I Already Know The Name Of Your Street

Go for a walk.

Look at what’s named.

Then tell me you don’t see it.

Content Note
This podcast gets into bodies, panic attacks, trauma, sexism, mental health, and the occasional emotional sinkhole. Please look after yourself only listen when you feel safe to engage with potentially triggering material. 
Also, I swear.

Support
These aren’t here as a formality. I’ve used some of these myself.

Lifeline 13 11 14 (24/7)
Kids Helpline 1800 55 1800 (ages 5–25)
1800RESPECT 1800 737 732
Emergency 000

Outside Australia, local crisis services are available.

The Socials (I'd love a follow) 
Instagram
https://www.instagram.com/catharine.redden/

LinkedIn
https://www.linkedin.com/in/catharine-redden/

Support The Pod
Substack (where I write stuff)
https://catharineredden.substack.com

Buy Me a Coffee (where you can financially support the pod, and me!)
https://buymeacoffee.com/CatharineRedden

Credits
Recorded on the lands of the Ramindjeri and Ngarrindjeri peoples.
Sovereignty never ceded.

Recorded & edited at Ridley Farm Studio by Luke Ridley
https://ridleyfarmstudio.com.au...

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:03

If I asked you to name five streets near your house, how many of them would be named after women? Oh, I thought I was just going for a walk. Turns out I accidentally ordered to the patriarchy. And it's got a very particular naming convention. There's this idea that to name something is to define it. Ooh, and I first heard that about 500 years ago when I was at university working at Dimmix in Rundlemore. We're at the Christmas party, which was in October, because retail, and one of the staff, she was doing a PhD in English literature. She was very bright and very funny, and I was very in awe of her. I think I wanted to be her. And she said, just in passing, to name something is to define it. But when she said that, something shifted. I started noticing names, what things were called, wondering why they were called that. And it's kind of become a quiet little hobby of mine ever since. Now, before I take you on the walk that I went on, I want to give you three quotes. To sort of set the tone for the walk and what I observed and perhaps what you might observe as you go around, or if you go around noticing the names of things. The first one's from the fiction writer Ursula K. LeGuin. To name is to control. Then we've got Michael Foucault Foucault Foukou the philosopher. What gets named becomes real. What becomes real gets remembered. And then lastly, Adrienne Rich. This is from Adrienne Rich. This is the oppressor's language, yet I need it to talk to you. On Thursday, the 9th of April, I decided to test a theory. I was lying in bed and I thought, right, today I'm gonna go on an expedition. I'm really gonna draw this thing up. From the moment my feet hit the floor, I'm gonna notice what things are called. What they're labelled. Not analyze, not argue, try and not argue, just notice. So I got up and I made my iced coffee, which I do every morning because my life has devolved really rapidly. I have three shots of decaf, sugar, and cream. Do not judge me, do not ask any questions, but I'm telling you it's fabulous. And the cream was bulla, which is a big dairy brand in Australia, and I thought, here we go, here we go. Is that named after a man? I looked it up. No, bulla is an Aboriginal word meaning two. Okay, okay. Score one for reality, zero for Catherine, and then I had a shower. My shampoo is called Cookie with a K, and it's by the way, woman-owned, excellent. Tragically, this is an unpaid sponsorship, but no, honestly, if you want a bar shampoo that's amazing, this thing's changed my hair, it's fantastic. Oh, and on the sponsorship thing, I'm really open to offers, you know. And then I looked at the labels on things that I was using um in my shower and afterwards, Cera V, Argan Oil, Colgate, Oral B, Dove. And I realised I am not seeing a lot of male names here. If anything, neutral or slightly feminised. And I thought, oof, perhaps I've really made this stuff up in my head. Oh, and then I thought, here we go. I picked up my brush. Tony and Guy. T O N I. I thought, yes, possibly a woman. And Guy, probably not. And then I left the house slightly humbled, but things took a turn, pun intended. We went down Kent Drive. We went down Victor Street, we went down George Street, we went past Hungry Jack's, McDonald's, Kentucky Fried Chicken. I dropped mum off at St. Vincent de Paul for her volunteer shift. And I thought, yeah, this is exactly what I thought I was gonna find. After I dropped mum off at Vinnie's, oh, by the way, St. Vincent de Paul is the best op shop on the Flurio Peninsula, it smells clean. Which, if you go op shopping enough, you know that it's a major boon to have a shop that smells clean, everything's tidy, everything's in perfect condition, the staff are wonderful. Highly