Reproduced from the copy in the University of Adelaide.

The play One Man's Vision covers the period 1963 to 1966 when Jorn Utzon, the Danish architect of the Sydney Opera House, resided in Sydney until his resignation or dismissal in February 1966. The play draws on the tensions and hostility towards Utzon, which builds in the government of the day, cultural groups, press, and also with some senior architects. Rowdy scenes in the N.S.W. Legislative Assembly paint a broad canvas of construction, funding, and political problems. These further escalate with a change of government. Utzon's daily work features interaction between his assistant, consulting engineers, and Public Works Department inspectors, as pressures develop to overcome operational and financial problems. His forced dismissal, resulting in a public rally and march, puts in doubt the completion of the opera house. The exegesis takes Arthur Miller's argument for the playwright as an interpreter of history as its starting point, in order to examine the issues of balancing history with drama in the writing of my play, One Man's Vision. To bring unity to existing reports and to construct a play capable of holding an audience, a playwright must make many choices shaped by the conventions of the theatre and of the genre of the work being attempted. A historical play based on existing records will also draw on the imagination of the playwright. The playwright, therefore, makes decisions as to the blend of history and imagination which will be used to serve the story and represent ideas and concepts through dialogue. In making these artistic decisions history becomes just one component rather than the predominant one.

The Neighbourhood Centres (NCs) in Sydney, Australia, were established to encourage forms of local control and resident participation and to provide a range of activities to build, strengthen and support local communities and marginalised groups. This thesis is concerned with exploring the personal conceptions, passions and frameworks, as well as the political and professional identities, of activists and community workers in these NCs. It also explores stories of practice and of how these subjective experiences have been shaped through the discourses around the NCs, some of which include feminism, environmentalism, multiculturalism and social justice. The following key research questions encouraged stories of community practice: What do the terms empowerment, participation, community service and citizenship mean for community organisation? What did community workers and organisers wish for when they became involved in these community organisations? What happened to the oppositional knowledges and dissent that are part of the organisational histories? Foucault’s concept of governmentality is used to explore the possibility that these NCs are also sites of ‘government through community’. This theoretical proposition questions taken-for-granted assumptions about community development and empowerment approaches. It draws on a willingness of the research participants to take up postmodern and poststructuralist theories. ‘Practising place’ emerges in the research as a description of a particular form of activism and community work associated with these inner city Sydney NCs. The central dimensions of ‘practising place’ include: a commitment to identity work; an openness to exploring diverse and fluid citizenship and identity formations; and the use of local knowledges to develop a critique of social processes. Another feature of ‘practising place’ is that it involves an analysis of the operation of power that extends beyond structuralist explanations of how to bring about social change and transform social relations. The research has deconstructed assumptions about empowerment, community participation, community organisations and community development, consequently another way of talking about the work of small locally based community organisations emerges. This new way of talking builds upon research participants’ understandings of power and demonstrates the utility of applying a poststructural analysis to activist and community work practices. Overall the research suggests that if activists and community workers are to work with new understandings of the operation of power, then the languages and social practices associated with activist and community work traditions need to be constantly and reflexively analysed and questioned.

This thesis uses the theory of abjection to understand differentiations in non-heterosexual identity performances in two distinct spaces - the 2005 Sydney Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras (SGLMG) parade and its associated press coverage, and latrinalia (graffiti found inside public toilets). At the same time, this thesis also presents evidence for a new concept of neo-normativity, where the stereotypical is normalised, both internally and externally, and actively reproduced. Neo-normativity, in turn, succeeds in explaining the many abjected relationships that between non-heterosexual communities and the stereotypical and quintessentialised performances. At the 2005 SGLMG parade such quintessentialised (or neo-normalised) performances were treated with both contempt - for being stereotypical and narrowly representative of the very diversity of non-heterosexual communities - as well as a tool for attracting commercial sponsorships which have growingly become an integral part to the continued survival of the annual parade. On a different level, another expression of abject was also revealed when these neo-normalised performances are persistently criticised by academics, news reporting and official photography for being stereotypical and non-representative which in itself are both a recognition as well as an ejection of the non-normative aspects of non-heterosexualities. Such an expression of abject was also evident in latrinalia found in several public toilet facilities throughout Greater Sydney were the interplay of desire and ejection were played out in a more covert manner, all the while highlighting the marginality of non-heterosexualities in these presumably heteronormative spaces. This application of abject theory emphasises neo-normative performances as permanently peripheral, a marginality of which makes these performances (and identities) intrinsically Queer.

