{"id":638599,"date":"2026-04-29T14:32:21","date_gmt":"2026-04-29T14:32:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/638599\/"},"modified":"2026-04-29T14:32:21","modified_gmt":"2026-04-29T14:32:21","slug":"raygun-loses-job-at-aussie-university","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/638599\/","title":{"rendered":"Raygun loses job at Aussie university"},"content":{"rendered":"

Australia\u2019s most infamous breakdancer Raygun has lost her job at one of the nation\u2019s top universities.<\/p>\n

Rachael Gunn, better known as Raygun, shot to global prominence when she represented Australia in the debut Olympic breakdancing event at the 2024 Summer Olympics in Paris.<\/p>\n

Gunn made international headlines when she scored zero points for her performance with moves that imitated hopping kangaroos, wriggling snakes and the sprinkler.<\/p>\n

The performance went viral and saw her become the subject of memes from around the globe.<\/p>\n

\"Breaking<\/p>\n

Australian breakdancer Rachael Gunn, better known as Raygun, made international headlines when she scored zero points at the sports Olympic debut in Paris. Picture: Getty Images<\/p>\n

Gunn was employed as a media and popular culture lecturer at Sydney\u2019s Macquarie University, but was reportedly included in the educator\u2019s latest round of redundancies, the Australian Financial Review (AFR) reports.<\/p>\n

A Macquarie University spokesman said they were unable to comment or confirm details on the confidential employment arrangements involving individual staff.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is our standard practice for legal and privacy reasons,\u201d a spokesman said.<\/p>\n

The AFR reports lower international student numbers had led to universities across Australia look for cost saving measures, and Macquarie\u2019s Arts department was the latest to be targeted in a round of redundancies.<\/p>\n

\"Breaking<\/p>\n

The media and popular culture lecturer at Macquarie University was reportedly made redundant in the latest round of cost saving measures at Macquarie University. Picture: Getty Images<\/p>\n

According to Gunn\u2019s LinkedIn profile, she worked at the university for more than a decade, where she completed a PHD on the gender politics of Sydney\u2019s breaking culture in 2017.<\/p>\n

Her research career was built on the cultural politics of breaking and street dancing that saw her complete a study about the experience of street dancers performing in public spaces for the City of Sydney.<\/p>\n

Following Gunn\u2019s Olympic performance, Senator Gerard Rennick criticised the use of taxpayer funds on unproductive academic courses.<\/p>\n

\u201cJust how many obscure and pointless courses do universities offer that are subsidised by the taxpayer,\u201d he said in a Facebook post.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt also goes to show just because you have a PhD in something doesn\u2019t mean you are any good at it.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Breaking<\/p>\n

Dr Rachel Gunn used her fame to start a new venture on Cameo where she charged fans almost $70 for a personalised video from her. Picture: Getty Images<\/p>\n

A Macquarie University spokesman said they were unable to comment or confirm details on the confidential employment arrangements involving individual staff.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is our standard practice for legal and privacy reasons,\u201d a spokesman said.<\/p>\n

Earlier this year, Gunn used her fame to start a new venture on Cameo where she charges fans almost $70 for a personalised video.<\/p>\n

The website enables users to purchase personalised messages from celebrities, actors and athletes from across the world.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Australia\u2019s most infamous breakdancer Raygun has lost her job at one of the nation\u2019s top universities. Rachael Gunn,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":638600,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[64,63,528,309249,63335,309250,309248,16763,85],"class_list":["post-638599","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sports","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-getty-images","tag-international-headlines","tag-macquarie-university","tag-olympic-performance","tag-raygun","tag-redundancies","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/638599","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=638599"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/638599\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/638600"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=638599"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=638599"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=638599"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}