Simon Order

In October 2023, an ABC Australia article by Levy and Heaton discussed the ‘gender gap’ in electric vehicle (EV) ownership, noting Australia’s similarity to the United States. where reportedly 67% of EV buyers were men and 33% were women. In Western Australia (WA), Evenergi’s 2023 survey revealed that 83% of the survey’s EV owning respondents were male. Such data suggest a noticeable gender discrepancy in EV ownership, which may be more prominent in WA. Through ten in-depth interviews with female-identifying WA-based EV owners, we sought to investigate this imbalance further, particularly why it might exist and, how it might be overcome. This paper focusses on the everyday experiences and practices of our Perth metropolitan and regionally based interviewees to shed light on potential barriers or issues associated with EV ownership such as purchase costs, driving range, charging, interactions with others about their cars, the use of technology and media coverage, including myths and misinformation. Overall, our interviewees provided insights into how they adjusted to owning and driving an EV in Western Australia, a state known for its isolation and vast distances.

American Movie Classics’ (AMC) popular television series The Walking Dead (2010–present) transports viewers into an apocalyptic zombie dystopia where the lines between safety and precarity, being governed and governing, or being alive and/or dead slip and change. Utilizing Achille Mbembe’s term “necropolitics”, the article explores The Walking Dead’s representation of governance and power in terms of individual and group security. While the zombie has been understood as the liminal figure par excellence, The Walking Dead’s non-zombie characters illustrate diasporic liminality as refugees, hovering on or near the threshold of death. The scale of suffering or prosperity is determined by who leads or governs. Frequently, those deemed “in charge” exercise power and control to discipline, to punish, and to provide security. The series offers a metaphor for the potential uses of power in biological, environmental, or natural disaster situations where survivors grapple with scarce resources and the constant presence of death.

This innovative volume compels readers to re-think the notions of performance, performing, and (non)performativity in the context of the COVID-19 global pandemic. Given these multi-faceted ways of thinking about “performance” and its complicated manifestations throughout the pandemic, this volume is organised into umbrella topics that focus on three of the most important aspects of identity for cultural and intercultural studies in this historical moment: language; race/gender/sexuality; and the digital world. In critically re-thinking the meaning of “performance” in the era of COVID-19, contributors first explore how language is differently staged in the context of the global pandemic, compelling us to normalise an entirely new verbal lexicon. Second, they survey the pandemic’s disturbing impact on socio-political identities rooted in race, class, gender, and sexuality. Third, contributors examine how the digital milieu compels us to reorient the inside/outside binary with respect to multilingual subjects, those living with disability, those delivering staged performances, and even corresponding audiences.

Together, these diverse voices constitute a powerful chorus that rigorously excavates the hidden impacts of the global pandemic on how we have changed the ways in which we perform identity throughout a viral crisis. This volume is thus a timely asset for all readers interested in identity studies, performance studies, digital and technology studies, language studies, global studies, and COVID-19 studies. It was originally published as a special issue of the Journal of Intercultural Studies.

This chapter draws upon existing approaches to screen violence to explore The Walking Dead’s challenging representations of death including controversial episodes where child characters die from fatal violence. We explore how the show positions viewers to interpret extreme violence, especially how violence is accepted or rejected within the narrative context. At times, the show’s narrative works to justify and/or legitimise an aggressor’s conduct, thereby minimising the likelihood of audience rejection of the narrative and/or backlash against the show. We draw upon key analytical tools from Revilla et al. (Communications 46(1):4–26, 2021) and Riddle and Martins (J Commun 72:33–58, 2021) to explore the context of fatal violence, punishment for violent acts, consequences, seriousness, graphicness and explicitness as well as justification and legitimation, particularly relating to child characters. How audience members are positioned in relation to violence may impact their views or understandings of violence or even how they may model certain behaviours in real life (Revilla et al., Communications 46(1):4–26, 2021; Riddle and Martins, J Commun 72:33–58, 2021). In this chapter we argue that violence leading to the death of child characters on The Walking Dead tends to contain low levels of graphicness and explicitness and is often combined with careful narrative justification or legitimation to explain the reasons for that death.

