Academic literature on the topic 'KPMG Australia ;Research Services Group Case studies'

While the importance of community researchers has long been acknowledged in disability studies, inclusive research practices such as these are less common in research about another marginalised group: people who are in prison or have spent time in prison. Over the past decade in Australia, the number and rate of people imprisoned has risen rapidly, and recidivism rates remain high, indicating a need for improved services. In this article, we draw on methodological reflections from two case studies on research with marginalised communities, one in disability studies and one in post-prison research. We apply insights from disability research to argue the importance of incorporating community researchers in qualitative research projects seeking to explore the experiences of people involved with the criminal justice system, such as people who have been released from prison.

Access to health services for common health problems is a fundamental principle of primary health care. Although there have been few Australian prevalence studies, it is estimated that about 900,000 adult Australians suffer from incontinence (National Health and Medical Research Council, 1994). The purpose of this study was to investigate urinary continence services for community-dwelling people in the Gold Coast region of Australia, prior to implementing new services. A case study design was used, including: a survey of general medical practitioners, specialist medical practitioners, physiotherapists, hospitals, and home visiting agencies in the region; a focus group with key stakeholders; and a critical review of the literature in relation to prevalence, treatment-seeking behaviour and service provision. Health practitioners were asked about services provided, policies, clinical pathways, referrals, and their views on what services they would like to see offered in the region. Results showed that while there were some existing continence-specific services in the region, they were inadequate to provide for the numbers of people in need. Many generalist health practitioners demonstrated a lack of interest in and knowledge of the plight of those suffering from incontinence. Links between services were found to be ad hoc, with inconsistent referral patterns between health professionals. These findings are consistent with international studies. It was concluded that, in general, community-dwelling people suffering incontinence were poorly served by health professionals due an inability of available services to meet demand, and a lack of knowledge and/or interest by many generalist health practitioners.

Social media provides numerous opportunities for small businesses to promote their products and services, build brand communities and reach diverse market niches. An important factor in seizing these opportunities is developing trust and creating reputation among consumers. This qualitative study examines how a group of Australian small business managers utilize social media websites to connect to, communicate with and maintain their customer base. For the purpose of this paper we are using case studies of four companies physically based in Victoria, Australia. These businesses have a high presence in online consumer groups, being both active members of communities and representatives of their businesses. The duality of their role as participant and company representative imposes difficulties in creating reputation among community members. We have used in-depth interviews as a primary research method, additionally monitoring their activities on social media sites such as forums, social networking services, blogs and micro-blogs. We have identified practices helpful for developing trust, building reputation and create a brand image in online communities.

The COVID-19 pandemic has inflicted substantial losses on a large number of enterprises and brought about the risk of unsustainable operations across the world. However, certain enterprises still managed to grow against the trend prevailing during the epidemic and succeeded in taking risks to make profits. This study discusses how global enterprises adopt a proactive risk management approach to transform crises into sustainable business performance during the period starting from the epidemic outbreak to normalization. By mainly obtaining research data from the Internet news media and official websites of the enterprises using content analysis technique, this paper chose case studies, from December 2019 to December 2021, of eight different companies, namely: BYD (China, Asia), Mafengwo (China, Asia), Xiamen Airlines (China, Asia), Zhijiang Bio (China, Asia), The Bund (United States, America), Walmart (United States, America), Qantas Airways (Australia, Oceania), and Honotel Group (France, Europe), from different industrial sectors including manufacturing, tourism, transportation, technical services, catering, retail, airlines, and accommodation, respectively. The study results show that each enterprise specifically incorporates the method of proactive risk management, to deal with a sudden crisis and take risks to make profits during the epidemic. The study findings provide a feasible way for enterprises to cope with sudden crises and enhance their ability to maintain sustainable operations.

