Create an experience with Shanell Dargan

Shanell Dargan went viral in 2014 when her audition for singing show The X Factor brought the house down. Mentored by Ronan Keating, Dargan made the final stages of the competition, one of the last six female contestants who flew to New York to sing in front of John Legend.

Now, 10 years later, Shanell Dargan plans to become the first Indigenous Australian female world champion boxer. She pulled on the boxing gloves as a way to find resilience due to the domestic violence she was enduring at home. Quitting her job in child protection to become a professional fighter.

On three weeks’ notice, she made her debut against Ashleigh Sims in April, in what has entered folklore as the greatest female boxing match witnessed in Australia. It finished as a draw after four rounds, and plans are underway to stage a rematch in December.

But Dargan, a super-featherweight (59kg) plans to fight well before then, and in doing so, wants to inspire other women who are also suffering domestic violence.

“The goal is that I want to be the first Indigenous female world champion”

Dargan feels a close connection to her Wiradjuri and Mununjali roots, but that has largely been made possible by the Irish grandmother who raised her.