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Archive for December, 2014

Lovely review of book from Elizabeth Lhuede – so gratifying to find it really can be read by people outside the academic or PR fields (my secret wish).

Devoted Eclectic

This book builds on a lifetime of reading, writing, thinking, dreaming, failing, starting again, denying, confronting, shifting and teaching.

Public Relations Ethics FawkesIf anyone had told me at the beginning of the year that I’d end up reading for pleasure – make that, devouring – a Jungian book on public relations, I’d have said they were dreaming. That was before I met Blue Mountains resident, writer and academic, Johanna Fawkes.

In her book Public Relations Ethics and Professionalism: The shadow of excellence, Fawkes writes much how she speaks, with intelligence, intuition and poetic flair. As the opening lines quoted above suggest, she is no stranger to nuances of language. She revels in them. It’s a feature of her writing that betrays the fact that she is not only a Senior Lecturer in Public Relations at Charles Sturt University, she is also a prize-winning writer, having completed a Masters in Creative Writing at…

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Lovely gathering of friends, colleagues and students today at St James Ethics centre in Sydney CBD. The centre’s director, Dr Simon Longstaff, talked about the importance of ethics in helping us understand and negotiate complex relationships in contemporary society, including the bond between professions and social values. Professor Andy Vann, Vice Chancellor of Charles Sturt University, was generous in his comments about the book, including the autobiographical approach. I particularly liked his explanation that CSU’s mission to be a university of (and for)  the professions requires that we educate students to lead and develop their fields, not merely reproduce current practice. Both agreed the book is timely and welcomed a new approach to these issues, given the inadequacies of the old ones. But going back further, and deeper, Andy referred to the Wiradjiri notion of ‘yindyamarra winhanga-nha’ (‘the wisdom of respectfully knowing how to live well in a world worth living in’). This requires humility and self-awareness, the notions I see as central to depth ethics.

Writing a book, as I said at the do, involves long periods of isolation, boredom, despair and exhaustion, so it was really moving to celebrate its release into the world with fellow dreamers and writers as well as academics and students. As well as the kind introduction by the VC, I was delighted that Prof Jim McNamara from UTS, Julian Kenney from the PRIA, and the Australian Council’s new Chair of Literature, Charlotte Wood, could attend. Colleagues, doctoral students and friends came from Brisbane, Wollongong, Bathurst, Katoomba and Sydney for the event – so grateful that they made the effort to share this moment.

Dr Simon Longstaff, JO Fawkes, Prof. Andy  Vann

Dr Simon Longstaff, Jo Fawkes, Prof. Andy Vann

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Very chuffed that CSU’s Vice Chancellor, Prof Andy Vann, will be launching my book at the St James Ethics Centre next Tuesday. It’s great to have such support from my university. The Media Office have produced a nice release for the do:

book release

If any of my FB or LinkedIn friends & contacts are in the Sydney area then, please see this invite and respond to Donald Alexander.

Book launch

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