Climate change induced sea-level rise (SLR) is on its increase globally. Regionally the lowlands of China, Vietnam, Bangladesh, and islands of the Malaysian, Indonesian and Philippine archipelagos are among the world’s most threatened regions. Sea-level rise has major impacts on the ecosystems and society. It threatens coastal populations, economic activities, and fragile ecosystems as mangroves, coastal salt-marches and wetlands. This paper provides a summary of the current state of knowledge of sea level-rise and its effects on both human and natural ecosystems. The focus is on coastal urban areas and low lying deltas in South-East Asia and Vietnam, as one of the most threatened areas in the world. About 3 mm per year reflects the growing consensus on the average SLR worldwide. The trend speeds up during recent decades. The figures are subject to local, temporal and methodological variation. In Vietnam the average values of 3.3 mm per year during the 1993-2014 period are above the worldwide average. Although a basic conceptual understanding exists that the increasing global frequency of the strongest tropical cyclones is related with the increasing temperature and SLR, this relationship is insufficiently understood. Moreover the precise, complex environmental, economic, social, and health impacts are currently unclear. SLR, storms and changing precipitation patterns increase flood risks, in particular in urban areas. Part of the current scientific debate is on how urban agglomeration can be made more resilient to flood risks. Where originally mainly technical interventions dominated this discussion, it becomes increasingly clear that proactive special planning, flood defense, flood risk mitigation, flood preparation, and flood recovery are important, but costly instruments. Next to the main focus on SLR and its effects on resilience, the paper reviews main SLR associated impacts: Floods and inundation, salinization, shoreline change, and effects on mangroves and wetlands. The hazards of SLR related floods increase fastest in urban areas. This is related with both the increasing surface major cities are expected to occupy during the decades to come and the increasing coastal population. In particular Asia and its megacities in the southern part of the continent are increasingly at risk. The discussion points to complexity, inter-disciplinarity, and the related uncertainty, as core characteristics. An integrated combination of mitigation, adaptation and resilience measures is currently considered as the most indicated way to resist SLR today and in the near future.References Aerts J.C.J.H., Hassan A., Savenije H.H.G., Khan M.F., 2000. Using GIS tools and rapid assessment techniques for determining salt intrusion: Stream a river basin management instrument. 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It was the Canadian philosopher Marshall McLuhan who first introduced the term ‘global village’ into the lexicon, almost fifty years ago. He was referring to the phenomenon of global interconnectedness of which we are all too aware today. At that time, we were witnessing the world just opening up. In 1946, British Airways had commenced a twice weekly service from London to New York. The flight involved one or two touch downs en-route and took a scheduled 19 hours and 45 minutes. By the time McLuhan had published his book “Understanding media; the extensions of man”, there were regular services by jet around the globe. London to Sydney was travelled in just under 35 hours. Moving forward to a time immediately pre-covid, there were over 30 non-stop flights a day in each direction between London and New York. The travel time from London to Sydney had been cut by a third, to slightly under 22 hours, with just one touchdown en-route. The world has well and truly ‘opened up’. No place is unreachable by regular services. But that is just one part of the picture. In 1962, the very first live television pictures were transmitted across the Atlantic, via satellite. It was a time when sports’ fans would tune in besides a crackling radio set to hear commentary of their favourite game relayed from the other side of the world. Today of course, not only can we watch a live telecast of the Olympic Games in the comfort of our own homes wherever the games are being held, but we can pick up a telephone and talk face to face with friends and relatives in real time, wherever they may be in the world. To today’s generation – generation Z – this does not seem in the least bit remarkable. Indeed, they have been nicknamed ‘the connected generation’ precisely because such a degree of human interconnectedness no longer seems worth commenting on. The media technology and the transport advances that underpin this level of connectedness, have become taken for granted assumptions to them. This is why the global events of 2020 and the associated public health related reactions, have proved to be so remarkable to them. It is mass travel and the closeness and variety of human contact in day-to-day interactions, that have provided the breeding ground for the pandemic. Consequently, moving around and sharing close proximity with many strangers, have been the activities that have had to be curbed, as the initial primary means to manage the spread of the virus. This has caused hardship to many, either through the loss of a job and the associated income or, the lengthy enforced separation from family and friends – for the many who find themselves living and working far removed from their original home. McLuhan’s