INDUMATHI MARIAPPAN

‘I’m a Local…’

Publisher: University of Technology, Sydney (UTS)

Date: 14-10-2019

DOI: 10.5130/CCS.V11.I2.6665

Abstract: This article discusses the impact and implications of ‘I’m a Local…’, an initiative developed in partnership between a regional university, a refugee resettlement community organisation and former refugees from African nations in a regional Australian community. The initiative sought to improve understandings about refugees, acknowledge their contributions to Australian society and support local, inclusive cultures. It included the development of public resources exploring the process of former refugees in establishing a sense of belonging and becoming ‘locals’. Racialised ‘Others’ continue to be excluded from ‘belonging’ within Australian communities at a wide range of practical and symbolic levels, so it remains an ongoing challenge to broaden the experience of belonging, challenge the borders erected around ‘local’ identities, and work to transform Australia’s post-colonial paradigm. ‘I’m a Local…’ provides an instructive ex le of how change agents from different sectors working collaboratively can dismantle prevailing discourses and affirm more inclusive and hopeful futures.

#BlackLivesMatter: Exploring the digital practises of African Australian youth on social media

Publisher: SAGE Publications

Date: 02-05-2022

DOI: 10.1177/01634437221089246

Abstract: African Australian diasporic literature has drawn attention to the anti-Black racism Black African young people endure in everyday Australia. By drawing on a multi-method approach consisting of social media ethnography and multiple participant interviews, this paper explores the use of social media by Black African young people (n=15) to visibilise their experiences of racism. We situate the murder of George Floyd on May 25, 2020, as a significant ‘turning point’ when the social media practises of our participants radically transformed. Our findings indicate that prior to the murder of George Floyd, participants evoked careful boundaries around the type of racial content they posted for fear of the punishments or backlash that could occur if they disrupted the white racial comfort of their friends and followers. After the murder of Floyd, participants used the resurgence of the #BlackLivesMatter Movement to visibilise their own experiences of anti-Black racism and racial violence in Australia, sharing content on social media that marked whiteness, demanded safety and challenged white silence and performative allyship.

Approaches to Assessment and Intervention With Children and Young People Who Engage in Harmful Sexual Behavior: A Scoping Review

Publisher: SAGE Publications

Date: 03-08-2023

DOI: 10.1177/15248380231189293

Abstract: This paper reports the findings of a project that conducted a rapid review of evidence regarding assessment and intervention approaches responding to children and young people who engage in harmful sexual behaviors. A literature review was conducted using a systematic search of academic databases and consultation with subject matter experts. The process resulted in 27 scholarly publications being included and analyzed to explore what was known about effective approaches with children and young people who have engaged in harmful sexual behavior. The review found that the current state of knowledge was limited, with few of the included papers reporting research outcomes. In the absence of a sound evidence base, additional theoretical literature and expert commentary have been drawn upon to better understand issues in this complex practice area. A key finding of this review was that growing awareness that children and young people who engage in harmful sexual behaviors are, first and foremost, children. They should not be regarded as soon-to-be-adults who are engaging in adult offending. This shift in thinking informs contemporary assessment and intervention approaches, challenging those models that previously focused on measuring risk using forensic approaches to predict the likelihood of future offending. A critical failure to understand the needs of specific cohorts of children and young people was also evident.

Indigenous Children and Young People in Residential Care: A Systematic Scoping Review.

Publisher: SAGE Publications

Date: 30-10-2021

DOI: 10.1177/1524838019881707

Abstract: In Australia and internationally, Indigenous children are seriously overrepresented in the child welfare system. This article provides an overview of literature investigating the needs of Indigenous children in residential care facilities. The provision of culturally safe and trauma-informed therapeutic care to Indigenous children and young people in residential care recognizes that the trauma and violence that they have experienced is exacerbated by their Indigeneity due to the colonial histories presenting. Utilizing a systematic scoping review methodology, the study returned a total of 637 peer-reviewed articles that were identified and reviewed for inclusion. The process of exclusion resulted in the inclusion of eight peer-reviewed studies and 51 reports and discussion papers sourced from gray literature. Findings from this study, though dearth, indicate that trauma-informed and culturally safe interventions play a significant role in Indigenous children's health and well-being while in care. Their experiences of abuse and neglect transcend in idual trauma and include intergenerational pain and suffering resulting from long-lasting impacts of colonization, displacement from culture and country, genocidal policies, racism, and the overall systemic disadvantage. As such, a therapeutic response, embedded within Indigenous cultural frameworks and knowledges of trauma, is not only important but absolutely necessary and aims to acknowledge the intersectionality between the needs of Indigenous children in care and the complex systemic disadvantage impacting them.

Reclaiming racial dignity: An ethnographic study of how African youth in Australia use social media to visibilise anti‐Black racism

Publisher: Wiley

Date: 23-06-2022

DOI: 10.1002/AJS4.224

Abstract: The #BlackLivesMatter Movement has lified the role of social media in visibilising anti‐Black violence. Drawing on the narratives and expertise of those who have experienced anti‐Black racism, this paper employs the theoretical concept of racial dignity to highlight how young African Australians participate in racial discourse on social media. The findings of this paper demonstrate that social media is a significant site where Black African youth reclaim racial dignity through: 1) reversing the white gaze 2) recognising and calling out anti‐blackness and 3) cultivating and engaging in communities of healing and belonging. Through these digital practices, Black African youth in Australia foster racial agency that promotes positive self‐recognition, racial resilience and racial dignity. We argue, therefore, that social media offer Black African young people in Australia spaces to engage in positive expressions of Afro‐blackness and challenge anti‐blackness in ways that are safer to them than in physical, offline settings in white contexts.

Plasma Polymer-Coated Contact Lenses for the Culture and Transfer of Corneal Epithelial Cells in the Treatment of Limbal Stem Cell Deficiency

Publisher: Mary Ann Liebert Inc

Date: 23-01-2014

DOI: 10.1089/TEN.TEA.2013.0089

Putting vaginal fistulas on the international social work map: A critical perspective

Publisher: SAGE Publications

Date: 25-11-2015

DOI: 10.1177/0020872815594865

Abstract: Why should social workers care about vaginal fistulas? Why should we turn our attention to a health problem mostly experienced by materially impoverished young Black women, especially those in Africa? Using a critical perspective, which we define, we argue that vaginal fistulas are much more than a gynaecological health issue but symptomatic of the gender-, race-, class- and age-based oppressions many young Black women in the ‘Third World’ suffer. Affecting very few White western women but plenty of subjugated Black women forced to live in chronic poverty, and exposed to multiple levels of control from early in their lives, vaginal fistula sufferers often have little, if any, access to adequate health services. Our aim is to put vaginal fistulas on the global social work agenda. It is a call to work towards ending a problem that produces much shame and suffering for far too many women.

What does research tell us about young people’s participation in decision making in residential care? A systematic scoping review

Publisher: Elsevier BV

Date: 03-2021

DOI: 10.1016/J.CHILDYOUTH.2020.105899

Southern Cross University

Location: Australia

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Flinders University

Location: Australia

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Southern Cross University - Gold Coast Campus

Location: Australia

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Hyderabad Eye Research Foundation

Location: No location found

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Hyderabad Eye Research Foundation

Location: India

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Centre For Cellular And Molecular Biology CSIR

Location: India

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Discovery Early Career Researcher Award - Grant ID: DE230101177

Start Date: 2023

End Date: 12-2025

Amount: $456,607.00

Funder: Australian Research Council

Linkage Projects - Grant ID: LP210100177

Start Date: 06-2022

End Date: 06-2025

Amount: $429,569.00

Funder: Australian Research Council