Lucy Nicholas
Biographic Data
| ID | 3601180 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Lucy Nicholas |
| GIVEN NAMES | Lucy |
| FAMILY NAME | Nicholas |
| SIGNATURE | NICHOLAS L |
| AFFILIATIONS | Western Sydney University |
| ORCID | 0000-0001-7432-1526 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 23 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 89 |
| WORKS AS AUTHOR | 23 |
| WORKS AS EDITOR | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2018 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2026 |
| H-INDEX | 5 |
Complex Religion, Conspiracy Theories, Misinformation, and Covid-19 in NSW, Australia
This article explores contemporary empirical evidence of the extent of the uptake of misinformation and conspiracy theories about COVID-19 with regards to religion in the New South Wales population in Australia. The data were collected through an online survey conducted in 2022 (N=5,276). Religious respondents tend to follow conspiracy theories, distrusting the recommendations of scientists and for some, resourcing information from religious lead…
Every snowflake is different, and every person is different’
This paper outlines the ways that 32 (so-called) ‘Australian’ nonbinary people imagine gender utopia. For this group of nonbinary people, most imagined a gender utopia to be one where gender as a form of social categorization and stratification was either no longer a feature, or less of a defining feature of selves, relationality or society. This perspective is at odds with a rising number of critics who suggest that nonbinary is collapsing into …
Whose concerns? Young adults discussing (their) concerns with pornography
Concerns regarding pornography have always existed, and perhaps this is nowhere more pronounced than in the contexts of young people’s viewing. Pornography is often framed in binary ways (sexual revelation versus moral turpitude), often by people who do not specialise in pornography, and young people’s experiences are often neglected. Against this backdrop, this article engages with interview and focus group data that sought to explore young adul…
A scoping review of non‐binary research in “Australian” social sciences
Non‐binary and genderqueer identities are increasingly discussed in public discourse and academia, but there remains a dearth of academic literature centred on non‐binary people's lives and experiences. When non‐binary people are included in research, it is frequently as an additive to explorations of trans identities and subsumed under the trans umbrella or treated as categorically indistinct. Much has been written from a clinical perspective, b…
From Exceptionality to Mundanity
Pornography scholarship is often dominated by discourses surrounding its alleged risks to viewers. Approaching sex and porn through the lens of 'play' rather than 'drama', this article concentrates on the everyday particularity of porn viewing, where media-related practices/technologies afford possibilities between porn users and digital objects. Drawing upon focus groups/interviews with 17 young adult porn viewers (18-25 years) based in western …
Misinformation and Conspiracy Theories During the Covid-19 Pandemic in NSW, Australia and the Risks for Social Cohesion
Conspiracy theories are by no means new. However, during the COVID-19 pandemic, the risks and dangers associated with beliefs in conspiracy theories and misinformation intensified. Furthermore, while conspiracy theories are often attributed to marginal or fringe populations, the pandemic context saw the spread of such ideas more widely and with greater impacts. The latter includes fuelling major public disorders, political violence and/or widespr…
Beyond the Clickbait
There is now an expansive literature on the manosphere - the loosely connected groups of digital communities that revolve around men's rights, aspirations and entitlements, and the perceived constraints upon these. Such studies have produced important critical insights into the collective and organized dimension of the networked harassment of women in digital settings, as well as highlighting the manosphere's craving to reanimate regressive modes…
‘An abundance of cakes’
This paper charts how, in interviewing across generations of assigned female at birth (AFAB) queers in ‘Australia’ about their experiences of lateral violence in LGBTQ+ communities, we found dominant narratives of joy, solidarity and empathy across differences, generations and intersections that demonstrate the ongoing world-making inherent to queer communities. We chart the future-oriented, more utopian themes that came out, in particular around…
It gets a Little Dicey on the Home Page’
Antifeminist, manosphere and right-wing extremist sentiment among men who use domestic and family violence
Young People's Perspectives of the 'Male Gaze' and Matters of Representation in Online Pornography
Young Masculinities, Masculinism, Backlash, and the Complexities of Fostering Change
Lateral Violence and Microaggressions in the LGBTQ+ Community