powerful metaphor was ahead of its time. His thoughts were centred around media and electronic communications well prior to the notion of a ‘physical’ pandemic, which today has provided an equally potent image of how all of our fortunes have become intertwined, no matter where we sit in the world. Yet it is this event which seems paradoxically to have for the first time forced us to consider more closely the path of progress pursued over the last half century. It is as if we are experiencing for the first time the unleashing of powerful and competing forces, which are both centripetal and centrifugal. On the one hand we are in a world where we have a World Health Organisation. This is a body which has acted as a global force, first declaring the pandemic and subsequently acting in response to it as a part of its brief for international public health. It has brought the world’s scientists and global health professionals together to accelerate the research and development process and develop new norms and standards to contain the spread of the coronavirus pandemic and help care for those affected. At the same time, we have been witnessing nations retreating from each other and closing their borders in order to restrict the interaction of their citizens with those from other nations around the world. We have perceived that danger and risk are increased by international travel and human to human interaction. As a result, increasingly communication has been carried out from the safety and comfort of one’s own home, with electronic media taking the place of personal interaction in the real world. The change to the media dominated world, foreseen by McLuhan a half century ago, has been hastened and consolidated by the threats posed by Covid 19. Real time interactions can be conducted more safely and more economically by means of the global reach of the internet and the ever-enhanced technologies that are being offered to facilitate that. Yet at a geopolitical level prior to Covid 19, the processes of globalism and nationalism were already being recognised as competing forces. In many countries, tensions have emerged between those who are benefitting from the opportunities presented by the development of free trade between countries and those who are invested in more traditional ventures, set in their own nations and communities. The emerging beneficiaries have become characterised as the global elites. Their demographic profile is one associated with youth, education and progressive social ideas. However, they are counter-balanced by those who, rather than opportunities, have experienced threats from the disruptions and turbulence around them. Among the ideas challenged, have been the expected certainties of employment, social values and the security with which many grew up. Industries which have been the lifeblood of their communities are facing extinction and even the security of housing and a roof over the heads of self and family may be under threat. In such circumstances, some people may see waves of new immigrants, technology, and changing social values as being tides which need to be turned back. Their profile is characterised by a demographic less equipped to face such changes - the more mature, less well educated and less mobile. Yet this tension appears to be creating something more than just the latest version of the generational divide. The recent clashes between Republicans and Democrats in the US have provided a very potent example of these societal stresses. The US has itself exported some of these arenas of conflict to the rest of the world. Black lives Matter and #Me too, are social movements with their foundation in the US which have found their way far beyond the immediate contexts which gave them birth. In the different national settings where these various tensions have emerged, they have been characterised through labels such as left and right, progressive and traditional, the ‘haves’ versus the ‘have nots’ etc. Yet common to all of this growing competitiveness between ideologies and values is a common thread. The common thread lies in the notion of competition itself. It finds itself expressed most potently in the spread and adoption of ideas based on what has been termed the neoliberal values of the free market. These values have become ingrained in the language and concepts we employ every day. Thus, everything has a price and ultimately the price can be represented by a dollar value. We see this process of commodification around us on a daily basis. Sports studies’ scholars have long drawn attention to its continuing growth in the world of sport, especially in situations when it overwhelms the human characteristics of the athletes who are at the very heart of sport. When the dollar value of the athlete and their performance becomes more important than the individual and the game, then we find ourselves at the heart of some of the core problems reported today. It is at the point where sport changes from an experience, where the athletes develop themselves and become more complete persons experiencing positive and enriching interactions with fellow athletes, to an environment where young athletes experience stress and mental and physical ill health as result of their experiences. Those who are supremely talented (and lucky?) are rewarded with fabulous riches. Others can find themselves cast out on the scrap heap as a result of an unfair selection process or just the misfortune of injury. Sport as always, has proved to be a mirror of life in reflecting this process