Tanja Dreher
Dr Tanja Dreher is a Lecturer in Media and Communications, specialising in International Communications and media and multiculturalism. Dr Dreher’s research focuses on the politics of listening in the context of media and multiculturalism, Indigenous sovereignties and feminisms and anti-racism. Tanja is a co-convenor of The Listening Project exploring the practices, technologies and politics of listening as political practice. Tanja’s particular interest lies in listening across difference and the politics of recognition in listening for media justice. Her previous research has focused on news and cultural diversity, community media interventions, experiences of racism and the development of community anti-racism strategies after September 11, 2001. Tanja has worked closely with diverse communities in western Sydney through collaborative research with Arab and Muslim communities and with media and community arts organisations. Dr Dreher has previously worked as ARC Postdoctoral Fellow and as the Research Manager at the UTS Shopfront community engagement program.
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SIDS communities as climate “refugees,” and SIDS as travel destinations. Yet these frames undermine the desire of SIDS communities to be seen as proactive, self determining, and active agents of change. This paper explores the way in which Pacific
Islanders view the existing media coverage of their concerns over climate change and how they would prefer the media to tell their stories. Through an action research collaboration with a climate change non-governmental organization working in Kiribati and Australia, participants proposed alternative frames for climate justice media, including frames of human rights, active change agents, and migration with dignity.
But there is limited understanding about how Indigenous
voices are heard at times of major policy reform, and whether
increased participation in digital media necessarily leads to
increased democratic participation. Leading Indigenous
commentators in Australia suggest an inability of governments and other influential players to listen sits at the heart of the failure of Indigenous policy. This article presents two contemporary Australian case studies that showcase Indigenous participatory media response to government policy initiatives: first, the diverse reaction in social media to the government-sponsored campaign for constitutional reform to acknowledge Australia’s First Peoples, branded as Recognise and second, the social media-driven movement #sosblakaustralia, protesting against the forced closure
of remote Aboriginal communities. This article brings together
theories of political participation, media change and listening to
ask whether key democratic institutions, including the mainstream news media and political decision-makers, can engage with the proliferation of Indigenous voices enabled by participatory media. We argue that while the digital media environment allows diverse Indigenous voices to be represented, recent scholarship on participation and listening extends the analysis to ask which voices are heard as politics is increasingly mediatized.
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Mass media is a key tool by which environmental interventions, such as Marine Protected Areas (MPAs) are communicated to the public. The way in which local news outlets present and explain MPAs to local communities is likely to be influential in determining how they respond to the proposal. In particular the tendency of news media to focus on areas of conflict and dispute ensures ideology and politics play a central role in reporting of MPA proposals, often simplifying debate into an 'us versus them' or 'fishers versus conservationists' ideological conflict. This can lead to the outright rejection of an MPA or undermine acceptance of the park within local communities. The media coverage of two marine parks in NSW, Australia was compared to determine the way in which news presented the parks to each community and how this may have influenced public acceptance of the parks. In particular the study examined the role ideology and politics played in the news coverage of each park by investigating the way in which the news was framed and the positions of key media spokespeople. Media coverage of the Batemans Marine Park appears to have been highly politicised and heavily influenced by the strong convictions of a small handful of prominent spokespeople. By way of contrast media coverage of the Port Stephens Great Lakes Marine Park was more nuanced and drew from a wide range of sources. This research provides insight into how areas of conflict could be reframed as opportunities that enhance MPA planning exercises and highlights how ideology can help shape community sentiment. Acknowledging the role of ideology in contested areas such as these allows for the development of strategies that can accommodate as well as moderate its influence. These strategies may include the incorporation of 'bottom up' approaches into MPA planning, the promotion and support of a range of voices within the community, and seeking out and building upon common ground and shared values.
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The continual rise of participatory, media offers increasing opportunities for nonprofessionals and marginalised communities to tell their stories. In the policy arena, Australia's Social Inclusion Agenda and international debates on indicators of well-being name 'voice' as a key capability for social inclusion and individual flourishing. In this article, I engage recent scholarship on 'listening' and 'voice that matters' to highlight the limits of the participatory media genre of digital storytelling and of the social inclusion category of 'voice'. The discussion is illustrated via examples from public launch events for 'mini-films' produced in digital storytelling projects facilitated by Information Cultural Exchange (ICE), a new media arts organisation working in Sydney's cosmopolitan western suburbs. While these public events ensure a process of 'voice', I argue for a greater commitment to political listening in media research, practice and policy, lest the promise of 'voice' remain only partially fulfilled.