recommend St. Vincent de Paul and Victor Harbour. After I've dropped mum off, I went to Port Elliot, you know, because it's where I like to go. And it's a beautiful I went to Horseshoe Bay actually because it's a beautiful bay. Um I sit there and pretend that I'm thinking deeply, as normally I just turn my radio up and sing to the Spice Girls. But this morning I thought, no, no, I'm here for purpose. And I got out of the car and tried to look at things around me. And the first thing I thought, the first thing I saw was a sign called the Maritime Heritage Trail. I'm not recording this again, I'm just not. The Maritime Heritage Trail. And and it was a sign that explained the different points on the trail. When it talked about any human, it talked about a man. The names of the ships were all masculine names. Look, and I know what you're thinking, it's history. I mean, yep, but I'm not analysing, I'm just noticing. And then I walked up to the soldiers' memorial gardens, which are beautiful, by the way. I love botanical gardens, memorial gardens, war memorial gardens, give me a garden, and I'm happy, Catherine. And I sort of knew in the back of my mind what I was going to find, but I really wanted to experience it on the ground. You know, and it talked about there were plaques for the Vietnam War, the Korean War, World War I, and World War II, and all of the plaques said to those who gave their lives. But I think what's implicit there is that there are men that gave their lives because women could not fight on the front lines, Australian women could not fight on the front lines in the Vietnam War, the Korean War, World War I, or World War II. So whilst it said those who gave their lives, it implies men. And then as I walked further along, there are a lot of date palms, inexplicably, for our climate, but there are a lot of date palms, and each palm tree had a plaque to a particular person who had lost their life in those wars. Douglas, Gordon, Raymond, Howard, William, Roy. I mean, if yes, again, you you're going to say to me, but Catherine, that was the war. It might be different if it was the Afghanistan war, although I don't think so. If we participate in a war in 2026 because of what's going on between America and Iran, perhaps it will be different. What's also interesting about War Memorial Gardens and Soldiers Memorial Gardens is not just who we remember and who we don't. But it's also who we don't commemorate. So we don't commemorate the women who stayed behind, the women who raised the children, the women who get who kept everything going, the women who took over men's jobs to run the country, the women who baked the bloody Anzac biscuits and sent them to Gallipoli. We don't talk about the heartbroken women who lost their boyfriends and their fiancees. We don't talk about the women who lost their fathers. We don't talk about the women who lost their sons. We don't talk about the women who, after having a job for four years that kept the country going, were forced to give it up when the men came home from the war. They're not named. So does that mean that they don't exist at all? Another place women aren't is in the unpaid housework and childcare that they do. Another place women aren't is in the pain that we suffer when we have periods and give birth and go through IVF and we are told to suck it up most of the time. I will grant you that sometimes women, I mean often women are given painkillers in childbirth, but it's not enough. Look, and this podcast is not Rage Bay. I'm on an expedition, and I invite you to go on one too the next time you go for a walk, the next time you go for a drive. Notice what things are called, what things are labeled. Ask yourself what's here and what's not here. And another thing is by the end of the walk, something else became very, very clear. When we name things you can buy, they're neutral. The names of those things are neutral and sometimes feminized. But when we name things in public, the things we honour, the things we are memb, the things we remember, they are overwhelmingly white and male. I really want to mention at this point too, that Aboriginal men went and fought and died for Australia in all those wars I mentioned. And in the First World War and the Second World War, Aboriginal men and women were not counted as people in Australia. They were counted as stock. And nowhere is there a plaque. Is there a plaque that explains this? And that, my friends, is what's called the fucking whitewashing of history. Aboriginal men went and fought and died alongside other Aussie blokes. And when those other Aussie blokes came home, they got given parcels of land. This was not afforded to Aboriginal men. I wanted to go for a walk. It turns out I was walking through a map of what mattered. Or a map of who matters. And I'm not sure I like what that map says. I'm Catherine Redden, and this is the C word.