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  • Dr Donna Mazza at ECU's School of Arts and Humanities

    Dr Donna Mazza

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  • Google Scholar
    http://scholar.google.com.au/citations?user=BvUHvJ8AAAAJ&hl=en
  • Google Scholar
  • The Conversation
    https://theconversation.com/profiles/donna-mazza-605331/articles
  • The Conversation

Associate Professor Donna Mazza

Associate Professor

Staff Member Details
Telephone: +61 8 9780 7742
Email: donna.mazza@ecu.edu.au
Campus: South West  
Room: BU5.119  
ORCID iD: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1135-5187

Donna Mazza is an Associate Professor in the School of Arts and Humanities and coordinates Major in Creative and Professional Writing and the Arts offerings at South West Campus.

Current teaching

  • CCC3109 - Speculative Fiction
  • CCC3106 - Contemporary Australian Literature
  • WRT1101 - Language and Writing
  • WRT1103 - Creativity and Writing
  • WRT2110 - Introduction to Editing
  • WRT2213 - Creative Writing
  • WRT3215 - Authorship and Publication
  • Coordinator - WRT3105, WRT3107, CCC3102, WRT3120

Background

Donna is a fiction writer and researcher with qualifications in English and Writing. She has mentored and supervised highly successful researchers and writers who have won major awards and published their work internationally.

Her research focuses on environmental and feminist speculative fiction, responds to genetic technologies and climate. Her recent novel, "Fauna" (2020) was shortlisted for Aurealis Best Science Fiction Novel and she is also author of The Albanian (2007), which won the TAG Hungerford Award. Her stories and poetry have been published in major literary journals in Australia and India and her research on kangaroos, swearing, utopia and Australian literature has appeared in The Conversation and other journals.

Donna received fellowships to Ireland and in Australia for her environmental writing and presents at conferences, writers festivals and on national radio. She is active as fiction editor, workshop facilitator, mentor and judge.

She has also been writer for public art projects in Busselton, Perth and the iconic Wardandi Boodjar sculpture in Bunbury.

Professional associations

  • 2015-present - Varuna Writers Centre Alumni, (Member)
  • 2017-present - city of Bunbury Art Collection Committee, (Member)
  • 2019-present - Association for the Study of Australian Literature (ASAL), (Member)

Awards and recognition

National and International Awards

  • 2021 - WA Premier’s Writing Awards Writers Fellowship (shortlisted)
  • 2021 - Aurealis Award Best Science Fiction Novel 2020 – Shortlisted for Fauna (Allen & Unwin)
  • 2021 - Davitt Awards: Sisters in Crime – Longlisted for Fauna (Allen & Unwin)
  • 2021 -Tyrone Guthrie International Exchange – Annaghmakerrig, Ireland
  • 2018 - Mick Dark Flagship Fellowship for Environmental Writing – Varuna Writers Centre NSW – ‘Natural Deviations’
  • 2015 - Patricia Hackett Prize for best contribution to Westerly - ‘The Exhibit’
  • 2016 - Australian Greens Short Story Competition – Winner for ‘Dear Daddy’
  • 2016 - Dorothy Hewett Award for an Unpublished Manuscript – Shortlisted Author for Dark Little Ghost [novel]
  • 2015 - Alan Marshall Short Story Prize – Shortlisted for ‘Dear Daddy’
  • 2005 - TAG Hungerford Award for Unpublished Fiction - Winner for The Albanian

Research areas and interests

  • Speculative fiction with a focus on feminism and environmental issues.
  • Australian Gothic literature, particularly in relation to coastal areas and return of the repressed.
  • Representation of kangaroos and other fauna in Australian fiction.
  • Creative examinations of new genetic science through art and literature.

Qualifications

  • Doctor of Philosophy, Edith Cowan University, 2004.
  • Bachelor of Arts with First Class Honours (English Studies), Edith Cowan University, 1999.
  • Bachelor of Arts (English), Edith Cowan University, 1991.

Research Outputs

2021

Journal Articles

  • Mazza, D., Carter, N., Rhodes, D. (2021). More than something weird: Teaching Australian Gothic in the classroom. English in Australia, 56(3), 27-37.

2020

Creative Arts Research Outputs

  • Mazza, D. (2020). The Last of its Kind. Westerly. 65.
  • Mazza, D. (2020). The Fingerprint. New Australian Fiction 2020. Kill Your Darlings Pty Ltd.
  • Mazza, D. (2020). Fauna. [Novel]. . Allen & Unwin.

2019

Creative Arts Research Outputs

  • Mazza, D. (2019). Seven Dead Emus. Arena Magazine.
  • Mazza, D. (2019). The True Tail. Westerly.

