Miriam Dixson

Miriam Joyce Dixson (born 1930) is an Australian social historian and the author of The Real Matilda: Woman and Identity in Australia 1788 to 1975.[1][2]

Early life and education

Miriam Joyce Dixson was born in Melbourne in 1930.[3] She graduated from the University of Melbourne with a BA in history in 1950 and an MA from the same university in 1957 for her thesis, The strike of waterside workers in Australian ports, 1928, and the lockout of coal miners on the northern coalfield of New South Wales, 1929-30.[4]

She was awarded a PhD in May 1966 by the Research School of Social Sciences at the Australian National University for her thesis, Reformists and revolutionaries: An interpretation of the relations between the Socialists and the mass labor organisations in New South Wales 1919-27, with special reference to Sydney.[5][6]

Career

In 1969 Dixson published a book based on her PhD thesis, The role of ideology: Lang and Labor's faction war 1920-1927, followed in 1975 by Greater than Lenin: Lang and Labor 1916-1932.

Dixson was appointed a lecturer in history at the University of New England, and in 1975 she offered Australia's first course on the history of women.[2] In 1976, Penguin published The Real Matilda: Woman and Identity in Australia 1788 to 1975. When its third edition came out in 1994 it was considered one of four key volumes of Australian women's history,[7][8] along with Beverley Kingston's My wife, my daughter, and poor Mary Ann: Women and work in Australia, Edna Ryan and Anne Conlon's Gentle Invaders: Australian Women at Work, 1788-1974 and Anne Summers' Damned Whores and God's Police: The Colonization of Women in Australia.[2] As one writer commented, "in .. the Australian context, you can't discuss women in history as though The Real Matilda, or Damned Whores And God's Police, had never been written."[9] A fourth edition of The Real Matilda was published in 1999.

Dixson's papers are held by the National Library of Australia.[10]

In 1997 Dixson was awarded an honorary Doctor of Letters by the University of New England.[11]

Works
  • Dixson, Miriam (1969), The role of ideology : Lang and Labor's faction war 1920-1927, Australasian Political Studies Association
  • — (1975), Greater than Lenin : Lang and Labor 1916-1932, Melbourne Univ. Political Science Department
  • — (1976), The real Matilda: woman and identity in Australia 1788 to 1975, Penguin
  • — (1999), The imaginary Australian: Anglo-Celts and identity, 1788 to the present, UNSW Press, ISBN 978-0-86840-665-7

References
  1. Doyle, Helen (2001). "Dixson, Miriam". In Davison, Graeme; Hirst, John; Macintyre, Stuart (eds.). The Oxford Companion to Australian History. Oxford University Press.
  2. Foley, Susan; Sowerwine, Charles. "Dixson, Miriam Joyce - The Encyclopedia of Women and Leadership in Twentieth-Century Australia". www.womenaustralia.info. Retrieved 17 October 2018.
  3. "Dixson, Miriam Joyce - The Australian Women's Register". www.women Australia.info. Retrieved 17 October 2018.
  4. Dixson, Miriam (1957), The strike of waterside workers in Australian ports, 1928, and the lockout of coal miners on the northern coalfield of New South Wales, 1929-30, retrieved 17 October 2018
  5. "Degrees conferred". The Canberra Times. Vol. 40, no. 11, 468. Australian Capital Territory, Australia. 14 May 1966. p. 26. Retrieved 17 October 2018 – via National Library of Australia.
  6. Dixson, Miriam (1965), Reformists and revolutionaries : an interpretation of the relations between the Socialists and the mass labor organisations in New South Wales 1919-27, with special reference to Sydney (Thesis), retrieved 17 October 2018
  7. Dowse, Sara (16 September 1978). "BOOKS: COLONIAL WOMAN OBSERVED". The Canberra Times. Vol. 53, no. 15, 700. Australian Capital Territory, Australia. p. 12. Retrieved 2 November 2018 – via National Library of Australia.
  8. Pratt, Catherine (8 March 1994). "Catherine Pratt reviews two books which re-examine the place of women in our national identity The real Matildas". The Canberra Times. Vol. 68, no. 21, 510. Australian Capital Territory, Australia. p. 16 (THE CANBERRA TIMES BOOK SUPPLEMENT). Retrieved 2 November 2018 – via National Library of Australia.
  9. Lawson, Sylvia (1 March 1983). "Seriously Undertaken". Filmnews. Vol. 13, no. 3. New South Wales, Australia. p. 10. Retrieved 2 November 2018 – via National Library of Australia.
  10. "Dixson, Miriam (1930-) - People and organisations". Trove. Retrieved 17 October 2018.
  11. "Honorary Degree Recipients since 1955 and Emeritus Professor Awardees since 1964". www.une.edu.au. Retrieved 17 October 2018.
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