Jon Willis is a public health anthropologist with a longstanding interest in the interaction between modern medical technologies and the lived cultures of those living with chronic illness.
AlterNative: An International Journal of Indigenous Peoples, 2022
This study aimed to determine whether mandatory or non-mandatory cultural safety training would b... more This study aimed to determine whether mandatory or non-mandatory cultural safety training would be more effective to address a lack of cultural safety for Indigenous students in tertiary education. Two electronic databases were systematically searched, and articles were included based on reference to mandatory or non-mandatory cultural safety training, and respective outcomes for Indigenous students. Findings were mixed, whereby studies with both mandatory and non-mandatory cultural safety training have proven successful, suggesting potential for a mixed-methods model to be effective. Effectiveness can also be dependent on the context of the study and its associated delivery methods. These findings suggest that how cultural safety training is implemented may be more influential than whether or not it is mandated. This is a potential research topic for future studies that look at cultural safety for Indigenous peoples.
This discussion paper is from The University of Queensland’s Water for Equity and Wellbeing Initi... more This discussion paper is from The University of Queensland’s Water for Equity and Wellbeing Initiative. It was developed to consider Australia’s efforts to achieve the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals in Australia and within the broader Asia-Pacific region. It focuses particularly on those SDGs that are concerned with water, and it challengesthe current steps being undertaken towards attaining the SDGs in both Australia and overseas. The recommendationsidentify the most influential and critical SDGs that affect the attainment of the water, sanitation and hygiene goal – and, in doing so, the influence of the other goals, and identify plausible pathways for cross-government responsibility for attaining the SDGs.
This handbook on Australia features accounts of every region, from Tasmania to the Tropics, and t... more This handbook on Australia features accounts of every region, from Tasmania to the Tropics, and topics from trekking in the national parks to cafe society in Melbourne. It covers practicalities with recommendations of the best places to stay, eat and drink and it includes information on how to get around. It gives advice on all the activities - whether it is diving on the Great Barrier Reef, driving across the Outback, bungee-jumping or just cruising around Sydney Harbour. Coverage of the essential background, with topics as diverse as local food and wine, the natural environment, aboriginal issues and Australian film, is included.
Australia is positioned next to south-east Asia, where one billion people lack access to adequate... more Australia is positioned next to south-east Asia, where one billion people lack access to adequate sanitation facilities. Only half the population in the Pacific Island countries have access to such facilities, while poor hygiene and unsanitary living conditions have contributed to children in remote Australian Aboriginal communities experiencing a higher rate of common infectious diseases than in large urban communities. In 2015, the UN updated its development agenda, outlining 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) to be achieved in all countries globally by 2030. The SDGs included a goal specifically focused on water and sanitation (SDG 6), to ‘ensure access to water and sanitation for all’
This is the third SDG discussion paper from UQ in Water for Equity and Wellbeing Series, and was ... more This is the third SDG discussion paper from UQ in Water for Equity and Wellbeing Series, and was undertaken as a transdisciplinary review by 12 researchers across UQ with backgrounds in community development, social science, public health, integrated water resources management, policy and systems thinking. The combined research investigated the SDG6 target of ‘community participation’, which was identified by the UN to recognise that communities can affect the long-term success and impact of water, sanitation and hygiene (WaSH) projects. Community participation is also a target to achieve the related UN SDGs for gender equity (SDG5.5) and urban planning (SDG11.3). An investigation of 60 WaSH projects found that community participation approaches often occurred too late and on low-level decisions. Instead, we argue that the UN target of SDG6b presents an opportunity to design policies and procedures that serve as a mechanism to engage communities at earlier points in the timeline – where the scope of decisions is greater. This discussion paper presents four specific recommendations to improve the quality and impact of community participation in sustainable development, including in WaSH projects: Recommendation 1: Develop a common definition, framework and principles for community participation in WaSH. Recommendation 2: Ensure that the community participation approach for WaSH is designed to include five key elements: establishing an agreed participation objective; ensuring inclusiveness; providing information and capacity building; enabling spaces for dialogue; and ensuring transparency; and that it involves a ‘bottom-up’ approach. Recommendation 3: Provide meaningful community participation opportunities as early as possible in the development of WaSH projects. Recommendation 4: Establish robust indicators to monitor community participation in WaSH, and document participation from a community perspective to improve future efforts.
