BIOGRAPHY

Dr Marilyn Metta is the Director and Founder of The Metis Centre. Marilyn is human rights educator, practitioner and advocate who is passionate about addressing gender inequality and the safety and wellbeing of women and children. Marilyn is a practising trauma counsellor with over 22 years experience working with young people and families from First Nations and culturally-diverse communities. Marilyn is a feminist academic and researcher, and an internationally renowned author who’s published widely on coercive control, intimate abuse and family violence. Marilyn is also the Founder of the Mettamorphosis Inc, a not-for-profit charitable organisation working to raise awareness and funds to provide access to education for refugee and stateless children and young people.

Marilyn is a specialised expert consultant on cultural, social, economic, and environmental impacts of colonisation and development on First Nations communities and Country.

Marilyn is an Honorary Senior Research Fellow at the Indo-Pacific Research Centre at Murdoch University and Senior Lecturer with The Centre for Human Rights Education at Curtin University.

Board Governance

Marilyn’s a Graduate of the Australian Institute of Company Directors, with specialised skills and expertise in governance for corporate and not-for-profit, workplace psychological safety, gender and cultural diversity, interpersonal coaching and conflict management. Marilyn is the Executive Director of The Metis Centre Pty Ltd., Executive Director of Nidus Pty Ltd, Director of First Nations Cyber-Technologies Pty Ltd, and Manager of Indigenous Engagement and ESG, Arbor Carbon.

Marilyn is currently on the Cultural Diversity Committee for Women on Boards.

AWARDS

Marilyn was awarded the 2021 Westpac Social Change Fellowship for her Feeling Safe and Free initiative. The Feeling Safe and Free project is an innovative community-led initiative that creates safe spaces for young people to engage in conversations about challenging but important issues around sex, sexual harassment, consent, coercive control, intimate abuse, and safe relationships. What’s unique about this project is the use of different creative storytelling tools and media for young people to explore issues that are important to them. Marilyn’s vision is for the project to reach as many marginalised and remote communities around the country as possible.

·     Awarded the 2022 QBE Foundation Local Grant for the Feeling Safe and Free project.

·    Awarded the 2021 Westpac Safer Children, Safer Communities Impact grant for the Feeling Safe and Free initiative.

·     Selected for the Office of Multicultural Office WA’s Leadership and Governance program (2021).  

·     Awarded the Department of Local Government, Sports and Cultural Industries (DLGSC) Culture and the Arts (WA) Creative Development Program for the creative development of Metis theatre project (2018).

·    Her book, Writing Against, Alongside and Beyond Memory: Lifewriting as Reflexive, Poststructuralist Feminist Research Practice (2010) received the International Congress of Qualitative Inquiry 2011 Outstanding Book Award. The book explores memory, and how memory is embedded in our scripts of the past, inscribed in our bodies and reflected in the collective memory of every family, group and community.

Book reviews:

“Metta has written a text that is both an intriguing insight into her life as she experienced it and a theoretical explanation of the process of writing about it. This makes her research accessible to a new audience interested in the process of writing and researching a single life that may previously have only considered the case study format.”

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“The book is recommended to scholars and students who intend to engage with reflexive feminist research on ethnic lifewriting and those who are interested in the key issues and methodologies employed in the study of ethnic lifewriting. Metta's reflection on her strategy and negotiation in her lifewriting process is also of value to ethnic women writers.”

Marilyn is an award-winning filmmaker. Her debut documentary film, How I Became A Refugee (2014) has won three international film recognition awards (International Best Shorts Film Competition; Global Accolade Film Competition; Impact DOCS Award) and was a finalist at the IAFOR Documentary Film Award for 2015. The film was selected for a double screening at Myanmar Film Festival in Los Angeles in September 2015. How I Became A Refugee follows the extraordinary journey of the Ni Chin family who escaped religious persecution from Myanmar through to Malaysia before being resettled in Perth, Western Australia. The film has been screened internationally in Singapore, Los Angeles, New Zealand, Japan and Canada and nationally in Perth, Melbourne, Sydney and Brisbane.

SOCIAL & COMMUNITY IMPACT & RESEARCH PROJECTS

·     Expert Social & Cultural Impact Consultant for Kimberley Land Council (2022 - 2023).

·     Expert Social & Cultural Impact Consultant for Central Desert Native Title Services (2021- 2022).

·     Social Anthropologist, KONEKSI project, Kalimantan, Indonesia. GEDSI and Indigenous Research Project Lead KONEKSI research project, Aligning indigenous knowledge with innovative methods to measure natural capital and mitigate detrimental environmental, social, and cultural impacts, project lead, Emeritus Professor Giles Hardy, Murdoch University (2024).

