Sharpening the Pen: Activating Human Rights Through Writing

‘The pen is mightier than the sword.’ In an age of increasing humanitarian and ecological crises, how can writers sharpen their pen to effectively speak truth to power? Join us for an evening of discussion and readings from leading WA voices on how to activate human rights and social justice through writing. Hosted by WritingWA and the Curtin University Centre for Human Rights Education, this free event welcomes readers, writers and activists to explore creative avenues toward a more just future.

Our Panellists:

Rachel Bin Salleh is a Nimunburr and Yawuru woman from the Dampier Peninsula in the Kimberley of Western Australia. She grew up in the pearling town of Broome and joined Magabala Books in 1993. She has worked as an editor, project editor, assistant marketing manager, production co-ordinator, served on the board of Magabala Books as well as on other boards. Rachel has worked with First Nations writers, storytellers, poets, yarners, songwriters, playwrights, performers and illustrators from across Australia. She is passionate about publishing First Nations creators and their works, in various forms on a local, national and international literary stage.

Sisonke Msimang is the author of two books — Always Another Country and the Resurrection of Winnie Mandela. She worked in the field of human rights and democracy-building, before doing to Australia. Her work on storytelling aims to connect personal stories with larger narratives of equality and justice.

John Kinsella's recent books include the three vols of his collected poems, The Ascension of Sheep (UWAP, 2022), Harsh Hakea (UWAP, 2023) andSpirals (UWAP, 2024). A recent collection of stories is Beam of Light(Transit Lounge, 2024), and a recent novel The Mahler Erasures (Dalkey Archive, 2024). Recent collaborations include Art(with Charmaine Papertalk Green, Magabala Books, 2022),Mortality (with Kwame Dawes, Peepal Tree, 2024) andThe City Under the City (with Jeet Thayil, Harpercollins India, 2025).

Scott-Patrick Mitchell is a queer non-binary poet living on Whadjuk Noongar Country. They were the recipient of 2022’s Red Room Poetry Fellowship, Westerly’s 2022 Mid-Career Fellowship and the 2023 winner of The XYZ Prize for Innovation in Spoken Word. Their debut poetry collection Clean (Upswell Publishing, 2022) was shortlisted for The Prime Minister’s Literary Awards, The WA Premier’s Book Awards, The Victorian Premier’s Literary Awards and internationally in The Read Rainbow’s Best LGBTIQA+ Books of 2022 Awards.

Our Facilitator:

Yirga Gelaw Woldeyes is a writer, poet and human rights academic from Lalibela, Ethiopia. He currently lives in Boorloo (Perth, Western Australia) where he works as the Director of Curtin University’s Centre for Human Rights Education. His bilingual memoir/poetry collection የተስፋፈተና / Trials of Hopewon the 2024 City of Fremantle Hungerford Award (to be published by Fremantle Press in 2026). He was a 2023 Red Room Poetry Emerging Poet in Residence and one of 30 poets featured in Red Room’s ‘30in30’ National Australian Poetry Month celebrations. In Ethiopia, Yirga’s Amharic poetry was compiled and published in a solo collection titled የተራሮችጩኸት(Yeteraroch Chuhet, The Cry of Mountains), and has been performed widely on stage and radio. In Australia, his English short stories, translated poems and memoir have been published in anthologies and journals, including Westerly, Unlimited Futures (Fremantle Press) and Stories of Perth (Seizure).