Rural radio and the everyday politics of settlement on Indigenous land

Abstract

The Australian Broadcasting Corporation’s Country Hour radio programmes are produced regionally and promote specific understandings of rurality. This article presents an analysis that shows Indigenous people and issues are rarely sources or topics in Country Hour, and that stories about Indigenous land use are generally broadcast only if the land is used in a way that is seen as ‘productive’ through settler colonial eyes. It also argues the programme should include Indigenous voices and understandings of the land in imagining this space. It makes a theoretical contribution to media studies by extending on concepts of the ‘rural imaginary’ and ‘settler common sense’ to argue that the programme perpetuates a discourse that legitimates and valorises the use of ‘rural’ space for non-Indigenous people, concepts and activities. Indigenous people are noticeably absent and silent. Country Hour is therefore conceptualised as a media space that continues to transmit settler colonialism and its attendant myths.

Keywords

agrarian imaginary Australian broadcasting corporation indigenous voice media and countryside radio rural settler colonialism

Get full access to this article

View all access options for this article.

References

ABC Rural (2017a) Commercialisation of bush plum. Queensland Country Hour. Available at: https://www.abc.net.au/news/rural/programs/qld-country-hour/2017–11–28/qld-country-hour/9201500 (accessed 18 September 2019).

ABC Rural (2017b) On national agriculture day, farmers tell us what it’s like being a farmer. Queensland Country Hour. Available at: https://www.abc.net.au/news/rural/programs/qld-country-hour/2017–11–21/qld-country-hour-211117/9176186 (accessed 18 September 2019).

ABC Rural (2017c) One Queensland town has done their utmost to make sure people don’t have to leave their communities at the end of their life. Queensland Country Hour. Available at: https://www.abc.net.au/news/rural/2017–11–09/death-in-a-country-town/9123258 (accessed 18 September 2019).

ABC Rural (2017d) Wool renaissance sees strong demand and record prices. Queensland Country Hour. Available at: https://www.abc.net.au/news/rural/2017–11–03/wool-renaissance/9115688 (accessed 18 September 2019).

ABC Rural (2018a) Environmentalists slam idea of national parks being opened to grazing. New South Wales Country Hour. Available at: https://www.abc.net.au/news/rural/programs/nsw-country-hour/2018–08–06/nsw-country-hour-monday-6-august-2018/10078748 (accessed 18 September 2019).

ABC Rural (2018b) Indigenous representatives say they’re disappointed cultural values have been left out of the wild dog management in the South East. New South Wales Country Hour. Available at: https://www.abc.net.au/news/rural/programs/nsw-country-hour/2018–08–07/nsw-country-hour-tuesday-7-august-2018/10083486 (accessed 18 September 2019).

ABC Rural (2018c) Jigiija Indigenous fire training attracts remote firefighters from thousands of kilometres away. ABC Country Hour. Available at: https://www.abc.net.au/news/2018–08–02/firefighters-learn-cool-burning-techniques-Indigenous-rangers/10055220 (accessed 18 September 2019).

Altman

(2010) What future for remote indigenous Australia? Economic hybridity and the neoliberal turn. In: Altman

Hinkson

(eds) Culture Crisis: Anthropology and Politics in Aboriginal Australia. Sydney, NSW, Australia: UNSW Press, pp. 259–280.

Anderson

(2006 [1983]) Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism. London: Verso.

10.

Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) (2010) 4713.0 – Population Characteristics, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Australians, 2006. Canberra, ACT, Australia: ABS. Available at: http://www.abs.gov.au/ausstats/abs@.nsf/Lookup/6A3B043BCD6F5A90CA2578DB00283CC8?opendocument (accessed 18 September 2019).

11.

Craig

(2001) The farmer’s friend: radio comes to rural America 1920–1927. Journal of Radio Studies 8(2): 330–346.

12.

Crowe

(2018) Footage from liberal party meeting reveals who voted to sell the ABC. The Sydney Morning Herald. Available at: https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/footage-from-liberal-party-meeting-reveals-who-voted-to-sell-the-abc-20180618-p4zm5e.html (accessed 11 December 2018).

13.

Dreher

Waller

McCallum

(2017) Disruption or transformation? Indigenous voices contesting policy in the digital age. In Peeren

Celikates

de Kloet

, et al. (eds) Global cultures of contestation. London: Palgrave Macmillan, pp. 215–240.

14.

Eisinger

(1947a) The Freehold Concept in Eighteenth-Century American Letters. The William and Mary Quarterly 4(1): 42–59.

15.

Eisinger

(1947b) The influence of natural rights and physiocratic doctrines on American agrarian thought during the Revolutionary period. Agricultural History 21(1): 13–23.

16.

Ewart

(1997) The scabsuckers: regional journalists’ representation of Indigenous Australians. Asia Pacific Media Educator 3: 108–117.

17.

Ewart

(2002) Overlooked and underused: how Australia’s first public journalism project treated women and indigenous people. Australian Journalism Review 24(1): 61–81.

18.

Gammage

(2012) The Biggest Estate on Earth: How Aborigines Made Australia. Crows Nest, QLD, Australia: Allen & Unwin.

19.

Gramsci

(1971) Selections from the Prison Notebooks of Antonio Gramsci. New York: International Publishers.

20.