Violence and microaggressions against the LGBTQ+ community from those outside of the community is commonly known and understood within academic literature. However, there is limited comprehensive knowledge about violence and microaggressions that occur within LGBTQ+ communities. This scoping review helps to fill this gap in knowledge, analyzing and synthesizing 18 research articles published in English language scholarly journals all of which hav…
Gender, Sex and Freedom
Many Global North contexts are experiencing conflict in feminist discourses between supporters of trans and gender diverse self-identification and self-proclaimed 'gender critical' feminists who consider this to undermine feminist goals. We argue that the channelling of contemporary feminist discourse into defensive and oppositional channels has foreclosed the space for more nuanced and future-oriented, utopian thought around freedom from sex/gen…
Anti-feminism, gender and the far-right gap in C/PVE measures
Due to an overwhelming focus on Islamist extremism, western strategies to Counter or Prevent Violent Extremism (C/PVE) have largely neglected the growing far-right threat. In this article, we draw attention to the gender blind spot in C/PVE strategies by arguing that misogyny and masculinism go beyond ‘anti-women’ sentiment and align with the far-right’s valorisation of order, hierarchy and traditional values. This blind spot in C/PVE measures ha…
Game to play? ’
Sport settings have long been documented as exclusionary environments for sexuality and gender diverse (SAGD) people and a key location of discrimination. Sport is associated with well-being, and increasing physical activity for disadvantaged groups is a key aim for many governments. This study reports on 13 semi-structured interviews with young SAGD people aged 18–24 in Australia that explore their attitudes to and experiences of sport and physi…
Introduction
Remembering Simone de Beauvoir's 'ethics of ambiguity' to challenge contemporary divides
This article returns to Simone de Beauvoir's philosophical oeuvre in order to offer a way of thinking beyond contemporary feminist divisions created by 'gender critical' or trans-exclusionary feminists. The 'gender critical' feminist position returns to sex essentialism to argue for 'abolishing' gender, while opponents often appeal to proliferated gender self-identities. I argue that neither goes far enough and that they both circumscribe utopian…
Men and masculinities in qualitative research on vasectomy
Although vasectomy is a safe and highly effective method of contraception, uptake is variable globally, with scope for increased engagement in high income nations. Very little qualitative research has been published in recent years to explore men’s perspectives on vasectomy, which represents a key opportunity to better understand and strengthen men’s contribution to reproductive and contraception equality. This paper takes a scoping review approa…
Whiteness, Heteropaternalism, and the Gendered Politics of Settler Colonial Populist Backlash Culture in Australia1
This article analyzes backlashes to queer and Indigenous diversity-affirmative practices in Australia that entail perceived loss of dominance by the majority culture. The case studies outlined here demonstrate how whiteness, nationhood, and (gendered) heterosexuality are playing out in parallel ways through populist backlashes that have the purpose of containing queerness and indigeneity in “respectable” modes that do not challenge the default ne…
You’re actually the problem’
In 2016 the world witnessed a consolidation of a western brand of political ‘populist authoritarianism’ that is anti-globalisationalist and creates ‘shared objects of loathing’ in the popular imagination. This article engages with the implications of this affective and masculinist ‘post-truth’ era for higher education and analyses the narratives of teacher educators who teach compulsory classes based on inclusion and diversity. The article uses t…
Queer ethics and fostering positive mindsets toward non-binary gender, genderqueer, and gender ambiguity
Background: Alongside the growth in visibility of gender identities and presentations such as genderqueer, non-binary and gender neutral, there is ridicule and backlash in wider culture, as well as more subtle invisibility and misgendering. While there exists social psychology research about negative and positive attitudes to trans people, this is restricted to those whose gender identity is at odds with their sex assigned at birth, and who ident…
Dragon wings and butterfly wings
Despite explicit focus on addressing gender inequality in educational settings in Australia, without challenging gender binarism, inequality will persist. This article demonstrates the everyday and implicit means through which hierarchical gender binaries continue to be perpetuated. Observational fieldwork undertaken in three Australian early childhood settings with 13 members of staff and 53 children (ages 2–6) demonstrates how bi-gendered langu…
Game to play? ’
