As part of a doctoral thesis entitled ‘What are our secrets now? Intergenerational changes in intimate life’, this project explores how secrecy and practices of secret-keeping have shifted and evolved in Australian society. The project employs an innovative method of qualitative data re-use, eliciting responses from participants using stories and secrets collected from prior research on historical family secrets. The intergenerational nature of this study will provide insight into what is concealed or disclosed about intimate life today, what has changed (or not) over time, and how the affordances of contemporary society have impacted intimate life and secrecy.
This work is funded by way of the Dr Isabel Clifton Cookson Scholar dual-award scholarship, with the student researcher dividing their time between the University of Melbourne and the University of Manchester.