International Journal of Workplace Health Management, 2014
Purpose – Factors for successful workplace health promotion (WHP) are well described in the liter... more Purpose – Factors for successful workplace health promotion (WHP) are well described in the literature, but often sourced from evaluations of wellness programmes. Less well understood are the features of an organisation that contribute to employee health which are not part of a health promotion programme. The purpose of this paper is to inform policy on best practice principles and provide real life examples of health promotion in regional Victorian workplaces. Design/methodology/approach – Individual case studies were conducted on three organisations, each with a health and wellbeing programme in place. In total, 42 employers and employees participated in a face to face interview. Interviews were transcribed verbatim and the qualitative data were thematically coded. Findings – Employers and senior management had a greater focus on occupational health and safety than employees, who felt that mental/emotional health and happiness were the areas most benefited by a health promoting wo...
Critical theorists from Walter Benjamin to Arthur Kroker and Debra Lupton have commented on how e... more Critical theorists from Walter Benjamin to Arthur Kroker and Debra Lupton have commented on how end-of-century or end-of-millennium social anxieties manifest in crises of social or subjective integrity including widespread social panic responses to perceived threats to such integrity. During the last 2 decades we have seen such a response to a range of public health issues, including obesity, drug use in sport, binge drinking, rural mental health, and the sexual health of social minorities. In this series of autoethnographic reflections, based in the framework of analytic autoethnography established by Leon Anderson (2006), I examine the impact of these panic discourses on the experience of living with a chronic disease. Particularly I examine the medicalization of HIV-infected bodies, the surveillance and governance of HIV-positive bodies, and the systematic distortions to self-care that result from the internalization of tropes of toxic or panic bodies. I also explore the possibilities for an emancipatory resistance to these tropes, and the place of hope and public health citizenship in the subjectivities of the chronically ill.
AlterNative: An International Journal of Indigenous Peoples, 2022
This study aimed to determine whether mandatory or non-mandatory cultural safety training would b... more This study aimed to determine whether mandatory or non-mandatory cultural safety training would be more effective to address a lack of cultural safety for Indigenous students in tertiary education. Two electronic databases were systematically searched, and articles were included based on reference to mandatory or non-mandatory cultural safety training, and respective outcomes for Indigenous students. Findings were mixed, whereby studies with both mandatory and non-mandatory cultural safety training have proven successful, suggesting potential for a mixed-methods model to be effective. Effectiveness can also be dependent on the context of the study and its associated delivery methods. These findings suggest that how cultural safety training is implemented may be more influential than whether or not it is mandated. This is a potential research topic for future studies that look at cultural safety for Indigenous peoples.
This discussion paper is from The University of Queensland’s Water for Equity and Wellbeing Initi... more This discussion paper is from The University of Queensland’s Water for Equity and Wellbeing Initiative. It was developed to consider Australia’s efforts to achieve the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals in Australia and within the broader Asia-Pacific region. It focuses particularly on those SDGs that are concerned with water, and it challengesthe current steps being undertaken towards attaining the SDGs in both Australia and overseas. The recommendationsidentify the most influential and critical SDGs that affect the attainment of the water, sanitation and hygiene goal – and, in doing so, the influence of the other goals, and identify plausible pathways for cross-government responsibility for attaining the SDGs.
This handbook on Australia features accounts of every region, from Tasmania to the Tropics, and t... more This handbook on Australia features accounts of every region, from Tasmania to the Tropics, and topics from trekking in the national parks to cafe society in Melbourne. It covers practicalities with recommendations of the best places to stay, eat and drink and it includes information on how to get around. It gives advice on all the activities - whether it is diving on the Great Barrier Reef, driving across the Outback, bungee-jumping or just cruising around Sydney Harbour. Coverage of the essential background, with topics as diverse as local food and wine, the natural environment, aboriginal issues and Australian film, is included.
