Killing sharks is a popular strategy for reducing risk for beach-goers and ocean-users. But the effectiveness of kill-based strategies is debated and the ecological and economic costs are high. In Western Australia the state government introduced new policy in 2012 in response to shark-related fatalities, to track, catch and destroy sharks deemed to pose an 'imminent threat' to beach-goers. This paper reports on a survey of Western Australia-based ocean-users, and pursues two aims: to develop an understanding of the experiences of oceanusers in encountering sharks; and to learn about the attitudes of ocean-users towards shark hazard management. The research finds that people encounter sharks often, without harm, and that most ocean-users adapt their practices in order to reduce personal risk. The majority of ocean-users oppose the kill-based elements of the new policy, and kill-based shark hazard management strategies more broadly. Rather, oceanusers strongly support further research and education focusing on shark behaviour and shark deterrents, and approaches that enable people to understand and accept risks associated with ocean use. These findings present opportunity to refocus debates about shark hazard management on non-lethal strategies in concert with better educating publics so they can make informed decisions about their ocean-based activities. This paper reports on a survey of Western Australia-based ocean-users, and pursues two aims: to develop an understanding of the experiences of ocean-users in encountering sharks; and to learn about the attitudes of ocean-users towards shark hazard management. The research finds that people encounter sharks often, without harm, and that most ocean-users adapt their practices in order to reduce personal risk. The majority of ocean-users oppose the kill-based elements of the new policy, and kill-based shark hazard management strategies more broadly. Rather, ocean-users strongly support further research and education focusing on shark behaviour and shark deterrents, and approaches that enable people to understand and accept risks associated with ocean use. These findings present opportunity to refocus debates about shark hazard management on non-lethal strategies in concert with better educating publics so they can make informed decisions about their ocean-based activities.

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This article stems from a project examining cultural assets in Wollongong – a medium-sized Australian city with a decentralized and linear suburban pattern that challenges orthodox binaries of inner-city bohemia/outer-suburban domesticity. In Wollongong we documented community perceptions of cultural assets across this unusual setting, through a simple public research method. At the city’s largest annual festival we recruited the general public to nominate the city’s most ‘cool’ and ‘creative’ places, by drawing on a map of Wollongong and telling their stories. Hand-drawn maps from 205 participants were combined in a Geographical Information System and 50 hours of stories transcribed for qualitative analysis. Over 2300 places were identified. Among them were some surprising results: although places known for the arts and bohemian creative industries figured prominently, these were not only in the inner-city but in beachside suburbs with unique cultural histories. Also, a range of affective engagements with place, including unconventional forms of creativity, were described in industrial and blue-collar suburbs. Network topology analysis by place of residence also revealed the extent of localism, as well as specializations and aggrandizements among suburbs. Our conclusions are threefold: first, that ‘creativity’ is relationally situated and linked across all parts of the city; second, that decentralized forms of small-scale cultural infrastructure provision are vital for vernacular cultural pursuits; and, third, that ‘creativity’ is a polysemic and contested category – only ever partially revealing the contours of cultural vitality in the suburbs.

This paper examines the agency o f nonunionized workers employed in the surfboard industry. Inform ing a labor geography approach with cultural economy theory, the paper contributes to the progression o f labor geographies beyond the confines of unionized labor-m anagem ent relations. Using ethnographic m ethods with 135 workers across thirty-five w orkshops and three hubs o f production (O'ahu, H aw ai'i, southern California, and east coast Australia) I reveal how cultural values and logics powerfully shape labor relations in the surfboard industry. U nder labor-intensive systems o f craft-based, customized production, workers handle m ost aspects o f business themselves: taking orders, designing, making, and exchanging finished products. W orkers use deliberate, targeted actions to create agency and achieve stable, well-paid jobs anchored in vibrant surfing locations. Over the last decade, however, standardization, international com petition, and m anagerial am bitions to upscale for export have instigated pervasive shifts to autom ated, capital-intensive production. C om puter autom ation is transform ing the scope, scale, and conditions o f work. H um an skills have been replicated, work hours have declined, and wages have stagnated. Against an increasingly precarious employment backdrop, workers' strategies to achieve positive change remain perceptible. But workers' agency is now being ham pered by the laid-back, subcultural values pertaining to commercial production and workplace relations.