Sport settings have long been documented as exclusionary environments for sexuality and gender diverse (SAGD) people and a key location of discrimination. Sport is associated with well-being, and increasing physical activity for disadvantaged groups is a key aim for many governments. This study reports on 13 semi-structured interviews with young SAGD people aged 18–24 in Australia that explore their attitudes to and experiences of sport and physi…
Anti-feminism, gender and the far-right gap in C/PVE measures
Due to an overwhelming focus on Islamist extremism, western strategies to Counter or Prevent Violent Extremism (C/PVE) have largely neglected the growing far-right threat. In this article, we draw attention to the gender blind spot in C/PVE strategies by arguing that misogyny and masculinism go beyond ‘anti-women’ sentiment and align with the far-right’s valorisation of order, hierarchy and traditional values. This blind spot in C/PVE measures ha…
Young Masculinities, Masculinism, Backlash, and the Complexities of Fostering Change
Queer ethics and fostering positive mindsets toward non-binary gender, genderqueer, and gender ambiguity
Background: Alongside the growth in visibility of gender identities and presentations such as genderqueer, non-binary and gender neutral, there is ridicule and backlash in wider culture, as well as more subtle invisibility and misgendering. While there exists social psychology research about negative and positive attitudes to trans people, this is restricted to those whose gender identity is at odds with their sex assigned at birth, and who ident…
Whiteness, Heteropaternalism, and the Gendered Politics of Settler Colonial Populist Backlash Culture in Australia1
This article analyzes backlashes to queer and Indigenous diversity-affirmative practices in Australia that entail perceived loss of dominance by the majority culture. The case studies outlined here demonstrate how whiteness, nationhood, and (gendered) heterosexuality are playing out in parallel ways through populist backlashes that have the purpose of containing queerness and indigeneity in “respectable” modes that do not challenge the default ne…
Beyond the Clickbait
There is now an expansive literature on the manosphere - the loosely connected groups of digital communities that revolve around men's rights, aspirations and entitlements, and the perceived constraints upon these. Such studies have produced important critical insights into the collective and organized dimension of the networked harassment of women in digital settings, as well as highlighting the manosphere's craving to reanimate regressive modes…
Gender, Sex and Freedom
Many Global North contexts are experiencing conflict in feminist discourses between supporters of trans and gender diverse self-identification and self-proclaimed 'gender critical' feminists who consider this to undermine feminist goals. We argue that the channelling of contemporary feminist discourse into defensive and oppositional channels has foreclosed the space for more nuanced and future-oriented, utopian thought around freedom from sex/gen…
Remembering Simone de Beauvoir's 'ethics of ambiguity' to challenge contemporary divides
This article returns to Simone de Beauvoir's philosophical oeuvre in order to offer a way of thinking beyond contemporary feminist divisions created by 'gender critical' or trans-exclusionary feminists. The 'gender critical' feminist position returns to sex essentialism to argue for 'abolishing' gender, while opponents often appeal to proliferated gender self-identities. I argue that neither goes far enough and that they both circumscribe utopian…
Introduction
Men and masculinities in qualitative research on vasectomy
Although vasectomy is a safe and highly effective method of contraception, uptake is variable globally, with scope for increased engagement in high income nations. Very little qualitative research has been published in recent years to explore men’s perspectives on vasectomy, which represents a key opportunity to better understand and strengthen men’s contribution to reproductive and contraception equality. This paper takes a scoping review approa…
You’re actually the problem’
In 2016 the world witnessed a consolidation of a western brand of political ‘populist authoritarianism’ that is anti-globalisationalist and creates ‘shared objects of loathing’ in the popular imagination. This article engages with the implications of this affective and masculinist ‘post-truth’ era for higher education and analyses the narratives of teacher educators who teach compulsory classes based on inclusion and diversity. The article uses t…
Dragon wings and butterfly wings
Despite explicit focus on addressing gender inequality in educational settings in Australia, without challenging gender binarism, inequality will persist. This article demonstrates the everyday and implicit means through which hierarchical gender binaries continue to be perpetuated. Observational fieldwork undertaken in three Australian early childhood settings with 13 members of staff and 53 children (ages 2–6) demonstrates how bi-gendered langu…
Antifeminist, manosphere and right-wing extremist sentiment among men who use domestic and family violence
From Exceptionality to Mundanity