Australia is positioned next to south-east Asia, where one billion people lack access to adequate... more Australia is positioned next to south-east Asia, where one billion people lack access to adequate sanitation facilities. Only half the population in the Pacific Island countries have access to such facilities, while poor hygiene and unsanitary living conditions have contributed to children in remote Australian Aboriginal communities experiencing a higher rate of common infectious diseases than in large urban communities. In 2015, the UN updated its development agenda, outlining 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) to be achieved in all countries globally by 2030. The SDGs included a goal specifically focused on water and sanitation (SDG 6), to ‘ensure access to water and sanitation for all’
This is the third SDG discussion paper from UQ in Water for Equity and Wellbeing Series, and was ... more This is the third SDG discussion paper from UQ in Water for Equity and Wellbeing Series, and was undertaken as a transdisciplinary review by 12 researchers across UQ with backgrounds in community development, social science, public health, integrated water resources management, policy and systems thinking. The combined research investigated the SDG6 target of ‘community participation’, which was identified by the UN to recognise that communities can affect the long-term success and impact of water, sanitation and hygiene (WaSH) projects. Community participation is also a target to achieve the related UN SDGs for gender equity (SDG5.5) and urban planning (SDG11.3). An investigation of 60 WaSH projects found that community participation approaches often occurred too late and on low-level decisions. Instead, we argue that the UN target of SDG6b presents an opportunity to design policies and procedures that serve as a mechanism to engage communities at earlier points in the timeline – where the scope of decisions is greater. This discussion paper presents four specific recommendations to improve the quality and impact of community participation in sustainable development, including in WaSH projects: Recommendation 1: Develop a common definition, framework and principles for community participation in WaSH. Recommendation 2: Ensure that the community participation approach for WaSH is designed to include five key elements: establishing an agreed participation objective; ensuring inclusiveness; providing information and capacity building; enabling spaces for dialogue; and ensuring transparency; and that it involves a ‘bottom-up’ approach. Recommendation 3: Provide meaningful community participation opportunities as early as possible in the development of WaSH projects. Recommendation 4: Establish robust indicators to monitor community participation in WaSH, and document participation from a community perspective to improve future efforts.
International Journal of Workplace Health Management, 2014
Purpose – Factors for successful workplace health promotion (WHP) are well described in the liter... more Purpose – Factors for successful workplace health promotion (WHP) are well described in the literature, but often sourced from evaluations of wellness programmes. Less well understood are the features of an organisation that contribute to employee health which are not part of a health promotion programme. The purpose of this paper is to inform policy on best practice principles and provide real life examples of health promotion in regional Victorian workplaces. Design/methodology/approach – Individual case studies were conducted on three organisations, each with a health and wellbeing programme in place. In total, 42 employers and employees participated in a face to face interview. Interviews were transcribed verbatim and the qualitative data were thematically coded. Findings – Employers and senior management had a greater focus on occupational health and safety than employees, who felt that mental/emotional health and happiness were the areas most benefited by a health promoting wo...
Critical theorists from Walter Benjamin to Arthur Kroker and Debra Lupton have commented on how e... more Critical theorists from Walter Benjamin to Arthur Kroker and Debra Lupton have commented on how end-of-century or end-of-millennium social anxieties manifest in crises of social or subjective integrity including widespread social panic responses to perceived threats to such integrity. During the last 2 decades we have seen such a response to a range of public health issues, including obesity, drug use in sport, binge drinking, rural mental health, and the sexual health of social minorities. In this series of autoethnographic reflections, based in the framework of analytic autoethnography established by Leon Anderson (2006), I examine the impact of these panic discourses on the experience of living with a chronic disease. Particularly I examine the medicalization of HIV-infected bodies, the surveillance and governance of HIV-positive bodies, and the systematic distortions to self-care that result from the internalization of tropes of toxic or panic bodies. I also explore the possibilities for an emancipatory resistance to these tropes, and the place of hope and public health citizenship in the subjectivities of the chronically ill.
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Papers by Jon M Willis