International Women's Day 2026

This International Women’s Day, join a conversation exploring how gender, labour and environmental change intersect across regional and global contexts.

From migrant domestic workers navigating precarious labour migration in Asia and polycrisis at home, to feminist environmental thought and activism, to women’s work in mining and renewable energy industries in regional NSW, this discussion examines how extractive economies and energy transitions reshape work, care and community life.

Bringing together global and regional perspectives, the event highlights how sustainable development is deeply gendered — and why feminist approaches are essential to achieving justice and sustainability in the regions.

"Migrant Domestics Workers in Asia: Forced Labour and Failed Protection" – Dr Sallie Yea

Sallie is a Senior Lecturer in Human Geography in the Environmental Science Program at CSU's Albury Campus. She researches issues of forced migration, human trafficking, and how these problems interpole with gender and race. Her recent research examines how climate change, extractivist economies and political crisis act as important drivers of vulnerability for migrant workers. Sallie examines these issues in relation to migrant domestic workers from Myanmar and Cambodia as they travel abroad for work in Singapore and Saudi Arabia respectively. She has published widely on these subjects in key journals in Human Geography and two monographs.

“From Plumwood to Thunberg: Gender and Environmental Justice” –  Dr Lara Stevens

Lara is a Lecturer in English at CSU’s Albury campus. She is co-author of Performing Climates (Routledge 2025) with Eddie Paterson, which argues for a reorientation of theatre and performance around the more-than-human. Lara is co-editor of Feminist Ecologies (Palgrave 2018) with Peta Tait and Denise Varney and author of Anti-War Theatre After Brecht (Palgrave 2016). She sits on the executive that manages the estate of the late environmental philosopher Val Plumwood.

“Women in the mining and renewable energy industries in Dubbo, NSW” –  Dr Catherine Orian Weiss

Catherine is a Lecturer in Sociology at CSU’s Albury campus. Her work focuses on feminist theory in relation to gender, work, care, and migration, alongside empirical work on disaster and multilingual communication. Since 2024, she has been working on research in Dubbo focusing on the organisation of social reproduction (activities like cooking, cleaning, childcare and so on) for large workforces involved in the mining and renewable energy industries around the town, and the implications of these processes for gender equality and for the community.