Crystal McKinnon

Dr Crystal McKinnon is a Yamatji woman and an academic, researcher and community organiser. She is a an Associate Professor of History, Law and Justice at University of Melbourne. She has extensive experience working in both the Aboriginal community organisation and the community legal centre sectors. Her research work looks at Indigenous sovereignty, law and justice matters, and Indigenous social movements, resistance and protest.

Articles by Crystal McKinnon:

31 January 202531 January 2025 · Racism

The QUT Symposium: holding the line against rising racism

Elizabeth Strakosch, Jordy Silverstein, Crystal McKinnon, Eugenia Flynn, Natalie Ironfield, Holly Charles, Priya Kunjan, Roj Amedi and Lina Koleilat

Last weeks's QUT Symposium met in the staunch tradition of the Brisbane Blacks, who have fought for sovereignty, land rights, liberation and an end to racial violence for decades. It was a gathering of Elders, academics, organisers and frontline community workers who speak, theorise and embody the truth about race and racism in this place. It refused to clothe itself in multicultural platitudes about tolerance, or to speak about racism only in terms of individual prejudice.

7 February 202322 February 2023 · Black Lives Matter

Victoria police back down, is this a case for defunding?

Crystal McKinnon and Meriki Onus

After three arduous years, Victoria Police have today withdrawn their charges against two organisers of the 2020 Black Lives Matter protest. Whilst we welcome their decision, we note that their mediocrity gave them no other option. Emboldened by their state-sanctioned impunity, Victoria Police’s ineptitude hit a dead end. Pigs cannot fly.