Biography and expertise
Biography
Antonia is a social anthropologist and Research Fellow with the Centre for Children and Young People (CCYP) at Southern Cross University, Australia. In 2017 she won the Higher Degrees Research Excellence Award for her PhD 'Voices from the Margin: Youth, Identity and Belonging in a Tourist Destination'. She has continued to pursue her interests in children's rights, wellbeing and participation through her involvement in large-scale research projects including several ARCs.
Antonia's work contributes to the following UN Sustainable Development Goals
Research
Antonia is passionate about working with marginalised children and young people across diverse settings, including schools, disability services, residential care, and the tourism industry. Her work is grounded in social justice and critical pedagogy with an emphasis on participatory, collaborative and ethnographic methodologies to empower children and young people to contribute to research, policy and practice. She has worked across several areas, including children's rights; identity and belonging in childhood; youth activism for sustainable tourism; youth music cultures; ethical research involving children. Antonia is currently a Research Fellow on the ARC Linkage project 'Strengthening relationships and connections for young people in therapeutic residential care.'
Community Engagement
Antonia has led collaborative projects with industry partners like Byron Youth Theatre, co-developing a training program to help young people research tourism issues in their community. Their findings inspired an original youth-led theatre production used to advocate for sustainable tourism. The performance toured local high schools in 2021 and led to the creation of a responsible tourism pledge for Byron Bay.