This paper examines the role of the media in disseminating and perpetuating the mythology of shared national characteristics with particular reference to the Port Arthur massacre in 1996 and the Thredbo landslide in 1997. Attention is given in my research to the ways in which public grief and mourning are conducted through the media following such events, and how the shock of significant loss of life is ameliorated by the reinforcement of national characteristics. The positive actions of victims, survivors and rescuers are projected through the media as being representative of ‘Australianness’, thereby further entrenching the mythology of national characteristics within wider discourse.
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