·     Expert Research Consultant for the review and response into Sexual Violence in Western Australia commissioned by Department of Communities and Department of Communities (April 2022). Presented seminar on Sexual violence and Coercive control in Refugee, migrant and Indigenous communities in Western Australia to representatives from Departments of Justice and Communities.

·     On-Country life writing project with Aunty Irene Davey, Bardi Jawi elder and senior cultural advisor (2022-2023).

·     Finding Metis: Women’s Stories of Resistance and Resilience through Intimate Abuse and Violence book project - A creative non-fiction book on the lived experiences of culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD) women who have experienced intimate abuse and family violence in Western Australia (2020-2022).

·     Hidden Voices: Children and Young People’s experiences of living with domestic and family violence in culturally diverse communities in Western Australia (2022-2023).

·     Understanding through Participation educational project – a national educational research project which incorporates the award-winning documentary film, How I Became a Refugee to measure the impact of the film in changing attitudes about refugees and asylum seekers amongst Australian high school students (on-going).

PUBLICATIONS

• Metta, M. (2023). Speaking across difference: Autoethnography as a Living Practice of Resistance and Truth-telling. In S. Dovchin., Q. Gong., T. Dobinson., & M. McAlindens (Eds). Linguistic Discrimination and Diversity: Autoethnographies from Women in Academia. New York: Routledge.

• Metta, M. (2023). “Metis and Cixous: Cunning Resistance, Bodily Intelligence and Allies” in Écriture feminine and critical autoethnography: Coming to writing with Hélène Cixous. Edited by Elizabeth Mackinlay and Briony Lipton. Routledge.

• Metta, M. (2023). Reclaiming the Maternal Metis Body: Pregnancy, Birthing, and Mothering through Intimate Abuse and Coercive Control. Journal of Autoethnography. 3(4).

• Metta, M. (forthcoming). “Creative Storytelling: Refugees, Social Activism(s) and Solidarity in Young People.” in From Sit-ins to #Revolutions: Media and the Changing Nature of Protests. Edited by Victoria Grieve-Williams and Sonjah Stanley Niaah. Volume 2. Sydney: Bloomsbury.

• Metta, M. 2019. Scoping the Social and Economic Impacts and Costs of Trauma in the Fitzroy Valley. A report prepared for the Marninwarntikura Women’s Resources Centre.

• Metta, M. 2018. “Metis-Body-Stage: Autoethnographical Explorations of Cunning Resistance in Intimate Abuse and Domestic Violence Narratives Through Feminist Performance-making” in International Perspectives on Autoethnographic Research and Practice. Edited by Lydia Turner, Nigel P. Short, Alec Grant, and Tony E. Adams. New York: Routledge.

• Metta, M. 2017. Embodying Métissage: Entangling Memory, Identity and Difference in Feminist Intercultural Storymaking.  Journal of Intercultural Studies. 38(1): 70-87.

• Metta, M. 2016. Embodying Feminist Mothering: Narratives of Resistance through Patriarchal Terrorism from both Mother and Child’s Perspectives. Feminist Parenting, Eds. Lynn Comerford, Heather Jackson, Kandee Kosior. Bradford, ON: Demeter Press.

• Metta, M. 2016. Across the seas: Australia's response to refugees: a history. Ethnic and Racial Studies, 39(8), 1521-1523. doi:10.1080/01419870.2015.1095342

• Metta, M. 2015. “Embodying Mêtis: The Braiding of Cunning and Bodily Intelligence in Feminist Storymaking.” Outskirts: feminisms along the edge - Special edition, Magdalena Talks Back: Feminist Research Methodologies for the 21st Century.

• Metta, M. 2013. “Putting the Body on the Line: Embodied Writing and Recovery through Domestic Violence.” In Handbook of Autoethnography. Edited by Stacy Holman Jones, Tony Adams, and Carolyn Ellis. Walnut Creek: Left Coast Press (National Communication Association Ethnography Division 2013 award for Best Edited Collection).

• Metta, M. 2010. "Writing Against, Alongside and Beyond Memory: Lifewriting as Reflexive, Postructuralist Feminist Research Practice." Bern, Switzerland: Peter Lang. (Winner of International Congress of Qualitative Inquiry 2011 Outstanding Qualitative Book Award).

CREATIVE WORKS

• Metta, M. 2020. Looking After Country. Short documentary film commissioned by Yanunijarra Aboriginal Corporation.

• Metta, M. 2019. Wanami Women’s Cultural Camp. Videography and Photography for the Wanami Women’s Cultural Camp for the Kimberley Aboriginal Law and Cultural Centre.

• M. Metta. 2018. Metis written by Marilyn Metta, Leah Mercer & Margi Brown Ash. Directed by Leah Mercer. Performed by Margi Brown Ash, Adam T. Perkins & Jess Nyanda Moyle. The Blue Room Theatre, Perth, 29 June 2018.