The gay sauna played a central role in the battle for gay liberation in Sydney during the latter part of the twentieth century. This thesis examines the conjunction of social and political forces which contributed to the acceptance of the gay sauna by Sydney???s civic society. Two questions reveal this process: 1. How was an illegal and clandestine place for homosexuals, perceived as a threat to the moral standards of Sydney, transformed into an institutional entity, legally recognised as ???crucial???, and important within particular environs of this city? 2. How did the evolving public domain of gay saunas contribute to the development of gay culture in Sydney by fostering the opportunities for individual and collective expression of homosexual practices? This study is contextualised within international and Australian studies of the sexualisation of urban spaces???such as Michel Foucault???s, Manuel Castells??? and Lawrence Knopp???s???and the role of the built environment in the development of sexual identity and sexual practices???such as Gayle Rubin???s, John Ricco???s, and Joel Brodsky???s. The first part of the thesis is an empirical analysis of development applications for gay saunas in Sydney between 1967 and 2000 which reveals the play of forces within state and local government, legislative processes, the homosexual community and broader civic stakeholders through which the gay sauna achieved acceptance in Sydney???s civic society. Two principal research approaches???documentary research and twenty in-depth interviews???were used in this first part. The second part of the thesis is an ethnography that uses twenty-nine in-depth interviews to provided a unique insight into the evolving public domain of Sydney???s gay saunas and how they fostered the experiences of gay men, allowing gay men to develop individual and collective sexual identities and practices. This exploration of the interplay of built form, sexuality, civic governance, social identity and social action provide a sociological contribution which will also be of interest to gay studies, anthropology, architecture, geography and planning. Essential to an experience of the thesis is a concurrent reading of the Special Enclosures???a schematic chronology of Sydney gay saunas, plans of Sydney and architectural plans of its saunas.

The aim of this study was to investigate the factors that contribute to midwives in one Area Health Service in New South Wales (NSW), Australia, staying in midwifery. The study was set in the Northern Sydney Central Coast Area Health Service (NSCCAHS), Australia. A descriptive design underpinned the research. The study was conducted over two phases. Phase One involved focus groups to assess the suitability of a questionnaire for the Australian setting. The questionnaire was previously used in similar research in England. Phase Two was the distribution of the questionnaire and analysis of the data obtained. Both qualitative and quantitative data were obtained in the research, though most data were quantitative in nature. The quantitative data was analysed using descriptive statistics while content analysis was used on the qualitative data. The study sample consisted of midwives working within NSCCAHS who were employed full-time, part-time or on a casual basis. A total of 392 midwives were surveyed with a response rate of 53% (n=209). The results provided information on the factors which contribute to midwives staying in midwifery. The top three factors identified for midwives staying in midwifery were: relationships with women, professional identity as a midwife and the practice of midwifery. This study has implications for Area Health Services and Health Departments in Australia. If midwifery workforce shortages are to be improved Area Health Services and Health Departments must examine the way in which care is organised and ensure support systems are in place to support advantageous models of care and the midwives who work within them.

