[csaa-forum] Vale Professor Emerita Kay Schaffer, past president CSAA

[Rob Cover]

We are very sad to note the passing of Emerita Professor Kay Schaffer on 27
December 2019.

A founding member of the Department of Women’s Studies (now Sociology,
Criminology and Gender Studies) at The University of Adelaide, Kay had a
long and distinguished academic career. She will be greatly missed by
colleagues and friends.

Kay was born in Pittsburgh and graduated BA (1966) Duquesne University, and
MA in English (1971) Pittsburgh University. She became involved in the
nascent women’s movement and had completed her doctoral course work when,
after the re-election of Richard Nixon, she migrated to Australia with her
husband, Robert Iseman, and their two young daughters. Both Kay and Robert
taught at Mitchell CAE in Bathurst for two years, where Kay ran a most
successful Women in Education conference. In 1975 the family moved to
Adelaide and Kay was appointed lecturer in English at Salisbury CAE. The
International Women’s Day grant that she brought with her was used to
establish the Adelaide Women’s Studies Resource Centre (1975-2015), a
feminist library for women teachers and students.

At Salisbury CAE she developed and taught feminist literature and popular
culture subjects and with colleagues developed a successful Graduate
Diploma program in Women’s Studies. She was deeply involved in the
development of Women Studies in secondary schools.

Kay continued her doctoral studies part-time and in 1984 gained her PhD
through Pittsburgh. This led to her first book, Women and the Bush: Forces
of Desire and the Australian Cultural Tradition. CUP (1987), later
translated into Chinese.

Kay and colleagues from Women’s Studies joined the University of Adelaide
in 1991, following the CAE’s amalgamation into the university. Appointed
Associate Professor, Kay played a leading role in the newly established
Women’s Studies Department. She served as head on a number of occasions;
taught in the MA Women’s Studies course-work program; undertook doctoral
supervisions; and was highly regarded as a creative and innovative teacher.
Her research career was rich and prolific during the 1990s, leading to
numerous publications including:
-- Captured Lives: Australian Captivity Narratives (with Kate Darian-Smith
& Roslyn Poignant), Menzies Centre, London, 1993.
-- In the Wake of First Contact: The Eliza Fraser Stories, Melbourne, New
York and Cambridge: CUP, 1995.
-- Indigenous Australian Voices: A Reader (with Jennifer Sabbioni and
Sidonie Smith), Rutgers,1998.
-- Constructions of Colonialism: Perspectives on Eliza Fraser’s Shipwreck,
with Ian McNiven & Lynette Russell, Cassell/ Leicester UP, 1998.
-- The Olympics at the Millennium: Performance, Politics and the Games
(with Sidonie Smith), Rutgers, 2000.

In 2002 Kay was appointed Professor in Gender Studies. Taking early
retirement that year, Kay’s research career continued to flourish. She
developed a number of exciting collaborations which culminated in the
following publications,
-- Human Rights and Narrated Lives: The Ethics of Recognition (with Sidonie
Smith), Palgrave/Macmillan, 2004.
-- Decolonizing the Landscape: Indigenous Cultures in Australia (with Beate
Neumeier), Rodopi, 2014.
-- Women Writers in Post-socialist China (with Xianlin Song), Routledge,
2014.

Kay held visiting positions at ANU, Curtin University and at the Institute
for the Study of Law, Literature and Culture at the University of
Osnabrueck from 2010. She was the founding Dr. R. Marika Visiting Chair of
Australian and Indigenous Studies at the University of Cologne.

Kay will be remembered as a lively and engaging teacher, a generous and
involved supervisor, and an innovative and intellectually daring scholar,
who contributed greatly to feminist, cultural and literary studies. Her
dynamic personality and great sense of humour will be missed.

During her long and brave struggle with cancer, Kay continued to live life
to the full, taking special trips to connect with family and friends in the
US. Kay had a great talent for friendship and developed many close, dear
and life-long friends in the US and Australia. She is survived by her
husband, Robert, her daughters Laura and Juliet their partners, and her two
beloved grandsons.

Details of Kay’s memorial service will be available in the new year.

------- (Tribute written by Margaret Allen, Pam Papadelos, Ros Prosser and
Kathie Muir).




Rob Cover, on behalf of the CSAA Executive.
____________________________________________

*Rob Cover*
Professor of Digital Communication
RMIT University, Melbourne Australia

ph.  0437 902 967
Profile:    http://www.uwa.edu.au/people/rob.cover
____________________________________________
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