• Metta, M. (Director & Producer). 2014. How I Became A Refugee [Documentary]. Perth, Western Australia: Mettamorphosis Inc.

MEDIA

·     Interview with RTRFM on being an Agent of Change for the 16 Days in WA campaign. 1 December 2022.

·     Opinion piece in The West Australian, “How I learnt to shake off the shame and leave my abuser’. 9 December 2022.

Interview with RTRFM on the Hidden Voices research project on the impacts of family and domestic violence on CaLD young people. 14 March 2022.

·     Interview with 6PR Perth on International Women’s Day on 8 March 2022.

·     Interview with Radio National Drive on Lego’s decision to remove gender bias from its toys. 11 October 2021.

·     Feature article with Canberra Times titled, “Are our young people feeling safe and free?” 29 September 2021.

·     Featured as the Changemaker for Pro Bono Australia in feature article titled, Using the past as power discussing my career evolution in light of being awarded 2021 Westpac Social Change Fellowship.

·    Interview with The West Australian in the feature article titled, The white hot anger of Australian women was on full display at March 4 Justice – but what’s next? 28 March 2021.

·     Interview with 6PR Radio Perth on the promotion of five women in the Morrison Cabinet portfolio – 30 July 2021.

·     Interview with Fremantle Radio discussing my social change projects and passion to help people impacted by trauma.

·   RTRFM 92.1 (The Sound Alternative) - The Mag Show interview with Dr Marilyn Metta about the film screening of How I Became a Refugee as part of John Curtin Gallery Exhibition 'Refuge' - https://rtrfm.com.au/story/how-i-became-a-refugee/

·      RTRFM 92.1 (The Sound Alternative) - The Mag Show interview with Dr Marilyn Metta on 18 July 2018 with Presenter Antonino Tati on The Prevalence of Male violence in Western Australia.

·      Featured in the SBS documentary, Sexism in Australia produced by Joined Up Films.

Featured in the ABC national news on 21st June 2015 and the ABC News Online: http://www.abc.net.au/news/2015-06-21/refugee-documentary-wins-international-award/6561668

·      Featured in Curtin News Story – How I Became A Refugee and the film awards were featured in the Curtin news story on 4 September 2015. http://news.curtin.edu.au/stories/international-acclaim-for-refugee-documentary/

·      Featured in the documentary film, Family Violence and the Law as a family counsellor, researcher and expert on the effects of family violence on children. The film project is funded by WA Police and will be launched at the end of June. WA Police Commissioner Karl O’Callaghan introduced the film with commentary by the WA Attorney-General Michael Mischin.

KEY ACHIEVEMENTS & KEYNOTE PRESENTATIONS

In recognition of her profile as a leading educator and practitioner in the fields of feminist research, domestic and family violence, refugees, human rights and social justice, Marilyn has been invited as a keynote speaker at the numerous national and international conferences, seminars and events.

• 2023 – Keynote presentation to the Victorian Judicial College on Recognising and Responding to Coercive Control and working with victim-survivors.

• 2022 – Keynote presentation to The Office of Multicultural Interests’ 16 Days in WA campaign, alongside Hon. Tony Buti, Minister for Citizenship and Multicultural Interests, and Hon Simone McGurk, Minister for Prevention of Family and Domestic Violence.

• 2022 – Featured as an Agent of Change for 16 Days in WA campaign against gendered-violence alongside WA Premier Mark McGowan and Hon Simone McGurk, Minister for Prevention of Family and Domestic Violence.

• 2022 – Keynote presentation at the 2022 International Women’s Day Events for Soroptimist International and Women’s International Zionist Organisation.

• 2021 – Presented a Professional Development workshop for 2021 Relationships & Sexuality Education in Schools about the Feeling Safe and Free project, an innovative, community-led initiative that creates safe spaces for young people to engage in conversations about challenging but important issues around sex, sexual harassment, consent, coercive control, intimate abuse, and safe relationships.

• 2021 – Keynote speaker at the Zonta Club of Perth on award-winning project, Feeling Safe and Free.

• 2021 – Keynote speaker at the WA Family Law Pathways Network 2021 Conference. Title of presentation, Living with Intimate Abuse and Coercive Control and Navigating the Family Court System 

• 2021 – Presented the Centre for Human Rights Education Research Seminar Series, Unpacking coercive Control: Seeing, Understanding and Acting.

• 2021 – Guest speaker at the Community Innovators, Volunteers and Leaders (CIVAL) graduation held at the City of Wanneroo Civic Centre. There were 38 graduates who completed the CIVAL program which is run by the Association for Services to Torture and Trauma Survivors (ASeTTS).  