At the time of writing, the global pandemic COVID-19 is an ongoing world health crisis. One of the many ramifications of the pandemic is the impact on universities and colleges worldwide (Leung et al. 2020; UNESCO 2020; WHO Regional Office for Europe 2020). The disruption to classes that would usually involve face-to-face learning, the discontinuation of exchange programmes, and the spread of the virus, in general, has led to alternative methods of education using distance or online learning…

This special issue of the Journal of Intercultural Studies is titled ‘Performing Identity in the Era of COVID-19’, and co-mingles our current critical inquiries into the pandemic meaning of ‘performance’’ with our earlier research in global diasporas. While invoking our previous historical context of ‘the era of COVID-19’, we shift focus from migratory liminality to the many ways that we can re-think the notions of performance, performing, and performativity (and the nonperformative) in the context of the global pandemic...

American Movie Classics’ (AMC) popular television series The Walking Dead (2010–present) transports viewers into an apocalyptic zombie dystopia where the lines between safety and precarity, being governed and governing, or being alive and/or dead slip and change. Utilizing Achille Mbembe’s term “necropolitics”, the article explores The Walking Dead’s representation of governance and power in terms of individual and group security. While the zombie has been understood as the liminal figure par excellence, The Walking Dead’s non-zombie characters illustrate diasporic liminality as refugees, hovering on or near the threshold of death. The scale of suffering or prosperity is determined by who leads or governs. Frequently, those deemed “in charge” exercise power and control to discipline, to punish, and to provide security. The series offers a metaphor for the potential uses of power in biological, environmental, or natural disaster situations where survivors grapple with scarce resources and the constant presence of death.

Vision Australia Radio (VAR) is part of the Australian Radio for the Print Handicapped (RPH) community radio network providing a radio reading service to listeners with a vision impairment. Like mainstream media, it faces the challenge of ensuring the service is fit for purpose in the digital age. There is little preexisting research on the behaviour and interests of the vision-impaired as a discrete audience demographic. This paper reports on a survey of listeners to VAR in Perth, Western Australia, which gives an insight into their current listening habits and identifies some of the challenges in meeting their future needs.

The early days of radio were fraught for women who wanted to get their voice heard. Anne McKay (2000) has documented some of the struggles would-be female announcers faced. Mrs. Giles Borrett, the first ever female presenter at the BBC, was highly praised by managers during her three-month trial in 1933 but was abruptly removed from her position amid alleged listeners’ complaints about the unsuitability of the female voice for radio. In addition, one suggestion stood out: that she was, as a married woman, taking a man’s job (Kamarae, 1984). Similarly, across the Atlantic in the United States in 1935,...

The Community Broadcasting Association of Australia (CBAA) asserts that community radio should promote a culturally diverse society by representing those sections of the community much less visible in the mainstream media. This echoes the Australian Federal Government’s vision of social inclusion/cohesion in a society in which all Australians are valued and are able to participate fully. There are those, however, who are marginalised by mainstream culture and can find themselves alienated as a result of, for example, their language, religion, ethincity, sexuality or niche interests. Societal participation for those groups can be challenging and may mean some members feel a sense of isolation and lonliness. The incidence of loneliness in Australia is growing. The personal and social consequences of loneliness are significant for those affected but also for policy-makers. Community broadcasting is uniquely positioned to provide opportunities for volunteering, community participation, and sociability for niche community groups, all of which contribute towards countering the effects of loneliness. In this regard, community radio can be described as rhizomatic. It has the potential to generate social capital for the participants and the listeners via its many community entrance points and social pathways. Community radio is often a two-way street with content producers and consumers occupying the same position, thus blurring the line between the traditional professional broadcaster and the passive listener. The generated niche communities of interest expand away from a station towards the audience, and simultaneously, into the community station from the listeners. Overall, this article argues that community broadcasting in Australia should be valued as a medium that can reduce social isolation and enrich community cohesion.