The Dead Don’t Read
By Alli Gerkman
I was in a writing workshop, reading aloud an essay related to my cancer, when the instructor asked, “Who are you writing this for? Others who have been through your experience? Or people who haven’t?”
Good questions.
“The dead don’t read,” I said.
If I wrote just for people like me, I would have a…
Everyday, We Choose How We Will Live
By Alli Gerkman
In 2016, I checked off a long-time bucket list item when I participated in a sold-out Boulder Ignite event. When I rewatched it just now to transcribe it (below), I expected to cringe in the way you do when you read an old journal. But it wasn’t so bad. My life has gotten considerably more…
Time for some blue-sky thinking in legal education
By Katgallow
Subject to the vagaries of air travel, I will arrive in Sydney later today to attend the UNSW Legal Education Conference. I’ll be presenting with my colleagues Alex Steel and Melissa Castan on some work we are doing developing a taxonomy of legal education research. More on that in another post.
In this post,…
Marriage equality bill straight from the patriarchy
By Katgallow
It’s been a harrowing few weeks for the patriarchy. Having now been exposed, pants down, a number of big names in Hollywood appear to have been cast adrift by new-fangled feminist norms of respect for bodily autonomy, and non-exploitative deployment of personal wealth and power.
It’s so bad, that some ordinary men have taken…
énouement and gratitude and song
By Alli Gerkman
It is a windy morning in Palm Beach. The clouds are rolling through quickly, casting dark, then glimpses of light, as they go. I pull my sweater tight when things go dark and turn my face up instinctively when the sun reappears.
“I’ve looked at clouds from both sides now.”
I am sitting at a…
Head over to kategalloway.net for more blogging goodness
I’ve been posting on this blog since 2011. The time has come for me to upgrade my blogging platform – so now I won’t be posting on this blog any more. You can still find me, however, over at kategalloway.net in my new online home. I’ll be blogging as katgallow. Thank you for visiting…
Government v citizen: who is the vigilante?
In an action brought by Mackay Conservation Group, the Federal Court of Australia recently ruled that the Australian Government had failed to follow the law in granting approval to the Carmichael Mine. The Australian Government conceded this. The application will now need to be reconsidered by the relevant Minister in accordance with the relevant…
Marriage Equality: Taking the Liberal out of Liberalism
The same sex marriage debate in Australia is deeply strange. On the one hand, advocates of ‘traditional marriage’ paint marriage equality as a radical departure from morality. On the other hand, those in support of same sex marriage argue that ‘love has no boundaries’. Neither of these positions grapple with the rationale for the law’s…
I am not this hair
By Alli Gerkman
I have had the same hairstyle since middle school. This is not an exaggeration. Mid-length, side part, minimal fuss. I don’t use fancy products beyond shampoo and conditioner. I blow it dry every day (unless I’m on vacation—particularly in a humid destination where I like the curls I get). Sometimes I use a rounded brush…