and the limitations of working for media change in the context of the ‘war on terror’ and the ‘globalisation of the Muslim Other’ (Hage, 2007). The opening sections discuss the concept of ‘community media interventions’ and provide an overview of media intervention strategies among racialized communities in Sydney, Australia since 11 September 2001. The concluding
sections sketch the many limitations of and dilemmas for media interventions as strategies for responding to racialized media. I argue that, in order to adequately understand and contribute to struggles for media change, media research needs to attend to the politics of ‘listening’ in addition to the dynamics of ‘speaking up’. Crucially, attention to listening shifts the focus and responsibility for change from marginalized voices and on to the conventions, institutions and privileges which shape who and what can be heard in media.
also examines representation and critiques examples stereotyping and racialization. This paper extends these discussions to focus on questions of ‘listening’. Attention to
listening provokes important questions about media and multiculturalism: how do media enable or constrain listening across difference? Drawing on recent work in postcolonial
feminism and political theory, this paper explores the productive possibilities of a shift beyond the politics of voice to explore ‘listening across difference’ in media studies and
media advocacy work. To highlight listening shifts some of the focus and responsibility for change from marginalized voices and on to the conventions, institutions and privileges which shape who and what can be heard in the media.
speaking/listening binary.
The project, known as ‘Fairfield Stories’, involved training young people to use digital technologies to produce short documentaries about their lives to be screened, in the first
instance, to family and friends. The project forms one part of Tiffany’s wider commitment to developing citizens’ media initiatives and civic engagement in Fairfield, one of the most culturally diverse Local Government Areas in Australia.
and Muslim Australians as an exception and even a threat to harmonious community relations. Particularly striking was the anxiety and anger caused by their apparent large numbers, seen to be taking over certain public recreational spaces. This paper explores the contradictions in these findings in light of other contemporary Australian research and identifies complex and difficult issues to be addressed by research and by local
government. In particular, the paper discusses the need to address the interconnections between both everyday multiculturalisms and everyday racisms, to distinguish between
‘victim’ claims amongst diverse communities, and to ground research and policies on ‘place-sharing’ in Indigenous sovereignties.
- - -
Recent accounts of Habermas's conception of the public sphere concern the interlocking of multiple networks and spaces. In a global context new interfaces between existing (counter-) public spheres can lead to multiple counter-publics. This article explores this phenomenon through the examination of the communicative spaces that offer alternatives to Australia's mainstream public sphere from three different strands of Sydney's community media: diasporic media (Assyrian Radio SBS), Indigenous media (Koori Radio) and discursive sites that operate in between ethnic and mainstream media (Forum for Australia's Islamic Relations).
This article explores this phenomenon through the examination of the communicative spaces that offer alternatives to Australia’s mainstream public sphere from three different strands of Sydney’s community media: diasporic media (Assyrian Radio SBS), Indigenous media (Koori Radio) and discursive sites that operate in between ethnic and mainstream media (Forum for Australia’s Islamic Relations).
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Headscarves in schools. Sexual violence in Indigenous communities. Muslim women at public swimming pools, Polygamy. Sharia law. Outspoken Imams on sexual assualt. Integration and respect for women. It seems that around the world in the media and public debate, women's issues are at the top of the agenda. Yet all too often, support for women's rights is proclaimed loudest by conservative politicians intent on policing communities and demonising Muslims during the 'war on terror'. This edition of the Transorming Cultures eJournal offers critical reflections on the contemporary politics of gender, race and religion, and provides a platorm for those perspectives which are too often sidelined in the debate, perspectives that seek to go beyond simplistic debates such as 'hijab: to ban or not to ban?' or "Muslim women: oppressed or liberated?'
SIDS communities as climate “refugees,” and SIDS as travel destinations. Yet these frames undermine the desire of SIDS communities to be seen as proactive, self determining, and active agents of change. This paper explores the way in which Pacific
Islanders view the existing media coverage of their concerns over climate change and how they would prefer the media to tell their stories. Through an action research collaboration with a climate change non-governmental organization working in Kiribati and Australia, participants proposed alternative frames for climate justice media, including frames of human rights, active change agents, and migration with dignity.
