Showing all posts tagged: Australia
Photos of the construction of Sydney Opera House
27 June 2022
A collection of incredible photos of the Sydney Opera House, taken during its construction. Today the Opera House is one of the most recognisable buildings in the world, but it seems Sydneysiders were not enamoured by the iconic structure while it was being built.
Today the building is loved, yet while it was under construction attitudes were very different. The local press continually attacked its cost, its delays, and its architect; headline writers gave the now familiar white shell roof nicknames such as ‘the concrete camel’, ‘copulating terrapins’ and ‘the hunchback of Bennelong Point’.
What’s also compelling about these photos is both how much has changed, and how much has remained the same, when looking at the areas surrounding the land the Opera House stands on.
Via Things Magazine.
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Australia, history, photos, Sydney
Remaining mindful of Australian Indigenous reconciliation
7 June 2022
National Reconciliation Week, a celebration of Australian Indigenous history and culture, concluded last Friday, 3 June 2022. But there are still ways we can remain mindful of reconciliation, and the history and culture of Indigenous Australians, daily, and immersing ourselves in First Nations art, film, and literature, are some of the ways we can achieve this.
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Is an Australian republic any closer than it was 25 years ago?
4 June 2022
Australian federal MP Matt Thistlethwaite has been appointed to the role of assistant minister for the republic, in the new Labor led government, a move that will put the question of an Australian republic, and an Australian as head of state, rather than the British monarch, back on the agenda.
The push for Australia to break away from the monarchy has received its best news in 25 years after Prime Minister Anthony Albanese appointed an assistant minister for the republic. Australian Republic Movement chair Peter FitzSimons says the appointment of Matt Thistlethwaite was a major show of support. It remains to be seen what progress Labor will make on the issue after it confirmed a constitutionally-enshrined First Nations Voice to Parliament was its referendum priority.
A break from the British monarchy has long been on the cards. In 1995, then Prime Minister Paul Keating declared Australia should become a republic. But the notion was was rejected by the Australian people in a 1999 referendum, with about fifty-five-percent of the population voting against the proposal. But twenty-three years on, support for a republic could hardly be called overwhelming.
Polling conducted earlier this year in the states of New South Wales, Victoria, and Queensland found a little over a third of people supported an Australian republic, while a little under a third were opposed. But closer to forty-percent — a significant margin — said they were “unsure or neutral” on the matter. When posed the question: yes or no, would you support a republic, fifty-four-percent of respondents said yes. But it’s not much of a margin, and I’d contend a minimum of sixty-percent of Australians would need to be firmly in favour for the idea to carry.
But Australians appear to have other priorities, and the matter of a republic is of little interest to many, although that doesn’t mean Australia is a country filled with monarchists:
The biggest hurdle for republicans is the reality that Australia is already an independent nation, with only sentiment and inertia linking us to the British crown. Most Australians, when pressed, struggle to remember the name of the current governor-general or to explain their role.
Interestingly, this week marks the British monarch, Queen Elizabeth’s, seventieth jubilee. I only know because I try to keep up with the news. A month ago I’d have had no idea the occasion was imminent. Certainly I’m not aware of any events locally to acknowledge the milestone. I see no banners flying on the streets, nor detect any sort of buzz of interest generally. People seem to be going their day-to-day affairs as normal.
But another obstacle for those in favour of a republic is what the exact role of any head of state, presumably a president, would be. What sort of executive power would they be invested with, and how would they assume office? Should they be appointed by the Australian parliament, or elected by popular vote? There are many questions to address.
Personally I think Australia should be a republic, and a nation with a head of state chosen by the people. It may only be a symbolic gesture, but it’s an important one.
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New Australian arts minister promises more focus on sector
30 May 2022
The recent change of Federal government in Australia has raised hopes the arts sector will receive more economic support, with incoming arts and industrial relations minister Tony Burke keen to address insecure work and unreliable pay issues.
Burke has also long advocated for addressing issues of insecure work and unreliable pay, claiming Labor would launch a senate inquiry into insecure work if elected. The arts and cultural sector has the dubious title of being an industry leader in insecure work. And it is at the intersection of cultural and industrial relations policy where our new arts minister could dramatically reshape the sector.
I think Burke has a task and a half before him, but a closer focus on the arts is long overdue.
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Anna Spargo Ryan: hope and relief after the Australian election?
27 May 2022
Melbourne based Australian author, Anna Spargo-Ryan, who’s novels include The Paper House, and The Gulf, writes about the hope and relief some Australians are feeling — at least momentarily — as a result of the change of government in Australia last weekend.