in the world at large, highlighting the heights that can be climbed by the fortunate as well as the depths that can be plumbed by the ill-fated. Advocates of the free-market approach will point to the opportunities it can offer. Figures can show that in a period of capitalist organised economies, there has been an unprecedented reduction in the amount of poverty in the world. Despite rapid growth in populations, there has been some extraordinary progress in lifting people out of extreme poverty. Between 1990 and 2010, the numbers in poverty fell by half as a share of the total population in developing countries, from 43% to 21%—a reduction of almost 1 billion people (The Economist Leader, June 1st, 2013). Nonetheless the critics of capitalism will continue to point to an increasing gap between the haves and don’t haves and specifically a decline in the ‘middle classes’, which have for so long provided the backbone of stable democratic societies. This delicate balance between retreating into our own boundaries as a means to manage the pandemic and resuming open borders to prevent economic damage to those whose businesses and employment depend upon the continuing movement of people and goods, is one which is being agonised over at this time in liberal democratic societies around the world. The experience of the pandemic has varied between countries, not solely because of the strategies adopted by politicians, but also because of the current health systems and varying social and economic conditions of life in different parts of the world. For many of us, the crises and social disturbances noted above have been played out on our television screens and websites. Increasingly it seems that we have been consuming our life experiences in a world dominated by our screens and sheltered from the real messiness of life. Meanwhile, in those countries with a choice, the debate has been between public health concerns and economic health concerns. Some have argued that the two are not totally independent of each other, while others have argued that the extent to which they are seen as interrelated lies in the extent to which life’s values have themselves become commodified. Others have pointed to the mental health problems experienced by people of all ages as a result of being confined for long periods of time within limited spaces and experiencing few chances to meet with others outside their immediate household. Still others have experienced different conditions – such as the chance to work from home in a comfortable environment and be freed from the drudgery of commuting in crowded traffic or public transport. So, at a national/communal level as well as at an individual level, this international crisis has exposed people to different decisions. It has offered, for many, a chance to recalibrate their lives. Those who have the resources, are leaving the confines of the big capital cities and seeking a healthier and less turbulent existence in quieter urban centres. For those of us in what can be loosely termed ‘an information industry’, today’s work practices are already an age away from what they were in pre-pandemic times. Yet again, a clear split is evident. The notion of ‘essential industries’ has been reclassified. The delivery of goods, the facilitation of necessary purchase such as food; these and other tasks have acquired a new significance which has enhanced the value of those who deliver these services. However, for those whose tasks can be handled via the internet or offloaded to other anonymous beings a readjustment of a different kind is occurring. So to the future - for those who have suffered ill-health and lost loved ones, the pandemic only reinforces the human priority. Health and well-being trumps economic health and wealth where choices can be made. The closeness of human contact has been reinforced by the tales of families who have been deprived of the touch of their loved ones, many of whom still don’t know when that opportunity will be offered again. When writing our editorial, a year ago, I little expected to be still pursuing a Covid related theme today. Yet where once we were expecting to look back on this time as a minor hiccough, with normal service being resumed sometime last year, it has not turned out to be that way. Rather, it seems that we have been offered a major reset opportunity in the way in which we continue to progress our future as humans. The question is, will we be bold enough to see the opportunity and embrace a healthier more equitable more locally responsible lifestyle or, will we revert to a style of ‘progress’ where powerful countries, organisations and individuals continue to amass increased amounts of wealth and influence and become increasingly less responsive to the needs of individuals in the throng below. Of course, any retreat from globalisation as it has evolved to date, will involve disruption of a different kind, which will inevitably lead to pain for some. It seems inevitable that any change and consequent progress is going to involve winners and losers. Already airline companies and the travel industry are putting pressure on governments to “get back to normal” i.e. where things were previously. Yet, in the shadow of widespread support for climate activism and the extinction rebellion movement, reports have emerged that since the lockdowns air pollution has dropped dramatically around the world – a finding that clearly offers benefits to all our population. In a similar vein the impossibility of overseas air travel in Australia has resulted