But there is limited understanding about how Indigenous
voices are heard at times of major policy reform, and whether
increased participation in digital media necessarily leads to
increased democratic participation. Leading Indigenous
commentators in Australia suggest an inability of governments and other influential players to listen sits at the heart of the failure of Indigenous policy. This article presents two contemporary Australian case studies that showcase Indigenous participatory media response to government policy initiatives: first, the diverse reaction in social media to the government-sponsored campaign for constitutional reform to acknowledge Australia’s First Peoples, branded as Recognise and second, the social media-driven movement #sosblakaustralia, protesting against the forced closure
of remote Aboriginal communities. This article brings together
theories of political participation, media change and listening to
ask whether key democratic institutions, including the mainstream news media and political decision-makers, can engage with the proliferation of Indigenous voices enabled by participatory media. We argue that while the digital media environment allows diverse Indigenous voices to be represented, recent scholarship on participation and listening extends the analysis to ask which voices are heard as politics is increasingly mediatized.
- - -
Mass media is a key tool by which environmental interventions, such as Marine Protected Areas (MPAs) are communicated to the public. The way in which local news outlets present and explain MPAs to local communities is likely to be influential in determining how they respond to the proposal. In particular the tendency of news media to focus on areas of conflict and dispute ensures ideology and politics play a central role in reporting of MPA proposals, often simplifying debate into an 'us versus them' or 'fishers versus conservationists' ideological conflict. This can lead to the outright rejection of an MPA or undermine acceptance of the park within local communities. The media coverage of two marine parks in NSW, Australia was compared to determine the way in which news presented the parks to each community and how this may have influenced public acceptance of the parks. In particular the study examined the role ideology and politics played in the news coverage of each park by investigating the way in which the news was framed and the positions of key media spokespeople. Media coverage of the Batemans Marine Park appears to have been highly politicised and heavily influenced by the strong convictions of a small handful of prominent spokespeople. By way of contrast media coverage of the Port Stephens Great Lakes Marine Park was more nuanced and drew from a wide range of sources. This research provides insight into how areas of conflict could be reframed as opportunities that enhance MPA planning exercises and highlights how ideology can help shape community sentiment. Acknowledging the role of ideology in contested areas such as these allows for the development of strategies that can accommodate as well as moderate its influence. These strategies may include the incorporation of 'bottom up' approaches into MPA planning, the promotion and support of a range of voices within the community, and seeking out and building upon common ground and shared values.
- - -
The continual rise of participatory, media offers increasing opportunities for nonprofessionals and marginalised communities to tell their stories. In the policy arena, Australia's Social Inclusion Agenda and international debates on indicators of well-being name 'voice' as a key capability for social inclusion and individual flourishing. In this article, I engage recent scholarship on 'listening' and 'voice that matters' to highlight the limits of the participatory media genre of digital storytelling and of the social inclusion category of 'voice'. The discussion is illustrated via examples from public launch events for 'mini-films' produced in digital storytelling projects facilitated by Information Cultural Exchange (ICE), a new media arts organisation working in Sydney's cosmopolitan western suburbs. While these public events ensure a process of 'voice', I argue for a greater commitment to political listening in media research, practice and policy, lest the promise of 'voice' remain only partially fulfilled.
and the limitations of working for media change in the context of the ‘war on terror’ and the ‘globalisation of the Muslim Other’ (Hage, 2007). The opening sections discuss the concept of ‘community media interventions’ and provide an overview of media intervention strategies among racialized communities in Sydney, Australia since 11 September 2001. The concluding
sections sketch the many limitations of and dilemmas for media interventions as strategies for responding to racialized media. I argue that, in order to adequately understand and contribute to struggles for media change, media research needs to attend to the politics of ‘listening’ in addition to the dynamics of ‘speaking up’. Crucially, attention to listening shifts the focus and responsibility for change from marginalized voices and on to the conventions, institutions and privileges which shape who and what can be heard in media.
also examines representation and critiques examples stereotyping and racialization. This paper extends these discussions to focus on questions of ‘listening’. Attention to
listening provokes important questions about media and multiculturalism: how do media enable or constrain listening across difference? Drawing on recent work in postcolonial
feminism and political theory, this paper explores the productive possibilities of a shift beyond the politics of voice to explore ‘listening across difference’ in media studies and
media advocacy work. To highlight listening shifts some of the focus and responsibility for change from marginalized voices and on to the conventions, institutions and privileges which shape who and what can be heard in the media.
speaking/listening binary.