Title page, abstract and table of contents only. The complete thesis in print form is available from the University of Adelaide Library. / A 2002 report by Australian National Greenhouse Gas Inventory suggests that since 1990 Australia's net emissions of carbon dioxide equivalent from stationary combustion sources are on the rise and they are likely to rise even at a higher rate in keeping with continued economic and industrial growth. In order to reduce Australian CO₂emissions, there is a need to identify and explore large-capacity storage locations for CO₂ sequestration. In that context, Australian coal seams, notably the coal-bed methane (CBM) reservoirs in Sydney and Bowen Basins, could potentially be attractive sites to sequester large volumes of greenhouse CO₂ emissions while also recovering the methane gas, a relatively cleaner source of fossil fuel. This study investigates the deliverability and economic feasibility of CO₂ sequestration through CO₂-Enhanced CBM recovery (CO₂-ECBMR) in the Camden area, Sydney coal basin. The results of the study show that the CO₂-ECBMR impacts the absolute pelmeability of the Camden area significantly. Because of a good reticulated fracture system, the CO₂ breakthrough from the producers is faster. The enhancement of CH₄ recovery by preferential adsorption of CO₂ occurs simultaneously with the abatement of CH₄ recovery by overall decrease in permeability in the CBM reservoir. Hence, the actual CH₄ is produced under the overall effect of these two competing processes, with the operating parameters like producer-injector spacing and injection pressure affecting their relative dominance over each other. The study also addresses the opportunities of a niche for CO₂ sequestration in these coals, which will be dictated mainly by the factors of sequestration economics and status of these coals being "unmineable". The results derived from the study could help the design of an optimum operating strategy in implementing the CO₂ sequestration and enhanced CBM recovery in Sydney Basin, Australia and elsewhere. / http://proxy.library.adelaide.edu.au/login?url= http://library.adelaide.edu.au/cgi-bin/Pwebrecon.cgi?BBID=1259968 / Thesis (Ph.D.) -- University of Adelaide, Australian School of Petroleum, 2006

Title page, abstract and table of contents only. The complete thesis in print form is available from the University of Adelaide Library. / A 2002 report by Australian National Greenhouse Gas Inventory suggests that since 1990 Australia's net emissions of carbon dioxide equivalent from stationary combustion sources are on the rise and they are likely to rise even at a higher rate in keeping with continued economic and industrial growth. In order to reduce Australian CO₂emissions, there is a need to identify and explore large-capacity storage locations for CO₂ sequestration. In that context, Australian coal seams, notably the coal-bed methane (CBM) reservoirs in Sydney and Bowen Basins, could potentially be attractive sites to sequester large volumes of greenhouse CO₂ emissions while also recovering the methane gas, a relatively cleaner source of fossil fuel. This study investigates the deliverability and economic feasibility of CO₂ sequestration through CO₂-Enhanced CBM recovery (CO₂-ECBMR) in the Camden area, Sydney coal basin. The results of the study show that the CO₂-ECBMR impacts the absolute pelmeability of the Camden area significantly. Because of a good reticulated fracture system, the CO₂ breakthrough from the producers is faster. The enhancement of CH₄ recovery by preferential adsorption of CO₂ occurs simultaneously with the abatement of CH₄ recovery by overall decrease in permeability in the CBM reservoir. Hence, the actual CH₄ is produced under the overall effect of these two competing processes, with the operating parameters like producer-injector spacing and injection pressure affecting their relative dominance over each other. The study also addresses the opportunities of a niche for CO₂ sequestration in these coals, which will be dictated mainly by the factors of sequestration economics and status of these coals being "unmineable". The results derived from the study could help the design of an optimum operating strategy in implementing the CO₂ sequestration and enhanced CBM recovery in Sydney Basin, Australia and elsewhere. / http://proxy.library.adelaide.edu.au/login?url= http://library.adelaide.edu.au/cgi-bin/Pwebrecon.cgi?BBID=1259968 / Thesis (Ph.D.) -- University of Adelaide, Australian School of Petroleum, 2006

Zugl.: Zürich, Univ., Diss., 2004

Thesis (M.Sc.)--University of Western Sydney, Nepean, 1995. / Includes bibliography.