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A f/oxymoron?: Women, creativity and the suburbs

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  16 December 2015

Emma Felton
Emma Felton*
Affiliation:
e.felton@qut.edu.au
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Abstract

Donald Horne famously wrote, ‘Australia was born urban and quickly grew suburban’ (1964), an observation that carries a weight of assumptions about suburban living. Historically, the Australian suburbs have been regarded as places of retreat, family life and female activity, and subsequently as a place where not much of interest happens. By contrast, a city's central areas are seen as more dynamic spaces and, with recent creative city thinking and planning, as potential powerhouses of innovation and creativity. This article challenges assumptions about suburban living as passive places of retreat through an examination of women in the creative workforce who are living and working in the suburbs. It draws on historical accounts of creative suburban activity and a research project that mapped and investigated the experience of creative workers in the outer suburbs of Brisbane and Melbourne. The study finds that there is much creative work occurring in suburban localities, but this is not as unusual as might be expected.

Type
Articles
Information
Queensland Review , Volume 22 , Issue 2 , December 2015 , pp. 168 - 178
Copyright
Copyright © The Author(s) 2015 

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