For today – and maybe only for today, but we’ll see how things pan out – I feel held. Not fighting the solipsistic dread with weapons made out of my own wellbeing, but part of a community that has chosen to vote for the betterment of others. That’s new. It feels good to sit with it, to briefly imagine, in the words of famous internet depressed person Allie Brosh, that maybe everything isn’t hopeless bullshit.
The mood is a little different presently, but there often is when a new administration is elected. Whether things will be become “better” long term? That remains to be seen.
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Anna Spargo-Ryan, Australia, politics
Struggling Australians turn to crowd funding to pay the rent
20 May 2022
Melbourne based journalist Stephanie Convery, writing for The Guardian:
The unbearable costs and instability of the rental crisis are pushing more people towards crowdfunding for accommodation, with housing-related appeals on one of Australia’s biggest fundraising platforms more than quadrupling over the past year. The campaigns range from requests for assistance with rental arrears and covering the costs of temporary accommodation, to appeals for help to buy caravans or other forms of mobile accommodation in the face of homelessness.
We are frequently told Australia is a rich — or at least well off — country, making situations like these unfathomable. There may be inequality, often the result of a lack of momentum, but how something basic like reasonably priced rental housing remains a problem beggars belief. I fear whatever the outcome of tomorrow’s federal election, there will be little change to the status quo. Because, you know, this a state issue, not a federal one.
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Australia, elections, politics, welfare
Arts and culture polices in the 2022 Australian election
20 May 2022
Australians go to the polls tomorrow, Saturday 21 May 2022, to choose who will govern the country for the next three years. While issues such as climate change, the pandemic, and regional security have dominated the election campaign, matters arts and culture have been largely absent from the spot light.
In terms of policy in this area, the incumbent Liberal National Coalition government appears to offer little, while the present opposition party, Labor, has policy that Ben Eltham, a lecturer at the School of Media, Film, and Journalism at Monash University, describes as “surprisingly modest.” Eltham, together with four other policy experts, have compared the proposals of both major political parties, and graded each of them.
Meanwhile, Ben Francis has set out the difference between the Greens, Labor, and the Liberal National Coalition, arts and culture policies in slide format.
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arts, Australia, elections, politics
Early voting in Australia 2022 election proving to be popular
14 May 2022
Australians go the polls to elect a new federal government on Saturday 21 May 2022. Or is that yesterday, today, and tomorrow? Early voting is proving riotously popular again this year, with the Australian Electoral Commission saying almost 1.3 million Australians have already cast their vote.
At the last federal election, about six and a half million people either voted early, or by post. From a pool of just over sixteen million registered voters, that a solid forty percent of the population.
Despite the uptake in pre-poll voting, showing up at the polling booth on election day is meant to be the norm, says Tom Rogers, the Australian Electoral Commissioner:
Early voting options are designed for people who can’t make it their local polling booth. The idea of a dedicated election day is for voters to come together to decide who will run the country for the next three years. “It really is supposed to be an in-person community event where people vote on the day,” Mr Rogers says.
It’s a curious way of looking at the process of electing a government, like it’s the village fete day. We live in a country where voting is mandatory — and everyone, in my opinion, should vote — but expecting sixteen or so million people to converge on polling booths on a single day strikes me as thinking that belongs to another age.
Perhaps one where most people worked during the week, and restricted their weekends to non-work activities. If such a world actually existed.
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All Twitter hashtags for Australian democracy sausage emoji
16 April 2022
The Australian federal election has been called for Saturday 21 May 2022. But election day isn’t entirely about having a say in who gets to govern Australia for the next three years, it’s also synonymous with the sausage sizzle.
While not a feature at every polling booth in Australia — they were only present at about one-third of booths in the 2013 election — partaking of a barbequed sausage after voting seems to be all that voters can talk about.
To get in the spirit though, Twitter has bought back the democracy sausage emoji, and members using any of seven election related hashtags in tweets will see the emoji appended to them. And here, listed below, are all the Twitter hashtags for the Australian democracy sausage:
- #Auspol
- #AusVotes
- #AusVotes2022
- #AusVotes22
- #DemocracySausage
- #MyFirstDemocracySausage
- #SausageSizzle
And if you’re searching for polling booths selling fund-raising democracy sausages on election day, bookmark the Democracy Sausage website.
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Adelaide Writers’ Week 2022
31 January 2022
Adelaide Writers’ Week is on in the South Australian capital from Saturday 5 March, until Thursday 10 March 2022. Australian and international authors, including Michael Mohammed Ahmad, Lur Alghurabi, Anuk Arudpragasam, Hannah Bent, Trent Dalton, Michelle de Kretser, and Charlotte Wood, are among those participating in person, or online.
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