Diane Robin Bell OAM (born 1943) is an Australian feminist anthropologist, author, and social justice advocate.
Her academic posts included Research Fellow at the ANU (1983-6), and then as the Chair of Australian Studies at Deakin University in Geelong, where she was the first female professor on staff.
[6] In 1989, Bell moved to the United States to take up the Chair of Religion, Economic Development and Social Justice endowed by the Henry R. Luce Foundation, at the College of the Holy Cross in Worcester, Massachusetts.
As of December 2025[update] she is Emerita Professor at the ANU[10] Bell's first full-length anthropological monograph was Daughters of the Dreaming, which focused on the religious, spiritual and ceremonial lives of Aboriginal women in central Australia.
Through her research and in giving expert evidence, Bell has been able to demonstrate that Aboriginal women are owners and managers of land in their own right.
[14] Bell used an ethnographic approach to explore the commonalities of Australian women's cultures across age, time, race and region.
In 1994, a group of Ngarrindjeri women, traditional owners of the Lower River Murray, Lakes Alexandrina, and Lake Albert and the Coorong (South Australia) had objected that a proposal to build a bridge from Goolwa to Kumarangk (Hindmarsh Island) near the Murray mouth would desecrate sites sacred to them as women.
[19] However, with one exception, the women who claimed knowledge of the sacred tradition did not give evidence at the Royal Commission because they considered it to be a violation of their religious freedoms.
[23] In his 'Reasons for Decision' of August 2001, von Doussa noted 'the evidence received by the Court on this topic is significantly different to that which was before the Royal Commission.
[25][26] On 4 May 2009, "The Meeting of the Waters", the site complex the Ngarrindjeri women had sought to protect through the courts, was registered by the Government of South Australia.
[34] Bell's first published novel, Evil, addresses secrets within the Roman Catholic church and is set on the campus of a fictional American liberal arts college.
[38] Bell ran as an independent candidate in the 2008 Mayo by-election, caused by the resignation of former foreign minister and Liberal leader Alexander Downer.