Governor-General, Quentin Bryce, presents a new role for the vice-regal representative by giving the 2013 Boyer Lectures on the ABC, a prestige series of four talks, significant for their contribution to our social history, national identity and nomination of important future challenges for national contemplation. Departing from the usual low profile and controlled role of the GG in her last five months in the job and although not speaking overtly politically, Ms Bryce has opted to cover public issues such as equal rights, the role of women in Australian society, violence against women, and the future of citizenship, thus pointing to areas for attention by government. Labor appointed Governors-General have sought to expand the GG’s role in recent times. The last to do so was Keating-appointed Sir William Deane 1996-2001 who spoke out about injustice towards Indigenous peoples and the need for Reconciliation. [Dates for Quentin Bryce’s Boyer Lectures are 3, 10, 17 and 24 November at 12 noon on Radio National, repeated the following Tuesday at 8pm]
Woman for an Australian Republic, Adelaide Ironside, republican poet and artist 1831-1867
Self portrait 1855, Newcastle Art Gallery NSW
