Political listening and media justice

Poppy regularly collaborates and publishes with Associate Professor Tanja Dreher (School of Arts and Media, UNSW) on political listening and media justice; and their joint work has theorized situated or located listening in settler colonial contexts. 

In 2018, Tanja and Poppy co-convened The Politics of Listening conference, the first international interdisciplinary conference on critical studies of listening (29-30 November).  Inspired by the recent ‘turn to listening’ in media studies, cultural studies and political theory, the conference brought together over 50 scholars and practitioners from Australia, the U.K., Canada, Germany, South Africa and beyond whose work critically engages with listening in diverse ways - as a political practice; as a critical frame; as an alternative politics; as a contribution to justice and/or as an ethics of relation.

Between 2017 and 2020, Poppy contributed to Tanja’s ARC Future Fellowship project "Listening In", which identified listening practices which will improve the efficacy of Indigenous and community media for democratic participation and community wellbeing. As part of this, Poppy interviewed First Nations and community media producers, mainstream journalists, local government workers and other policymakers in Brisbane.  Broadly, the project analyses good practice in political listening within key democratic institutions – media and government – in professional roles that require engaging with, and responding to, community concerns. This approach focused on actors whose work in key institutions means that they have a degree of influence on policy formation, public debate and mainstream media content. The research identified possibilities for improvement where obstacles to political listening are evident, with a particular focus on increasing the efficacy of Indigenous and community media on the mainstream public sphere. Read the project report here.