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Program: Randa Abdel-Fattah and Louise Adler on the cost of speaking out in a time of division

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She's attracted controversy and cancellation, but Palestinian Australian author and academic Randa Abdel-Fattah has not been deterred from speaking out about the plight of Palestinians in the war on Gaza, and the experience of Muslim Australians since 9/11. At this event organised in the wake of the cancellation of Adelaide Writers' Week, she joins that festival's former Director Louise Adler, to talk about her latest novel, Discipline, and the experience of art imitating life.

This conversation was recorded at the Adelaide Town Hall as part of the Constellations: Not Writers' Week festival on 1 March 2026.

Speakers

Dr Randa Abdel-Fattah
Author, Discipline (winner of the People's Choice Award at the 2026 Victorian Premier's Literary Awards), Does My Head Look Big in This? and Coming of Age in the War on Terror
Future Fellow in the Department of Sociology at Macquarie University

Louise Adler (host) 
Former Director, Adelaide Writers' Week
Former CEO, Melbourne University Press
Former editor-at-large, Hachette Australia

Image Details

Randa Abdel-Fattah and Louise Adler in conversation at the community driven Constellations: Not Writers Week event at Adelaide Town Hall in Adelaide, Sunday, March 1, 2026.

Multiculturalism, Diversity, Equity and Inclusion, Race Relations, Government and Politics
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