From marginalisation to a 'voice of our own': African media in Australia

Abstract

Budarick analyses the work of African-Australian media producers working in the ethnic minority, community and public service media sectors in Australia through the mediums of print, broadcast and the Internet. Based on a thematic analysis of 14 in-depth interviews with black African journalists, writers and broadcasters in Australia, the chapter examines ways in which interviewees discuss and explain their media work, including their motivations, their aims and the role they see their media playing in Australian society. The findings of the study are placed within a historical context of ethnic media production in Australia and internationally in a way that teases out themes of integration, multiculturalism, self-representation and identity politics. The chapter will demonstrate the way in which participants’ media work is contextualised by experiences of structural inequality, marginalisation from the communicative environment and a desire to provide a ‘voice of our own’ to an African, and wider Australian, audience.