Research output per year
Research output per year
Higher Degrees Research (HDR) Convenor (A/g)
Research activity per year
Laura Dawes is an award-winning historian, author and broadcaster, who is devoted to the vibrant communication of the history of science, medicine and the law to the general public. Her research, writing and teaching investigates the history of modern science and particularly the history of medicine and the law, with a focus on public outputs and engagement. She previously worked in the media, in print, radio and television, and was awarded the Wellcome Trust/Guardian Science Writing Prize and the ABC Best Half Hour of Local Radio. Her history and science documentaries have been broadcast on, for example, PBS, the History Channel, BBC, and Smithsonian Television. Laura regularly speaks and writes in the media and to the general community on a variety of medical, scientific and legal topics.
Dr Dawes's first book, CHILDHOOD OBESITY IN AMERICA: BIOGRAPHY OF AN EPIDEMIC, was published to wide acclaim in 2014. Her second book FIGHTING FIT: THE WARTIME BATTLE FOR BRITAIN’S HEALTH was shortllisted for ACT Book of the Year. Laura holds a PhD from Harvard University in History of Science, a Masters degree from Oxford University and a Bachelors degree in physics and mathematics from Murdoch University in Western Australia. She has received numerous awards, prizes and fellowships, including Vice-Chancellor's Awards for Academic Excellence, the Frank Gillespie Prize, the Ronald Searcy Prize, the Parnell O'Connor Prize for creative writing, and the Forbes Society award in Legal History.
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Grants
PhD (Harvard) - History of Science
MSc (Oxon) - Economic and Social History
BSc (hons) (Murdoch) - Mathematics/Statistics and Physics (University Medal)
My particular area of expertise is the intersection of the history of science/medicine, public policy and the law. My research focuses on the public communication of science/medicine and public health, and also communication to specialized audiences outside of science, including the use of science/medicine in the law. My publications have included a study of the communication and reception of the theory of continental drift, the childhood obesity epidemic, public health as wartime strategy, patient activism, alternative health, medicine and the US space program, the rhetoric of climate change, and the use of the law to communicate and advance health policy.
Member, Australia New Zealand Legal History Society
Member, Australia New Zealand Society for the History of Medicine
Member, Australian Historical Association
Member, Australian Society of Authors
Member, Australian Writers Guild
Petherick Reader, National Library of Australia
Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review
Research output: Other contribution
Research output: Contribution to specialist publication › General Article
Research output: Contribution to specialist publication › General Article
Research output: Working paper