability to claim protection from Australia. This seems to be a legal loophole to allow the Government to sidestep the Refugee Convention to which Australia is a party and by which we have committed to provide protection to all genuine refugees who cross our borders and request asylum. Seeking asylum is a human right. It is the mechanism that millions of refugees have used to find safety and today continues to be the only hope for more than 99% Human Rights Overboard: Seeking Asylum in Australia by Linda Briskman, Susie Latham and Chris Goddard, with a foreword by Julian Burnside, Scribe Press, 2008. If I let my inner dictator loose, every person in Australia would be forced to read this book, while listening to the Paul Kelly song "I get a little emotional sometimes". Human Rights Overboard is a collection of the oral testimony and written submissions from the People's Inquiry into Detention, established by the Australian Council of Heads of Schools of Social Work in 2005. The Inquiry was partly in response to the Cor Buy Human Rights Overboard: Seeking Asylum in Australia by Linda Briskman,Susie Latham,Chris Goddard and Read aggregated book reviews, from top Indian online stores. Human Rights Overboard: Seeking Asylum in Australia. Author : Linda Briskman,Susie Latham,Chris Goddard. Book Price. Rs.4,059 @Amazon. Click to see latest prices. Book Information. ISBN-13. Home » Islandora Repository » Western Sydney University Research Collection Details il Title Human Rights Overboard: Seeking Asylum in Australia Language eng Date 2008 Author Briskman, Linda Latham, Susie Goddard, Chris Extent 448 ISBN 9781921372407 Handle http://handle.westernsydney.edu.au:8081/1959.7/uws:40804 Subjects asylum seekers Australia human rights personal narratives detention of persons refugees Publication Type book Publisher Scribe Publications Place Published Carlton North, Vic. Search Term Browse all Advanced search Publications Data search Library Home Submit Your Research Admin Login Help Human rights overboard: Seeking asylum in Australia

The Renewal of Critical Social Work

Abstract: Social Alternatives analyses, critiques and reviews contemporary social issues and problems. The journal seeks to generate insight, knowledge and understanding of our contemporary circumstances in order to determine local, national and global implications. We are committed to the principles of social justice and to creating spaces of dialogue intended to stimulate social alternatives to current conditions. Social Alternatives values the capacity of intellectual and artistic endeavour to prompt imaginative solutions and alternatives and publishes refereed articles, review essays, commentaries and book reviews as well as short stories, poems, images and cartoons.

Muslims at the Australian periphery

Abstract: The overt expression of anti-Muslim sentiment is a relatively new phenomenon in Australia. It builds upon racism embedded in history, “clash of civilisations” ideologies and constructs of border-terrorism. Denigration of Muslims, commonly termed Islamophobia, is overtly evident in the official sphere, media reporting and increasing popular rejection of Islamic amenities such as schools and mosques. Connected but more insidious is the Islamophobia of the ‘white savior rescue’ movement, in which Muslim men and Islam are positioned as perpetrators of oppression and harm toward Muslim women, requiring non-Muslim intervention. Varied forms of Islamophobia and their impacts are discussed.

The global rise of islamophobia: Whose side is social work on?

Abstract: The year 2015 saw an unparalleled level of organised activity against Muslims living in Western countries. In Australia, dozens of rallies against Islam were held, tens of thousands of Australians 'liked' the social media pages of anti-Muslim groups and at least six political parties with an anti-Islam platform declared their intention to contest the 2016 federal election.While some groups and individuals had been organising against Muslims for many years, the fear generated by Islamic State's (IS) declaration of a caliphate in June 2014 and the grotesque acts of violence committed by its adherents strengthened their hand. Western media coverage of IS and anti-Muslim groups and in-depth 'analysis' of the Muslim community's 'problems' have combined to create an overwhelmingly negative picture of Muslims in the imagination of the Western public.The widely promoted notion that all Muslims are somehow responsible for, or for putting a stop to, terrorism (RajanRankin 2015: 210) has taken hold. This is despite Muslims being more likely to fall victim to terror globally, and just as likely to die in Western attacks, Muslims having died in terrorist acts in New York, Madrid, London and Paris. Alarmingly, this perception of Muslims is a global phenomenon. As Poynting (2015: 1) writes:... an imagined 'other' is seen to be subversively spreading Muslim 'extremism' and exhorting antiWestern violence from within these societies, supporting global terrorism abroad and at home . The 'Muslim other' has become the folk demon of our time in a racialising ideology that circulates internationally and has strikingly similar effects in quite different local contexts.One major effect has been a dramatic rise in physical and verbal attacks on Muslims, particularly veiled women. Australian Muslim community leader Saara Sabbagh told a community forum recently, 'You can ask any Muslim woman with a headscarf and she'll tell you a story' (Flitton 2015). In 2015 in London, incidents of Islamophobia recorded by the police increased by seventy per cent (Khan 2015) and Council on American Islamic Relations spokesman Ibrahim Hooper called the level of attacks 'unprecedented' adding, ' ... the other thing that's unprecedented is the anti-Muslim bigotry has moved into the mainstream' (Dizard 2015).In Australia, former Prime Minister Tony Abbott can take much of the credit for that bigotry. Two weeks after he survived an internal leadership vote, he signalled in a national security speech that this would become his new focus, declaring, 'I've often heard Western leaders describe Islam as a "religion of peace". I wish more Muslim leaders would say that more often, and mean it' (Hartcher 2015). In the US, President Donald Trump has implemented a ban on entry to the country for citizens of seven Muslim majority nations, a move widely characterised as a 'Muslim ban'. In Europe, anti-Muslim parties in 'the Netherlands, Denmark, Finland, Sweden, Austria, France and Italy . are supported by millions [and] already poll in the 20 per cent bracket' (Latham 2015).As someone who was raised in a white, middle class family but converted to Islam when I married into a loving Muslim family over a decade ago, as someone who has many Muslim friends and two young boys being raised as Muslims in Australia, these developments have been extremely distressing. I have found the injustice of people I love so dearly, including my children, having their life potential affected by baseless prejudice difficult to cope with. This has led me to believe that social workers need to be aware of and challenge the surveillance, risk-management and discipline role, already expected of it across a range of fields including child protection, (Rogowski 2015; McDonald 2006) in relation to the Muslim community.Social Work as an Instrument of the StateWestern governments are increasingly looking to social workers and other community care professionals as part of their security response to terrorism. …

