Hearing the voice: Coverage of the Indigenous Voice to Parliament referendum in Australia’s multi-ethnic public sphere

Abstract

In the present study, we compare coverage in mainstream English and minority ethnic media in Australia of the Uluru Statement proposal for a Voice and later referendum announcements, over the period from 1 January 2018 to 31 March 2023, to compare any changes over time within and between these two sets of media. With the election of the Labor government in 2022 and subsequent referendum announcements in early 2023, we are provided an opportunity to study the influence of key actors, in this case an incoming government with a signature policy, on discourse in the multi-ethnic public sphere. Our overarching aim is to compare the extent to which an issue of national, political and civic importance is addressed across both the mainstream English and the minority ethnic public sphere in contemporary, multicultural Australia. The results of keyword searches show that, while there were significant increases in mainstream English media coverage of the Voice referendum proposal, corresponding to the election of the Labor government in 2022 and then subsequent announcements of an upcoming referendum in early 2023, there was inconsistent coverage across the minority ethnic media we studied: while significant increases in coverage in the Chinese media mirrored those in the mainstream English media, there was only a small increase in one of the Vietnamese media over the same period, and no increase in the other Vietnamese media. The findings presented here have implications for scholars and others interested in the development of a truly multicultural public sphere in Australia and elsewhere.