Informed by labour geography's thrust to situate workers as active subjects of analysis, this article examines lived experiences of restructuring at Australia's single largest industrial workplace. Drawing on extended ethnographic research, the article traverses three restructuring outcomes faced by workers and their families: (1) job retention; (2) redundancy; and (3) re-employment. Amid the turbulence and uncertainty of a major workplace restructuring episode, workers' different lived experiences illuminate uneven intra-labour power relations. As capitalist workplaces are re-organised and labour processes redefined, more conflictual and divisive relationships often develop among groups of workers differentially positioned within the hierarchical labour markets of large firms. Emphasising restructuring episodes as generative contexts for grounded labour geographies research, the article develops intra-labour agency as a critical analytical frame to explore more deeply the agency implications of workplace structures, co-worker relationships, and social life matters that shape workers' capacities for action inside and beyond workplaces.Resumen: Informado por el impulso de la geograf ıa del trabajo para situar a los trabajadores como sujetos activos de an alisis, este art ıculo examina las experiencias vividas de reestructuraci on en el m as grande lugar de trabajo industrial de Australia. Bas andose en la investigaci on etnogr afica extendida, el art ıculo atraviesa tres resultados de reestructuraci on que enfrentan los trabajadores y sus familias: (1) retenci on de empleo; (2) redundancia; y (3) reempleo. En medio de la turbulencia e incertidumbre de un importante episodio de reestructuraci on en el lugar de trabajo, las diferentes experiencias vividas de los trabajadores iluminan las desiguales relaciones de poder intralaborales. A medida que los lugares de trabajo capitalistas se reorganizan y los procesos laborales se redefinen, las relaciones conflictivas y divisivas se desarrollan a menudo entre grupos de trabajadores posicionados diferencialmente dentro de los mercados laborales jer arquicos de las grandes empresas. Al enfatizar los episodios de reestructuraci on como contextos generativos para la investigaci on de geograf ıas laborales fundamentadas, el art ıculo desarrolla la agencia intralaboral como un marco anal ıtico cr ıtico para explorar m as profundamente las implicaciones institucionales de las estructuras del lugar de trabajo, las relaciones del compañero de trabajo y la vida social que moldean las capacidades de acci on de los trabajadores dentro y m as all a de los lugares de trabajo.

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. (2016). Crafting masculinities: gender, culture and emotion at work in the surfboard industry. Gender, Place and Culture: a journal of feminist geography, 23 (1), 36-54.Crafting masculinities: gender, culture and emotion at work in the surfboard industry AbstractThis article examines the masculinities of male workers in the context of an emotionally rich form of labour: surfboard-making. Contributing to emerging research around the emotional and embodied dimensions of men's working lives, the article maps the cultural, emotional and embodied dimensions of work onto masculine identity construction. Combining cultural economy theory, emotional geographies and in-depth ethnographic methods, I reveal how surfboard-making has become a gendered form of work; how jobs rely on (and impact) the body and what surfboard-making means to workers outside of financial returns. Following a manual labour process, and informed by Western surfing subculture, commercial surfboard-making has layered onto male bodies. Men perform 'blokey' masculinities in relation with one another. However, doing manual craftwork evokes close, personal interaction; among co-workers but also through engagements with place and local customers. Felt, embodied craft skills help workers personalise boards for individual customers and local breaks. Beneath masculine work cultures and pretensions, surfboard-making is a deeply emotional and embodied work. Labour is dependent on haptic knowledge: sense of touch, bodily movement and eye for detail. Contrasting their blokey masculinity, surfboard-makers rely on intimate links between their bodies, tools, materials, customers and surfing places. These 'strong bodied' men articulate a 'passion' and 'love' for 'soulful' jobs, demonstrating how waged work comprises alternative masculinities, shaped by working culture, relations and labour processes. A cultural economy framework and emotionally engaged research approach are valuable for challenging hegemonic masculinity, important for achieving more inclusive, tolerant and equitable workplaces. Beneath masculine work cultures and pretensions, surfboard-making is deeply emotional and embodied work. Labour is dependent on haptic knowledges: sense of touch, bodily movement and eye for detail. Contrasting their blokey masculinity surfboard makers rely on intimate links between their bodies, tools, materials, customers and surfing places. These 'strong bodied' men articulate a 'passion' and 'love' for 'soulful' jobs, demonstrating how waged work comprises alternative masculinities, shaped by working culture, relations and labour processes. A cultural economy framework and emotionally engaged research approach is valuable for challenging hegemonic masculinity, important for achieving more inclusive, tolerant and equitable workplaces.2