Pornography scholarship is often dominated by discourses surrounding its alleged risks to viewers. Approaching sex and porn through the lens of 'play' rather than 'drama', this article concentrates on the everyday particularity of porn viewing, where media-related practices/technologies afford possibilities between porn users and digital objects. Drawing upon focus groups/interviews with 17 young adult porn viewers (18-25 years) based in western …
It gets a Little Dicey on the Home Page’
Young People's Perspectives of the 'Male Gaze' and Matters of Representation in Online Pornography
Queer ethics and fostering positive mindsets toward non-binary gender, genderqueer, and gender ambiguity
Background: Alongside the growth in visibility of gender identities and presentations such as genderqueer, non-binary and gender neutral, there is ridicule and backlash in wider culture, as well as more subtle invisibility and misgendering. While there exists social psychology research about negative and positive attitudes to trans people, this is restricted to those whose gender identity is at odds with their sex assigned at birth, and who ident…
Dragon wings and butterfly wings
Despite explicit focus on addressing gender inequality in educational settings in Australia, without challenging gender binarism, inequality will persist. This article demonstrates the everyday and implicit means through which hierarchical gender binaries continue to be perpetuated. Observational fieldwork undertaken in three Australian early childhood settings with 13 members of staff and 53 children (ages 2–6) demonstrates how bi-gendered langu…
Whiteness, Heteropaternalism, and the Gendered Politics of Settler Colonial Populist Backlash Culture in Australia1
This article analyzes backlashes to queer and Indigenous diversity-affirmative practices in Australia that entail perceived loss of dominance by the majority culture. The case studies outlined here demonstrate how whiteness, nationhood, and (gendered) heterosexuality are playing out in parallel ways through populist backlashes that have the purpose of containing queerness and indigeneity in “respectable” modes that do not challenge the default ne…
You’re actually the problem’
In 2016 the world witnessed a consolidation of a western brand of political ‘populist authoritarianism’ that is anti-globalisationalist and creates ‘shared objects of loathing’ in the popular imagination. This article engages with the implications of this affective and masculinist ‘post-truth’ era for higher education and analyses the narratives of teacher educators who teach compulsory classes based on inclusion and diversity. The article uses t…
Anti-feminism, gender and the far-right gap in C/PVE measures
Due to an overwhelming focus on Islamist extremism, western strategies to Counter or Prevent Violent Extremism (C/PVE) have largely neglected the growing far-right threat. In this article, we draw attention to the gender blind spot in C/PVE strategies by arguing that misogyny and masculinism go beyond ‘anti-women’ sentiment and align with the far-right’s valorisation of order, hierarchy and traditional values. This blind spot in C/PVE measures ha…
Game to play? ’
Sport settings have long been documented as exclusionary environments for sexuality and gender diverse (SAGD) people and a key location of discrimination. Sport is associated with well-being, and increasing physical activity for disadvantaged groups is a key aim for many governments. This study reports on 13 semi-structured interviews with young SAGD people aged 18–24 in Australia that explore their attitudes to and experiences of sport and physi…
Introduction
Remembering Simone de Beauvoir's 'ethics of ambiguity' to challenge contemporary divides
This article returns to Simone de Beauvoir's philosophical oeuvre in order to offer a way of thinking beyond contemporary feminist divisions created by 'gender critical' or trans-exclusionary feminists. The 'gender critical' feminist position returns to sex essentialism to argue for 'abolishing' gender, while opponents often appeal to proliferated gender self-identities. I argue that neither goes far enough and that they both circumscribe utopian…
Men and masculinities in qualitative research on vasectomy
Although vasectomy is a safe and highly effective method of contraception, uptake is variable globally, with scope for increased engagement in high income nations. Very little qualitative research has been published in recent years to explore men’s perspectives on vasectomy, which represents a key opportunity to better understand and strengthen men’s contribution to reproductive and contraception equality. This paper takes a scoping review approa…
Lateral Violence and Microaggressions in the LGBTQ+ Community
Violence and microaggressions against the LGBTQ+ community from those outside of the community is commonly known and understood within academic literature. However, there is limited comprehensive knowledge about violence and microaggressions that occur within LGBTQ+ communities. This scoping review helps to fill this gap in knowledge, analyzing and synthesizing 18 research articles published in English language scholarly journals all of which hav…
Gender, Sex and Freedom
