Week seven- Time to put the indigenous stereotype to rest

Indigenous voices in Australian media struggle to be heard, and struggle to have certain issues fairly represented. It has always been a challenge of journalists to represent cultural diversity, and nowhere is it more obvious than indigenous representation in the media. There is a lack of knowledge on the behalf on journalists, and a very limited number of indigenous Australians, be it Aborigines or Torres Strait Islanders, work within the media themselves.

For the most part, the Australian media do their journalistic best to represent all issues fairly, objectively, and as accurately as possible, but the overall framing of indigenous issues lends itself to a seemingly negative connotation. Stereotyping and skewed angles are all too common.

Some of the below headlines are just snippets of poor indigenous journalism in Australian media:

Image source:http://blogs.crikey.com.au/fullysic/2012/02/02/why-muriel-heslop-is-not-as-dumb-as-the-australian-financial-review/

Image source: http://www.creativespirits.info/aboriginalculture/people/racism-in-aboriginal-australia

This article by Indigenous site ‘Creative Spirit’ has a look at some of the reasons as to why there is such a discrepancy in media representation:

Media Coverage of Indigenous Issues

It goes on too fault the lack of diversity in the Australian media landscape to limit the diversity and shape the tone of indigenous affairs. Ray Jackson, president of the Indigenous Social Justice Association exclaims that the “media tend to make “our” issues only front page news when it can be spun into a report whereby lazy, drunken so and so are to blame for the mistakes of government and their departments.”

There have been previous cases of racial descrimination that have even seen some journalists in trouble legally. In 2011 Herald Sun journalist Andrew Bolt wrote several articles about how some indigenous Australians "selected" part of their Aboriginal heritage over the rest and used this on order to receive government benefits.  One of the women Bolt targeted took offence to these allegations and took him to court. It was eventually confirmed that Bolt's journalism had breached the Racial Discrimination Act [47] (www.cretivespirits.info). 

So what can journalists do to help eradicate what still remains of indigenous stereotyping? Be sure to obtain background knowledge, be careful with word choice, get all sides of the story or speak to an indigenous person, not to mention weigh up what part of the news story is essentially important. Is t an Indigenous issue, or perhaps just an issue? A lot of journalists get stuck in this idea. Always ask yourself the most professional way to approach the story and obtain unbiased information.

Foreign Correspondent and Journalist Jeff McMullen puts it like this: “The media has a responsibility to tell the country what is happening in a way that connects Australians. If you see that people are not listening to the truth, find another way to tell the story.”

Sourced from Media Coverage of Indigenous Issues article accessed on September 10, 2014, fromhttp://www.creativespirits.info/aboriginalculture/politics/media-coverage-of-aboriginal-issues