• 2019 – Seconded Jawun Program and I worked with the Marninwarntikura Women’s Resource Centre in Fitzroy Crossing, West Kimberley on Indigenous strategic trauma intervention programs. 

• 2019 – Film producer and co-creator of the HumanKIND digital storytelling project in collaboration with the Museum of Freedom and Tolerance, launched at Yagan Square on International Children’s Day.

• 2019 – Guest speaker on a panel on ‘Telling the Migrant Story’ at the State Library’s 6th annual Disrupted Festival of Ideas, July 2019. The panel was facilitated by Shelagh Magadza, Executive Director of the Chamber of Arts & Culture WA.

• 2019 - Keynote presentation and film screening at Museum of Freedom and Tolerance’s Inaugural Invisible Ink Symposium

• 2019 - Presentation at the 2019 Refugee Alternatives Conference, University of South Australia, Adelaide.

• 2018 - Keynote speaker at the WA Museum’s 16 Days of Activism to Stop Violence Against Women.

• 2018 – HASS presentation and film screening for teachers for the HASS Week held at Curtin University, Council Chambers August 2018.

• 2018 - Keynote speaker at the Bayside Council, NSW Refugee Week Celebration - presentation of film screening of How I Became A Refugee and panel discussion.

• 2018 – Curator of the launch of the ‘Keeping Dreams Alive’ Photovoice Exhibition at the Paper Mountain, Northbridge 18 May 2018.

• 2018 – Curator of ‘Keeping Dreams Alive’ Photovoice Exhibition held at the Curtin University Library as part of 2018 Curtin University Refugee Week Celebration (June 2018)

• 2017 - Guest speaker for the Geographies of Migration students at Curtin University, taught by visiting Professor Oren Yiftachel - film screening and Q&A Presentation of How I Became A Refugee on 20 September 2017.

• 2017 - Keynote speaker at the Amnesty International Event – Film screening and Keynote Presentation of How I Became A Refugee at Curtin University – 30 May 2017.

• 2016 - Keynote panel speaker at the Medfest 2016 Festival at FJ Clark Lecture Theatre Complex

• 2016 - Guest speaker and film screening of How I Became A Refugee and Q&A presentation at the Curtin University 2016 Open Day.

• 2016 - Keynote guest speaker for the Catherine McAuley Leadership Award - presentation and film screening of How I Became A Refugee.

• 2016 - Official Launch of Study Guide and Film Screening of How I Became A Refugee during Curtin University’s Refugee Week Celebration – Over 80 teachers, educators, academics and representatives attended the event from government and community organisations. The study guide developed with the Australian Teachers of Media (ATOM) for the documentary film, How I Became A Refugee is specially designed for students in Years 9-12 in the English, Civics and Citizenship, History, Media, Politics and Sociology.

• 2016 - Guest speaker at the school presentation and film screening of How I Became A Refugee at Sacred Heart Catholic School in Northam.

• 2015 - Curtin University Chin community campus tour collaboration with the AHEAD team at Curtin University took a group of over 60 Burmese Chin high school students on a campus tour of Curtin. A successful community event to address equity and access and alternative pathways to higher education for marginalised groups.

• 2015 – Keynote speaker and film presentation of How I Became A Refugee during the Curtin Refugee Week.

• 2015 - Special Film Screening for WA teachers for over 70 teachers and educators from 21 schools across WA who attended the special screening followed by a PD session with film producer, Dr Marilyn Metta and One World Centre Educator, Cameron Tero, on how to bring these conversations into the classroom.

• 2015 - Keynote speaker and presenter at the Centre for Human Rights Education Mini Symposium: “Social Change and Activism” – presented a paper titled, What does social activism in young people look like?

• 2015 - Guest speaker at Curtin Blue Stocking Event 2015 – delivered keynote speech at the Blue Stocking Event on 12 August, to celebrate the participation of women in higher education.

• 2015 - Guest speaker and presentation at Refugee Week Closing Ceremony 2015 – How I Became A Refugee was featured at the Refugee Week Closing Ceremony at the Perth Town Hall, with keynote speaker, Phil Glendenning, President of the Refugee Council of Australia.

• 2015 - Keynote speaker and presenter of special film screening at The Second Asian Symposium on Human Rights Education, Hiroshima, Japan.

• 2015 - Keynote speaker and launch of How I Became A Refugee at the Asia Research Institute (ARI) at the National University of Singapore by A/Prof Maitrii Aung Thwin, Department of History, as part of the film tour in Southeast Asia.

• 2011 - Keynote speaker at the Embodied Knowledges: An Interdisciplinary Symposium at ECU Centre for Research in Entertainment, Arts, Technology, Education & Communications (CREATEC). Title of presentation: Embodied Mothering through Domestic Violence: Voice and Silence in the Journey of Recovery for Mothers and Children.