2018

Journal Articles

  • Boxall, K., McKenzie, V., Henderson, G., Shizleen, S., Mazza, D. (2018). Reimagining social work case studies: a social work—creative writing collaboration. Social Work Education, 37(7), 881-894. https://doi.org/10.1080/02615479.2018.1458831.
  • Mazza, D. (2018). Kangaroos and predators in recent Australian fiction: A post-pastoral reading. Antipodes: a global journal of Australian/New Zealand literature, 32(1&2), 94-108. https://doi.org/10.13110/antipodes.32.1-2.0094.

Creative Arts Research Outputs

  • Mazza, D. (2018). Blue Tongue. Westerly. Westerly Centre - University of Western Australia.

2017

Creative Arts Research Outputs

  • Mazza, D. (2017). The Clearing. Southerly. English Association.

2016

Creative Arts Research Outputs

  • Mazza, D. (2016). Love in two parts. Westerly 61.2. University of Western Australia.
  • Mazza, D. (2016). Dear Daddy. Green Magazine. Australian Greens.

2015

Creative Arts Research Outputs

  • Mazza, D., Mickle, A., Corps, R., Ansell, T., Kus, D. (2015). The Rescue. Koombana Bay Sound Wall, Bunbury.
  • Mazza, D. (2015). The Exhibit. Westerly. Westerly Centre, UWA.

2014

Creative Arts Research Outputs

  • Mazza, D. (2014). The Cormorant. ECU South West Building.
  • Mazza, D. (2014). What I'm Reading: Donna Mazza. Meanjin Blog. Melbourne University Publishing.
  • Mazza, D., Mills, S. (2014). Ariadne Cast Away. ECU South West.

2013

Creative Arts Research Outputs

  • Mazza, D. (2013). Holyoake. Fire: A collection of stories, poems and visual images. Margaret River Press.

2011

Creative Arts Research Outputs

  • Mazza, D. (2011). Busselton Jetty Sculpture Walk Signage. . Safehaven studios and Busselton Shire Council.

2007

Creative Arts Research Outputs

  • Mazza, D. (2007). The Albanian. . Fremantle Press.

Research Projects

  • The spaces between us: Interdisciplinary, practice-led research into colonial Western Australian infanticide, Edith Cowan University, ECU Early Career Researcher Grant - 2016, 2016 ‑ 2018, $30,000.
  • Bitter Heritage: WA and its climate violence, Edith Cowan University, School of Arts and Humanities Research Grant Scheme 2016, 2016, $5,000.
  • Pilot study into the needs of young carers in South-West Australia, The Bethanie Group Inc, Grant, 2006, $7,434.

Research Student Supervision

Current Supervisions

Principal Supervisor

  • Doctor of Philosophy, The story of Fremantle Press: Promoting pluralism in writing business history through the use of creative nonfiction
  • Doctor of Philosophy, Castles of sand, and saltwater shackles: Abjection, liminal space, and entrapment within the Australian coastal gothic landscape
  • Doctor of Philosophy, Only their voices: Decentring the human in non-human fiction
  • Doctor of Philosophy, The Wound Model, a novel & Under sterile conditions: The depiction of surgery in contemporary fiction.

Co-principal Supervisor

  • Doctor of Philosophy, More than counting devices and woolly commodities: An empathic analysis of sheep in Australian texts for young readers.
  • Doctor of Philosophy, The Commonwealth of Amnesia: A collection of erasure and cut-up poems exploring the forgotten histories of Croatian and Yugoslav peoples in Australia

Completed Supervisions

Principal Supervisor

  • Doctor of Philosophy, Beneath the Money Tree and Nature is a Haunted House: A novel and exegesis.
  • Doctor of Philosophy, A novel: Bloodlines and exegesis: in the blood: mothering and othering
  • Doctor of Philosophy, Heartwood: Spiritual homebuilding and white-vanishing in Australian gothic fiction
  • Doctor of Philosophy, The wounded sinner and a stirring of cultures: The contest for place, belonging and identity in Australia
  • Doctor of Philosophy, On the corner of North and nowhere. A novel - and - going back to go forward: An invitation to get lost. a critical essay
  • Doctor of Philosophy, Rogue - novel. Wonderlust: The value of wonder for readers, writers and the vault

Co-principal Supervisor

  • Doctor of Philosophy, Unravel. A novel -and- a diverse palette: Cosmic horror and weird fiction with/out Lovecraft. a critical essay.

Associate Supervisor

  • Doctor of Philosophy, Belonging: A place for, and in, children's poetry
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