in a major increase in local tourism, where more inhabitants are discovering the pleasures of their own nation. The transfer of their tourist and holiday dollars from overseas to local tourist providers has produced at one level a traditional zero-sum outcome, but it has also been accompanied by a growing appreciation of local citizens for the wonders of their own land and understanding of the lives of their fellow citizens as well as massive savings in foregone air travel. Continuing to define life in terms of competition for limited resources will inevitably result in an ever-continuing run of zero-sum games. Looking beyond the prism of competition and personal reward has the potential to add to what Michael Sandel (2020) has termed ‘the common good’. Does the possibility of a reset, offer the opportunity to recalibrate our views of effort and reward to go beyond a dollar value and include this important dimension? How has sport been experiencing the pandemic and are there chances for a reset here? An opinion piece from Peter Horton in this edition, has highlighted the growing disconnect of professional sport at the highest level from the communities that gave them birth. Is this just another example of the outcome of unrestrained commodification? Professional sport has suffered in the pandemic with the cancelling of fixtures and the enforced absence of crowds. Yet it has shown remarkable resilience. Sport science staff may have been reduced alongside all the auxiliary workers who go to make up the total support staff on match days and other times. Crowds have been absent, but the game has gone on. Players have still been able to play and receive the support they have become used to from trainers, physiotherapists and analysts, although for the moment there may be fewer of them. Fans have had to rely on electronic media to watch their favourites in action– but perhaps that has just encouraged the continuing spread of support now possible through technology which is no longer dependent on personal attendance through the turnstile. Perhaps for those committed to the watching of live sport in the outdoors, this might offer a chance for more attention to be paid to sport at local and community levels. Might the local villagers be encouraged to interrelate with their hometown heroes, rather than the million-dollar entertainers brought in from afar by the big city clubs? To return to the village analogy and the tensions between global and local, could it be that the social structure of the village has become maladapted to the reality of globalisation? If we wish to retain the traditional values of village life, is returning to our village a necessary strategy? If, however we see that today the benefits and advantages lie in functioning as one single global community, then perhaps we need to do some serious thinking as to how that community can function more effectively for all of its members and not just its ‘elites’. As indicated earlier, sport has always been a reflection of our society. Whichever way our communities decide to progress, sport will have a place at their heart and sport scholars will have a place in critically reflecting the nature of the society we are building. It is on such a note that I am pleased to introduce the content of volume 43:1 to you. We start with a reminder from Hoyoon Jung of the importance of considering the richness provided by a deep analysis of context, when attempting to evaluate and compare outcomes for similar events. He examines the concept of nation building through sport, an outcome that has been frequently attributed to the conduct of successful events. In particular, he examines this outcome in the context of the experiences of South Africa and Brazil as hosts of world sporting events. The mega sporting event that both shared was the FIFA world cup, in 2010 and 2014 respectively. Additional information could be gained by looking backwards to the 1995 Rugby World Cup in the case of South Africa and forward to the 2016 Olympics with regard to Brazil. Differentiating the settings in terms of timing as well as in the makeup of the respective local cultures, has led Jung to conclude that a successful outcome for nation building proved possible in the case of South Africa. However, different settings, both economically and socially, made it impossible for Brazil to replicate the South African experience. From a globally oriented perspective to a more local one, our second paper by Rafal Gotowski and Marta Anna Zurawak examines the growth and development, with regard to both participation and performance, of a more localised activity in Poland - the Nordic walking marathon. Their analysis showed that this is a locally relevant activity that is meeting the health-related exercise needs of an increasing number of people in the middle and later years, including women. It is proving particularly beneficial as an activity due to its ability to offer a high level of intensity while reducing the impact - particularly on the knees. The article by Petr Vlček, Richard Bailey, Jana Vašíčková XXABSTRACT Claude Scheuer is also concerned with health promoting physical activity. Their focus however is on how the necessary habit of regular and relevant physical activity is currently being introduced to the younger generation in European schools through the various physical education curricula. They conclude that physical education lessons, as they are currently being conducted, are not providing the needed 50% minimum threshold of moderate to vigorous physical