Hilliard

(2001) Symposium introduction: farm and rural radio – some beginnings and models. Journal of Radio Studies 8(2): 321–329.

21.

Jebb

(2002) Blood, Sweat and Welfare: A History of White Bosses and Aboriginal Pastoral Workers. Nedlands, WA, Australia: University of Western Australia Press.

22.

Lee

(2015) 70 years of ABC Rural. Landline. Australian Broadcasting Corporation, 8 November. Available at: http://www.abc.net.au/tv/programs/landline/old-site/content/2015/s4347320.htm (accessed 5 October 2018).

23.

Manyozo

(2010) Mobilizing rural and community radio in Africa. Ecquid Novi: African Journalism Studies 30(1): 1–23.

24.

McCallum

Waller

(2017a) Indigenous media in Australia: Traditions, theories and contemporary practices. In Buderick

Han

(eds) Minorities and the media in Australia. London: Palgrave Macmillan, pp. 134–161.

25.

McCallum

Waller

(2017b) The dynamics of news and Indigenous policy in Australia. Bristol: Intellect.

26.

McCallum

Waller

Meadows

(2012) Raising the volume: Indigenous voices in news media and policy. Media International Australia 42: 101–111.

27.

McConville

McCreanor

Wetherell

, et al. (2016) Imagining an emotional nation: the print media and ANZAC day commemorations in Aoetearoa/New Zealand. Media Culture & Society 39(1): 94–110.

28.

McGrath

(1987) Born in the Cattle: Aborigines in Cattle Country. Sydney, NSW, Australia: Allen & Unwin.

29.

Manyozo

(2010) Researching developmental uses and formats of rural radio: a development broadcasting approach. The Radio Journal: International Studies in Broadcasting and Audio Media 8(2): 141–159.

30.

May

(1994) Aboriginal Labour and the Cattle Industry: Queensland from White Settlement to the Present. Melbourne, VIC, Australia: Cambridge University Press.

31.

Maydell

(2018) ‘It just seemed like your normal domestic violence’: ethnic stereotypes in print media coverage of child abuse in New Zealand. Media, Culture & Society 40(5): 707–724.

32.

Mayes

(2014) An agrarian imaginary in urban life: cultivating virtues and vices through a conflicted history. Journal of Agricultural and Environmental Ethics 27: 265–286.

33.

Mayes

(2018) Unsettling Food Politics: Agriculture, Dispossession and Sovereignty in Australia. New York: Rowman & Littlefield International.

34.

Mayes

(2019) Cultivating a nation: why the mythos of the Australian farmer is problematic. The Conversation. Available at: https://theconversation.com/cultivating-a-nation-why-the-mythos-of-the-australian-farmer-is-problematic-106517 (accessed 11 February 2019).

35.

Meadows

(1996) Reclaiming the public sphere: indigenous journalism in Australia and Canada. Australian Studies in Journalism 5: 61–81.

36.

Meadows

(2001) Voices in the Wilderness: Images of Aboriginal People in the Australian Media. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press.

37.

Medhora

(2015) Remote communities are lifestyle choices, says Abbott. The Guardian. Available at: www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2015/mar/10/remote-communities-are-lifestyle-choices-says-tony-abbott (accessed 18 September 2019).

38.

Mesikämmen

(2016) Limited interests, resources, voices: Power relations in mainstream news coverage of indigenous policy in Australia. Media, Culture & Society 38(5): 721–737.

39.

Montagnana-Wallace

(2016) Akubra: Handcrafted History. Preston: Bounce Books.

40.

Nikoi

(2019) Reflections of an international graduate student in a North American communication department. Media Culture & Society 41(3): 397–406.

41.

Rifkin

(2014) Settler Common Sense: Queerness and Everyday Colonialism in the American Renaissance. Minneapolis, MN: University of Minnesota Press.

42.

Rowe

Tuck

(2017) Settler colonialism and cultural studies: Ongoing settlement, cultural production and resistance. Cultural Studies – Critical Methodologies 17(1): 3–13.

43.

Snelgrove

Dhamoon

Corntassel

(2014) Unsettling settler colonialism: The discourse and politics of settlers, and solidarity with Indigenous nations. Decolonization: Indigeneity, Education & Society 3(2): 1–32.

44.

Steering Committee for the Review of Government Service Provision (SCRGSP) (2016) Overcoming Indigenous Disadvantage – Key Indicators 2016. Canberra, ACT, Australia: Productivity Commission.

45.

Taylor

(2004) Modern Social Imaginaries. Durham, NC: Duke University Press.

46.

Thomas

(2009) The archers: an everyday story of old and new media. The Radio Journal 7(1): 49–66.

47.

Thompson

(2010) The Agrarian Vision: Sustainability and Environmental Ethics. Lexington, KY: University Press of Kentucky.

48.

Tuck

Yang

(2012) Decolonization is not a metaphor. Decolonization: Indigeneity, Education & Society 1(1): 1–40.

49.

Veracini

(2011) Introducing: settler colonial studies. Settler Colonial Studies 1(1): 1–12.

50.

Waller

McCallum

(2018) How television moved a nation: Media, change and Indigenous rights. Media Culture & Society 40(7): 992–1007.

51.

Williams

(1977) Marxism and Literature. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

52.

Wolfe

(2006) Settler colonialism and the elimination of the native. Journal of Genocide Research 8: 387–409.