Adele Chynoweth OAM began her career as a teacher in secondary schools and vocational education. She furthered her studies and completed her PhD in performance studies. Her professional theatre directing credits include State Theatre SA, Vitalstatistix – National Women’s Theatre, the 3rd International Women’s Playwrights Conference and the Adelaide College of the Arts. In 2016, Adele was commissioned by the Street Theatre to develop and direct a new work, Under Sedation: Canberra Verse Remixed. Adele was also employed as part of the creative team commissioned to create the Memory Museum for the Centenary of Federation of Australia and later as a curator for the National Museum of Australia’s touring exhibition Inside: Life in Children’s Homes and Institutions. Adele was also employed as an international consultant for Welfare Stories: from the Edge of Society, a social history and justice project undertaken in Denmark, a collaboration between the Welfare Museum, Svendborg; the Prison Museum, Horsens; and. the Centre for Welfare State Research, University of Southern Denmark. Adele has also undertaken research and policy development for the Department of Education (Australian Government).

Adele was a lecturer in the Centre for Heritage and Museum Studies at the ANU and received the Vice Chancellor’s Award for Public Policy and Outreach in 2018. In 2020, Adele was admitted as a Fellow of the Higher Education Academy (UK). Her book Goodna Girls: A History of Children in a Queensland Mental Asylum (ANU Press) was shortlisted in 2021 for the Scholarly Nonfiction Book of the Year (Educational Publishing Awards Australia - EPAA). In 2020, Adele was awarded the Medal of the Order of Australia for service to public history. She is also the writer, director and producer of the documentary feature film Eighty Twenty: Mark Opitz Remembers (2023).