activity. They go further, to suggest that in reality, depending on the physical education curriculum to provide the necessary quantum of activity within the child’s week, is going to be a flawed vision, given the instructional and other objectives they are also expected to achieve. They suggest implementing instead an ‘Active Schools’ concept, where the PE lessons are augmented by other school-based contexts within a whole school programme of health enhancing physical activity for children. Finally, we step back to the global and international context and the current Pandemic. Eric Burhaein, Nevzt Demirci, Carla Cristina Vieira Lourenco, Zsolt Nemeth and Diajeng Tyas Pinru Phytanza have collaborated as a concerned group of physical educators to provide an important international position statement which addresses the role which structured and systematic physical activity should assume in the current crisis. This edition then concludes with two brief contributions. The first is an opinion piece by Peter Horton which provides a professional and scholarly reaction to the recent attempt by a group of European football club owners to challenge the global football community and establish a self-governing and exclusive European Super League. It is an event that has created great alarm and consternation in the world of football. Horton reflects the outrage expressed by that community and concludes: While recognising the benefits accruing from well managed professionalism, the essential conflict between the values of sport and the values of market capitalism will continue to simmer below the surface wherever sport is commodified rather than practised for more ‘intrinsic’ reasons. We conclude however on a more celebratory note. We are pleased to acknowledge the recognition achieved by one of the members of our International Review Board. The career and achievements of Professor John Wang – a local ‘scholar’- have been recognised in his being appointed as the foundation E.W. Barker Professor in Physical Education and Sport at the Nanyang Technological University. This is a well-deserved honour and one that reflects the growing stature of the Singapore Physical Education and Sports Science community within the world of International Sport Studies. John Saunders Brisbane, June 2021

Education in Oceania continues to reflect the embedded implicit and explicit colonial practices and processes from the past. This paper conceptualises a cultural approach to education and leadership appropriate and relevant to the Republic of the Marshall Islands. As elementary school leaders, we highlight Kanne Lobal, a traditional Marshallese navigation practice based on indigenous language, values and practices. We conceptualise and develop Kanne Lobal in this paper as a framework for understanding the usefulness of our indigenous knowledge in leadership and educational practices within formal education. Through bwebwenato, a method of talk story, our key learnings and reflexivities were captured. We argue that realising the value of Marshallese indigenous knowledge and practices for school leaders requires purposeful training of the ways in which our knowledge can be made useful in our professional educational responsibilities. Drawing from our Marshallese knowledge is an intentional effort to inspire, empower and express what education and leadership partnership means for Marshallese people, as articulated by Marshallese themselves. Introduction As noted in the call for papers within the Waikato Journal of Education (WJE) for this special issue, bodies of knowledge and histories in Oceania have long sustained generations across geographic boundaries to ensure cultural survival. For Marshallese people, we cannot really know ourselves “until we know how we came to be where we are today” (Walsh, Heine, Bigler & Stege, 2012). Jitdam Kapeel is a popular Marshallese concept and ideal associated with inquiring into relationships within the family and community. In a similar way, the practice of relating is about connecting the present and future to the past. Education and leadership partnerships are linked and we look back to the past, our history, to make sense and feel inspired to transform practices that will benefit our people. In this paper and in light of our next generation, we reconnect with our navigation stories to inspire and empower education and leadership. Kanne lobal is part of our navigation stories, a conceptual framework centred on cultural practices, values, and concepts that embrace collective partnerships. Our link to this talanoa vā with others in the special issue is to attempt to make sense of connections given the global COVID-19 context by providing a Marshallese approach to address the physical and relational “distance” between education and leadership partnerships in Oceania. Like the majority of developing small island nations in Oceania, the Republic of the Marshall Islands (RMI) has had its share of educational challenges through colonial legacies of the past which continues to drive education systems in the region (Heine, 2002). The historical administration and education in the RMI is one of colonisation. Successive administrations by the Spanish, German, Japanese, and now the US, has resulted in education and learning that privileges western knowledge and forms of learning. This paper foregrounds understandings of education and learning as told by the voices of elementary school leaders from the RMI. The move to re-think education and leadership from Marshallese perspectives is an