Willa McDonald

Before joining academia, Willa worked as a journalist in print, television and radio for outlets including the Sydney Morning Herald, the Bulletin, the Times on Sunday, ABC TV and ABC Radio National. While her expertise is in writing, her experience in the electronic media includes researching/associate producing the award-winning television documentaries Ladies in Lines and The Time of Your Life, as well as devising and producing two series of programs for Radio National, Love Stories and the ACIJ Journalism Forums.

Willa joined Macquarie University in 2000 after teaching communications and writing at the Sydney Institute of Technology, TAFE and the University of Technology, Sydney where she was also manager of the Australian Centre for Independent Journalism (ACIJ).  Originally trained as a lawyer (BA/LLB UNSW), she completed her PhD in 2000 on the political activism of the literary critic, poet and peace activist Dorothy Auchterlonie Green. That research underpinned her political biography of Green published in 2009. She was also co-founder of the Arts Faculty HDR conference and companion journal NEO: Journal for Higher Degree Research Candidates in the Social Sciences and Humanities at Macquarie University.

Appointments

Willa is currently Co-Director of the Centre for Media History at MQ. She is on the advisory board of the international journal, Literary Journalism Studies. She has been a judge of the UN Media Peace Awards since 2015 and was a committee member of the American-Australian Fulbright Awards, NSW Selection Committee, from 2003-2007. Her memberships include: the International Association of Literary Journalism Studies (IALJS) (and member of the executive in 2010 and 2011); the Australasian Association of Writing Programs (AAWP); the Journalism Education Association of Australia (JERAA), and the Australian and New Zealand Communication Associaiton (ANZCA) 

Awards

• 2015 - Best Article in Literary Journalism Studies Prize by the International Association for Literary Journalism Studies.
• 2009 - MQ Arts Faculty Higher Degree Research Award
• 2007 - SCMP Award for Excellence in Student Engagement in 2007
• 2000 - Letter of Congratulations from Vice-Chancellor on the excellence of her PhD thesis (the practice at the time in lieu of formal prizes or commendations)

Research Interests

Willa is currently working on several research projects concerning creative non-fiction writing and literary/narrative journalism. These include a history of literary journalism (long-form narrative journalism) in Australia.

She welcomes postgraduate students in literary journalism (practice and history), creative non-fiction, life writing (including biography and memoir), fiction, nature and place writing, travel writing, ethics in writing, and long and short narrative storytelling generally.