Many Global North contexts are experiencing conflict in feminist discourses between supporters of trans and gender diverse self-identification and self-proclaimed 'gender critical' feminists who consider this to undermine feminist goals. We argue that the channelling of contemporary feminist discourse into defensive and oppositional channels has foreclosed the space for more nuanced and future-oriented, utopian thought around freedom from sex/gen…
‘An abundance of cakes’
This paper charts how, in interviewing across generations of assigned female at birth (AFAB) queers in ‘Australia’ about their experiences of lateral violence in LGBTQ+ communities, we found dominant narratives of joy, solidarity and empathy across differences, generations and intersections that demonstrate the ongoing world-making inherent to queer communities. We chart the future-oriented, more utopian themes that came out, in particular around…
It gets a Little Dicey on the Home Page’
Antifeminist, manosphere and right-wing extremist sentiment among men who use domestic and family violence
Young People's Perspectives of the 'Male Gaze' and Matters of Representation in Online Pornography
Young Masculinities, Masculinism, Backlash, and the Complexities of Fostering Change
Whose concerns? Young adults discussing (their) concerns with pornography
Concerns regarding pornography have always existed, and perhaps this is nowhere more pronounced than in the contexts of young people’s viewing. Pornography is often framed in binary ways (sexual revelation versus moral turpitude), often by people who do not specialise in pornography, and young people’s experiences are often neglected. Against this backdrop, this article engages with interview and focus group data that sought to explore young adul…
A scoping review of non‐binary research in “Australian” social sciences
Non‐binary and genderqueer identities are increasingly discussed in public discourse and academia, but there remains a dearth of academic literature centred on non‐binary people's lives and experiences. When non‐binary people are included in research, it is frequently as an additive to explorations of trans identities and subsumed under the trans umbrella or treated as categorically indistinct. Much has been written from a clinical perspective, b…
From Exceptionality to Mundanity
Pornography scholarship is often dominated by discourses surrounding its alleged risks to viewers. Approaching sex and porn through the lens of 'play' rather than 'drama', this article concentrates on the everyday particularity of porn viewing, where media-related practices/technologies afford possibilities between porn users and digital objects. Drawing upon focus groups/interviews with 17 young adult porn viewers (18-25 years) based in western …
Misinformation and Conspiracy Theories During the Covid-19 Pandemic in NSW, Australia and the Risks for Social Cohesion
Conspiracy theories are by no means new. However, during the COVID-19 pandemic, the risks and dangers associated with beliefs in conspiracy theories and misinformation intensified. Furthermore, while conspiracy theories are often attributed to marginal or fringe populations, the pandemic context saw the spread of such ideas more widely and with greater impacts. The latter includes fuelling major public disorders, political violence and/or widespr…
Beyond the Clickbait
There is now an expansive literature on the manosphere - the loosely connected groups of digital communities that revolve around men's rights, aspirations and entitlements, and the perceived constraints upon these. Such studies have produced important critical insights into the collective and organized dimension of the networked harassment of women in digital settings, as well as highlighting the manosphere's craving to reanimate regressive modes…
Complex Religion, Conspiracy Theories, Misinformation, and Covid-19 in NSW, Australia
This article explores contemporary empirical evidence of the extent of the uptake of misinformation and conspiracy theories about COVID-19 with regards to religion in the New South Wales population in Australia. The data were collected through an online survey conducted in 2022 (N=5,276). Religious respondents tend to follow conspiracy theories, distrusting the recommendations of scientists and for some, resourcing information from religious lead…
Every snowflake is different, and every person is different’
This paper outlines the ways that 32 (so-called) ‘Australian’ nonbinary people imagine gender utopia. For this group of nonbinary people, most imagined a gender utopia to be one where gender as a form of social categorization and stratification was either no longer a feature, or less of a defining feature of selves, relationality or society. This perspective is at odds with a rising number of critics who suggest that nonbinary is collapsing into …
Sociology (19 works) · Political science (13 works) · Gender Studies (12 works) · Psychology (11 works) · Gender Studies (9 works) · Law (9 works) · Gender, Feminism, and Media (8 works) · Politics (7 works) · Social Psychology (7 works) · Gender Politics and Representation (5 works)