Conceptualizing detention Mobility, containment, bordering, and exclusion

Abstract: Detention is a pressing empirical, conceptual, and political issue. Detained populations, detention facilities, and industries have expanded globally. Detention is also a fundamentally geographical topic, yet largely overlooked by geographers. We argue that detention be conceptualized as a series of geographical processes. Operating through these processes are contradictory sets of temporal and spatial logics that structure the seemingly paradoxical geographies underpinning detention. These logics include containment and mobility, bordering and exclusion. We trace these logics through an emergent literature, synthesizing and analyzing important geographic themes in the field. We identify contributions by and new avenues of inquiry for geographers.

Learning to Be Old: Gender, Culture, and Aging

Abstract: Learning to Be Old: Gender, Culture, and Aging. Margaret Cruikshank. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield. 2003. 243 pp. ISBN 0-8476-9849-1. $22.95 (paper). ISBN 0-8476-9848-3. $65.00 (cloth). This book takes a position that aging is socially constructed and that resisting the current social construction is crucial for women's "comfortable aging." The author suggests that we should review positions such as self-reliance and stress creativity, spirituality, and the preservation of self-worth. She tackles head-on the dire pronouncements about an aging population. Much of the book revolves around the link between aging and disease and the incentives for old age to be defined as a sick role. Elders defined as sick could even become sick through lack of appropriate treatment. This role is seen as encouraging a profitability approach of HMOs, although these HMOs have now found that the elderly are not profitable and most have dropped their coverage. One of the strongest chapters in this book covers use of medications and all of the problems associated with it, including out-of-pocket costs and dangers of drug interactions. These problems are compounded by the lack of drug testing on women and men in their 80s. The discussion of healthy aging focuses on exercise, diet, and alternative medicine including chiropractic, homeopathy, acupuncture, and Ayurveda healing. In a section devoted to nutrition, the author recommends a vegetarian diet to protect against the risk of osteoporosis. Caffeine is blamed for many ills, although recent research suggests that it may be harmless. Health care policy is criticized as too Western and too "masculine." Too much attention to disease, especially acute diseases, has left a gaping need for health promotion and efforts to delay the onset of chronic diseases. The problem of ageism comes in for critical scrutiny. This is especially true for women, who are shown to suffer from more negative ageist stereotypes. The media and the culture's emphasis on appearance foster this. But, according to the author, families of the elderly are also guilty of not nurturing a woman's late-life development; families demand instead that she be loving and serve her family. In the last chapter before the conclusion, the author takes on the pressing need for a feminist view of gerontology and aging. Only the recently developed perspective of critical gerontology raises the issue of the social construction of aging and the need for liberation. The author proposes a more specific application to women's aging and the social construction of gendered aging. She points out that issues of women's aging are often omitted in women's studies courses. Instead of stressing older women's commonality, Cruikshank stresses their diversity and their individuality. Constraints to their individuality are contained in the larger culture, often limited resources, imposition of male models of aging, demand for "busyness," and the expectations of family members. …

Human Rights from Below: Achieving Rights through Community Development

Abstract: In Human Rights from Below, Jim Ife shows how human rights and community development are problematic terms but powerful ideals, and that each is essential for understanding and practising the other. Ife contests that practitioners - advocates, activists, workers and volunteers - can better empower and protect communities when human rights are treated as more than just a specialist branch of law or international relations, and that human rights can be better realised when community development principles are applied. The book offers a long overdue assessment of how human rights and community development are invariably interconnected. It highlights how critical it is to understand the two as a basis for thinking about and taking action to address the serious challenges facing the world in the twenty-first century. Written both for students and for community development and human rights workers, Human Rights from Below brings together the important fields of human rights and community development, to enrich our thinking of both.