Abstracts from the NIHR INVOLVE Conference 2017

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News, views and agendas: talkback radio and Muslims

Talkback radio has the power to attract and repel, delight and disgust in equal measures. The talkback phenomenon is defined by the extension of an invitation from the presenter to the audience to participate in the programme by phoning in, SMS messaging or emailing their views, opinions and contributions. While much of the Australian research in this field has been preoccupied with the talkback radio host as shock-jock and celebrity,! little attention has been paid to the way audiences conceptualise the space and themselves within that space. We initially set out to explore how talkback radio programmes affected audiences\u27 perceptions of diversity, multiculturalism and current issues associated with these themes.2 However, it became evident in the course of the research that issues around the perceived ownership of and right of access to the talkback space and identityboth cultural and national-were closely bound up with the original question we set out to explore. As we began thinking about and talking to mainstream talkback radio audience members, we identified another gap in the research-the scant attention paid by researchers to talkback spaces created as alternatives to populist talkback programmes. In considering those spaces and the mainstream commercial talkback agendas of recent times around ethnicity and religion, we identified two culturally distinct talkback spaces and subsequently gained access to some of their audience members, who we gathered into focus groups to discuss the issues outlined above

Political Communication in Disasters: A Question of Relationships

Politicians are both a help and hindrance in the provision of information to the public before, during and after disasters. For example, in Australia, the Premier of the State of Queensland, Anna Bligh, was lauded for her leadership and public communication skills during major floods that occurred late in 2010 and in early 2011 (de Bussy, Martin and Paterson 2012). Similarly, New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani was praised for his leadership following 9/11. This is in contrast to the poor performance of political leaders during Hurricane Katrina (Cole and Fellows 2008, Olson and Gawronski 2010). Political actors' lack of credibility and their poor situational awareness contributed to the problems. The involvement of political leaders in disaster communications is also problematic from the perspective of emergency agencies. For example, politicians who move their communication position from supportive to tactical can take over the role of providing official disaster information, such as evacuation warnings, without sufficient expertise, credibility or situational knowledge. This paper builds on the expanding body of research into the politics of disasters by exploring relationships with political actors from the perspective of emergency managers. Drawing on interviews with emergency agencies in Australia, Germany, Norway and the UK, we firstly examine when and what a politician should communicate during disasters and secondly, offer six principles toward a roadmap of involving political actors in the disaster communication process when life and property is at stake

People like us versus statistical representations of readers

This paper examines an under-researched issue, that of regional journalists' ideas of readership. It looks at the journalists' constructions of readership in light ofstatistical data which profile newspaper readers in a regional area. The paper investigates the journalists' constructions of readership and then compares these to pictures of readership which emerged from a survey undertaken through an independent surveying body. It does this in an attempt to provide hard data rarher than supposition about one facet of the reader-journalisr relationship. The similariries and contradictions between the sets of data are explored. In doing so this paper concludes that while there is some relationship between the two pictures of readership which emerge from the data, some groups remain overlooked by both approaches. Therefore, journalists need to ensure their conception of readership includes more than the narrow ideas they currently have or those presented by the survey informarion

Women and Male Hegemony in Australian Regional and Country Journalism

The article discusses a study which explored the treatment of women as news sources by the "Barcoo Independent." It offers a look at several studies which found that women have been underrepresented and misrepresented by the Australian news media. It discusses a case study which reveals some of the factors that have enabled the "Barcoo Independent" newspaper to overcome the under-use and misrepresentation of women as news sources. The article also cites reasons for the use of women sources by the newspaper such as their substantial role in society

News, views and agendas: talking about Muslims

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