The project, known as ‘Fairfield Stories’, involved training young people to use digital technologies to produce short documentaries about their lives to be screened, in the first
instance, to family and friends. The project forms one part of Tiffany’s wider commitment to developing citizens’ media initiatives and civic engagement in Fairfield, one of the most culturally diverse Local Government Areas in Australia.
and Muslim Australians as an exception and even a threat to harmonious community relations. Particularly striking was the anxiety and anger caused by their apparent large numbers, seen to be taking over certain public recreational spaces. This paper explores the contradictions in these findings in light of other contemporary Australian research and identifies complex and difficult issues to be addressed by research and by local
government. In particular, the paper discusses the need to address the interconnections between both everyday multiculturalisms and everyday racisms, to distinguish between
‘victim’ claims amongst diverse communities, and to ground research and policies on ‘place-sharing’ in Indigenous sovereignties.
- - -
Recent accounts of Habermas's conception of the public sphere concern the interlocking of multiple networks and spaces. In a global context new interfaces between existing (counter-) public spheres can lead to multiple counter-publics. This article explores this phenomenon through the examination of the communicative spaces that offer alternatives to Australia's mainstream public sphere from three different strands of Sydney's community media: diasporic media (Assyrian Radio SBS), Indigenous media (Koori Radio) and discursive sites that operate in between ethnic and mainstream media (Forum for Australia's Islamic Relations).
This article explores this phenomenon through the examination of the communicative spaces that offer alternatives to Australia’s mainstream public sphere from three different strands of Sydney’s community media: diasporic media (Assyrian Radio SBS), Indigenous media (Koori Radio) and discursive sites that operate in between ethnic and mainstream media (Forum for Australia’s Islamic Relations).
- - -
Headscarves in schools. Sexual violence in Indigenous communities. Muslim women at public swimming pools, Polygamy. Sharia law. Outspoken Imams on sexual assualt. Integration and respect for women. It seems that around the world in the media and public debate, women's issues are at the top of the agenda. Yet all too often, support for women's rights is proclaimed loudest by conservative politicians intent on policing communities and demonising Muslims during the 'war on terror'. This edition of the Transorming Cultures eJournal offers critical reflections on the contemporary politics of gender, race and religion, and provides a platorm for those perspectives which are too often sidelined in the debate, perspectives that seek to go beyond simplistic debates such as 'hijab: to ban or not to ban?' or "Muslim women: oppressed or liberated?'
Additional Publication Information
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The digital age and globalization has brought international issues to our doorstep and placed the local in the context of the global. News media have played a crucial role in allowing recognition and exploration of the global origins and outcomes of many environmental crises such as climate change, deforestation, threatened species management and biodiversity loss (Cottle, 2011c). The modern environmental movement has responded to the global scale of these crises with campaigns for global solutions. Many of these campaigns rely heavily on coordinated, collective action across a multitude of jurisdictions around the world, with the success of global campaigns dependent on the success of multiple local-scale actions. The slogan "think global, act local" has become the rallying cry of the modern environmental movement. Yet the individual success of these actions depends significantly on local conditions, particularly community and political support. The media, including local news and community-based media, play a crucial role in influencing both these factors.
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There is ample research identifying the many 'problems' in media representations of Australian Muslims and Islam in the Australian media. Increasingly, media researchers and government bodies advocate training and funding for communities subjected to media racism to 'speak up' and talk back' in the news media. Indeed, the skilling up and empowerment of Muslim communities has emerged as the preferrred strategy for change in the reporting of Islam in the Australian media.
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Since 2001, the "ethnic gang rapes" committed around the Sydney suburb of Bankstown have been repeatedly invoked in public debates about multiculturalism, Australian values and the "war on terror". These rapes were sensationalised not only because of the public outrage at the viciousness of the attacks but also because they were repeatedly, symbolically tied to other contemporary political events-both local and global. The perpetrators and the assaults were characterised as both foreigners and foreign to Australian life and values. The public discourse around these events has been analysed in terms of the racialisation of crime (Poynting et al. 2004; Manning 2004) and more recently, a growing scholarship has focused on questions of gender and masculinity (Serisier 2006, Grewal 2007, Baird 2009 forthcoming, Abood in this collection). In this chapter we extend the analysis of "stories that are constructed about this crime" (Wilcox 2005: 516) to highlight two interrelated concerns. Firstly, we explore the ways in which public discourse on the "Bankstown gang rapes" has in fact served to reproduce the invisibility of everyday sexual violence in Australia. Secondly, we argue that these discourses reflect not only processes of racialisation and the normalisation of male sexual violence, but that crucially, they are shaped by a pervasive heteronormativity. Indeed, we maintain that the categories of gender, race, ethnicity and heterosexuality are in fact intimately connected and mutually reinforcing, such that the national project of "protecting our borders" becomes focused on the paternalistic project of "protecting our women" as reproducers of a white heterosexist national narrative. Within this account,as other feminist theorists have previously noted, interracial sexual contact is the most dangerous and intimate of all border crossings (Nagel 2003; McClintock 1995; Frankenberg 1995; Davis 1981).
