Features
A Message From the FECCA Chair
Pino Migliorino
It is with great pleasure that I present to you our first online edition of the Australian Mosaic. Australian Mosaic has long been a flagship publication of FECCA. It has provided a forum for key thinkers and policy makers to reach a wide and diverse audience. In moving to an online version we recognise the changing face of communication in today's world. I hope that you will enjoy this version as much as you did our hard copy magazine publications.
From the Director’s Desk
Padma Menon
It is with great excitement that I welcome you to the new online edition of Australian Mosaic. In the past few months, we have worked on creating a new online presence for FECCA in keeping with the new communication scenario. You will see that FECCA now has a new website www.fecca.org.au which we will continue to update and develop in the next period.
View on the News
Dr James Jupp AM FASSA
Such a lot has been happening in the past six months that it is hard to know where to start or what to leave out. The two most startling and worrying events were the massacre of over eighty members of the Norwegian Labour Party youth league by Anders Breivik on 22 July, and the massive riots in London (and one or two other cities) in the second week of August. Some commentators tried to link these two, as proving the failure of multiculturalism and the need for tighter control over immigration. However the likelihood of either being replicated in Australia is (almost) zero.
Recognition: A Cornerstone of the Reconciliation Journey
Leah Armstrong
For the last four years I have been a judge for the biennial Indigenous Governance Awards. I have had the great privilege to meet the people behind the many remarkable Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander enterprises which are demonstrating world-class, innovative leadership and management, effective partnerships and brave, creative thinking. Organisations like the Laynhapuy Homelands Association based in remote north east Arnhem Land, which for more than two decades has provided essential services to 24 permanently occupied remote homelands.
Legitimising a fear of difference - major impediment to social cohesion
Mariam Veiszadeh
One of the most challenging impediments to social and community cohesion in Australia has been the alarming increase in Islamophobia - a relatively new term established in the aftermath of 9/11. The public discourse, particularly in the media and amongst politicians, surrounding anti-terrorism and the so-called rise of radicalisation is evidence of this frightening trend.
Temporary Migration and Multiculturalism in Australia
Peter Mares
With 6 million people or 27% of the population born overseas, Australia has one of the highest proportions of overseas-born residents of any country in the world and we celebrate the multiculturalism that derives from this. Indeed the Minister for Immigration and Citizenship Chris Bowen talks about the "genius" of Australian multiculturalism being substantially different from other apparently failed models of multiculturalism around the world.
Who shall we become? Planning our national character
Brad Chilcott
Transcript of address given by Pastor Brad Chilcott, Director of Welcome to Australia, at the FECCA 2011 Conference on Thursday 17 November for the ‘Australia’s Current and Future Multicultural Reality’ plenary session.
Exploring our Identity through the Arts
Chandrabhanu OAM
In Australia today we seem to be either confused about our identity, adamant about preserving an identity of the past, or accepting that our identity resides in our cultural differences. The question of identity is a highly political one, and certainly challenges our received view of our history. On one hand there is the Anglo-Celtic dominant culture which seeks to cling to the notion that Australia’s identity and artistic expressions are shaped by its colonial history. Yet that history is being rewritten in the post-colonial era.
Being a parent (the best, but hardest job in the world) – and adjusting to a new country
Shelley Atkins
Most of us learn how to be a parent from our own parents and from the expectations of the society we live in. For many parents who have brought their children to Australia to start a new life, what being a parent was all about in the old life doesn’t always seem to work as well in the new life. As a result, they become confused and anxious and sometimes are even made to feel they are bad and uncaring parents. Many of these are parents who have taken great risks and made enormous sacrifices to offer their children a better life. What has happened?
A National Disability Insurance Scheme – implications for the multicultural community
Sibylle Kaczorek
On 31 July 2011 the Productivity Commission (PC) released the final report of its Inquiry into Disability Care and Support. Since then the Council of Australian Governments welcomed the report and agreed on the need for major reform of disability services in Australia through a National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS).
Cancer prevalence in CALD communities in Australia
Mamta Porwal
Cancer represents a major disease both globally and in Australia where, in 2008, over 150, 000 new cases of cancer were diagnosed. It is well known that the risk of getting cancer increases with age; for an Australian-born person who lives to the age of 85 years, there is a one in two chance of being diagnosed with cancer in their lifetime for males and one in three for females.
Making Australia ‘Fairer’: Reform of our Equality Laws
Anna Brown
In recent times, the Occupy protests have focussed the public gaze on the principle of equality. However, few in the community would be aware that the Australian Government has recently embarked upon a significant review of its equality laws, a process which will have lasting consequences for all Australians and, in particular, the more vulnerable within society, including CALD communities.
The Department of Human Services addresses emerging issues
Sam Campisi
There is a wide range of needs among the culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD) population. Many newly arrived migrants and refugees are highly qualified, but need assistance to have their skills recognised in Australia and to negotiate the pathways to work. Refugees arriving from developing countries can need extra support to understand technologies that we take for granted, like ATMs, washing machines, telephones, computers and public transport systems.
Climate Change and Carbon Tax – How CALD communities can engage
Ross Tzannes AM
The Australian public’s response to the threat posed by climate change (and the attempt to deal with it through the imposition of a price on carbon pollution) has been extraordinarily wide-ranging and vehement. It has ranged from various manifestations of denial to passionate demands for drastic urgent action involving a major restricting of lifestyles and of society itself.