Cultural Diversity and Australian Commercial Television Drama: Policy, Industry and Recent Research Contexts

Media studies research of the 1990s illustrated an incongruity between cultural diversity in the Australian community with the representation of that diversity on commercial television screens. Australian drama in particular received much criticism for its seemingly “Anglo” portrayal of Australian society. Most of this former research was based on program content analysis and critical approaches to studying the media. From the mid 1990s, anecdotal evidence suggested an improvement in the casting of actors from culturally diverse backgrounds. This paper contextualises policy and industry developments of the 1990s related to cultural diversity and presents new research undertaken within the commercial drama television industry. Drawing on policy documents, institutional correspondence and previous research, the paper first tracks the development of policy formation with regard to cultural diversity as influenced by the commercial television industry’s representative body, advocacy groups and government authorities. The majority of this activity took place in the first half of the 1990s in a newly established broadcasting environment, based on the Broadcasting Services Act 1992. In order to determine the status of cultural diversity and commercial television drama at the end of the 1990s, a casting survey of all Australian commercial drama programs broadcast in 1999 was carried out. This was complemented by interviews with industry personnel and a two week content analysis of programming. The research establishes the degree of casting for actors from culturally diverse backgrounds and offers explanations for both improvements made in the previous years and the continuing obstacles faced by some groups in gaining a place on our popular drama programs.