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The detention of Dr Mohamed Haneef in July 2007 provided a litmus test, not only of Australia's counter-terrorism measures, but also of news reporting of the domestic front in the so-called 'war on terror'. While there was some evidence of diversity of opinions and of independent and investigative reporting the enormous volume of new coverage of the Haneef arrair, overall there remains considerable cause for concern. This chapter outlines the most significant critiqiues of news reporting of the case and indicates the action required of professional journalists and of concerned citizens in order to develop more responsible journalism in the area of national security.
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When I look back now and see our words and the photos, I'm glad we decided not to be invisible. If there is a wall of silence then it's not the Asian community that built it. I'm proud of my friends for speaking up. I hope our work will help the community to see that we're human too.
These comments featured in one of many cultural projects developed to respond to a moral panic linking the heroin trade and violent crime in and around the Western Sydney suburb of Cabramatta to debates on policing, immigration and "Asian gangs" in the period 1994-2001.
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Cabramatta is s suburb with a particularly high media profile, so much so that in Sydney it has become a household name. It ies within Fairfield City Council, which is one of the most culturally diverse local government areas in Australia (Fairfield City Council 1996, p117). Mainstream media images of Cabramatta present it to a city-wide, and occasionally a nation-wide, audience so the people I spoke to were all acutely aware of Cabramatta's high media profile.
hotline to receive calls relating to racially motivated attacks. This monograph presents an analysis of the data collected by that Hotline, providing a snapshot of a moment of crisis in community relations in New South Wales. During September to November 2001, the CRC Hotline recorded reports of violence, abuse, harassment, discrimination and vilification targeting Muslim, Arab and Sikh communities in New South Wales. These incidents produced a climate of fear and insecurity which continues to impact on experiences of citizenship and
belonging among the communities targeted.
The key findings for the impacts of September 11, 2001 on community relations in NSW are:
• In the two months after September 11, 2001, 248 reports were made to the CRC Hotline. These events were predominantly reported by Arab, Muslim and Sikh Australians. Reported incidents included physical assaults, sexual assault, verbal
assaults, racial discrimination and harassment, threats, damage to property and media vilification. The most commonly reported incident was a verbal assault in a public place.
• International events can produce crises in community relations in New South Wales. The impacts of international events can be unpredictable, as in the impacts of September 11, 2001 on Sikh communities in NSW. The impacts of international events can also build on existing tensions and prejudice, as in the impacts of September 11, 2001 on Muslim and Arab communities in NSW.
• Racially and religiously motivated incidents produced a climate of fear, distress and insecurity, impacting on both the subjects of individual incidents and the communities
targeted. Subjects of incidents and Muslim, Arab and Sikh communities in NSW were made to feel that that they are not ‘Australian’, that they do not belong and are not welcome in Australia.
• General public attitudes indicate a considerable lack of understanding of experiences of racism and discrimination and the rationale for anti-discrimination and antiracism measures. The widespread assumption that Australia is white, Christian and English-speaking demonstrates a lack of awareness of both the principles and the lived realities of Australian multiculturalism.
• There is a strong link between visible markers of ‘difference’ such as wearing the hijab or a turban and experiences of prejudice and assault. Attitudes of prejudice and hatred often focus on visible signs of ethnicity, culture or religion.
• The crisis in community relations after September 11, 2001 also produced opportunities for dialogue and support between communities.
• There is a widespread community perception that media reporting is a significant factor in contributing to a climate of heightened community tensions and racist violence.
developed by targeted communities, often in partnership with government. Whose Responsibility? identifies ways to develop better community and government strategies to address increased tensions in community relations, drawing on the lessons learned in the community sector in recent years. The research is based on interviews with key policymakers in state government, and extensive community consultations and interviews with Arab, Muslim and Sikh communities.