Melanie Oppenheimer
Associate Professor Melanie Oppenheimer BA; M. Litt (UNE) 1988, Ph. D. (Macq) 1997 is based at the University of New England where she has supervised several research projects dealing with soldier settlement. Like Professor Scates she has an active record of community and academic service.
She is the author of Oceans of Love (Sydney 2006); a powerful story about one Australian nurse at war, Narelle Hobbes, during World War One and her study of voluntary labour in wartime, All Work, No Pay was short listed for the NSW Premier’s History Prize. She is widely regarded as one of Australia’s leading authority on civilian voluntary service and war.
A/Professor Oppenheimer has spoken to many community groups about her work and lectured at the invitation of the Legacy and the Shrine of Remembrance. She has helped design major public exhibitions at the Australian War Memorial and the Shrine and was a member of a national reference group designing the new interpretive centre at Villers Bretonneaux.
A/Professor Oppenheimer has recently completed a landmark study Australian Women at War. commissioned and published by the Department of Veterans’ Affairs in 2008, as well as Volunteering: How we can’t survive without it, published by UNSW Press. She appears regularly on ABC Radio with series such as Via Activa, Life Matters and ABC New England/Northwest.