act of shifting the focus of bwebwenato or conversations that centres on Marshallese language and worldviews. The concept of jelalokjen was conceptualised as traditional education framed mainly within the community context. In the past, jelalokjen was practiced and transmitted to the younger generation for cultural continuity. During the arrival of colonial administrations into the RMI, jelalokjen was likened to the western notions of education and schooling (Kupferman, 2004). Today, the primary function of jelalokjen, as traditional and formal education, it is for “survival in a hostile [and challenging] environment” (Kupferman, 2004, p. 43). Because western approaches to learning in the RMI have not always resulted in positive outcomes for those engaged within the education system, as school leaders who value our cultural knowledge and practices, and aspire to maintain our language with the next generation, we turn to Kanne Lobal, a practice embedded in our navigation stories, collective aspirations, and leadership. The significance in the development of Kanne Lobal, as an appropriate framework for education and leadership, resulted in us coming together and working together. Not only were we able to share our leadership concerns, however, the engagement strengthened our connections with each other as school leaders, our communities, and the Public Schooling System (PSS). Prior to that, many of us were in competition for resources. Educational Leadership: IQBE and GCSL Leadership is a valued practice in the RMI. Before the IQBE programme started in 2018, the majority of the school leaders on the main island of Majuro had not engaged in collaborative partnerships with each other before. Our main educational purpose was to achieve accreditation from the Western Association of Schools and Colleges (WASC), an accreditation commission for schools in the United States. The WASC accreditation dictated our work and relationships and many school leaders on Majuro felt the pressure of competition against each other. We, the authors in this paper, share our collective bwebwenato, highlighting our school leadership experiences and how we gained strength from our own ancestral knowledge to empower “us”, to collaborate with each other, our teachers, communities, as well as with PSS; a collaborative partnership we had not realised in the past. The paucity of literature that captures Kajin Majol (Marshallese language) and education in general in the RMI is what we intend to fill by sharing our reflections and experiences. To move our educational practices forward we highlight Kanne Lobal, a cultural approach that focuses on our strengths, collective social responsibilities and wellbeing. For a long time, there was no formal training in place for elementary school leaders. School principals and vice principals were appointed primarily on their academic merit through having an undergraduate qualification. As part of the first cohort of fifteen school leaders, we engaged in the professional training programme, the Graduate Certificate in School Leadership (GCSL), refitted to our context after its initial development in the Solomon Islands. GCSL was coordinated by the Institute of Education (IOE) at the University of the South Pacific (USP). GCSL was seen as a relevant and appropriate training programme for school leaders in the RMI as part of an Asia Development Bank (ADB) funded programme which aimed at “Improving Quality Basic Education” (IQBE) in parts of the northern Pacific. GCSL was managed on Majuro, RMI’s main island, by the director at the time Dr Irene Taafaki, coordinator Yolanda McKay, and administrators at the University of the South Pacific’s (USP) RMI campus. Through the provision of GCSL, as school leaders we were encouraged to re-think and draw-from our own cultural repository and connect to our ancestral knowledge that have always provided strength for us. This kind of thinking and practice was encouraged by our educational leaders (Heine, 2002). We argue that a culturally-affirming and culturally-contextual framework that reflects the lived experiences of Marshallese people is much needed and enables the disruption of inherent colonial processes left behind by Western and Eastern administrations which have influenced our education system in the RMI (Heine, 2002). Kanne Lobal, an approach utilising a traditional navigation has warranted its need to provide solutions for today’s educational challenges for us in the RMI. Education in the Pacific Education in the Pacific cannot be understood without contextualising it in its history and culture. It is the same for us in the RMI (Heine, 2002; Walsh et al., 2012). The RMI is located in the Pacific Ocean and is part of Micronesia. It was named after a British captain, John Marshall in the 1700s. The atolls in the RMI were explored by the Spanish in the 16th century. Germany unsuccessfully attempted to colonize the islands in 1885. Japan took control in 1914, but after several battles during World War II, the US seized the RMI from them. In 1947, the United Nations made the island group, along with the Mariana and Caroline archipelagos, a U.S. trust territory (Walsh et al, 2012). Education in the RMI reflects the colonial administrations of Germany, Japan, and now the US. Before the turn of the century, formal education in the Pacific reflected western values, practices, and standards. Prior to that, education was informal and not binded to formal learning institutions (Thaman, 1997) and oral traditions was used as the medium for transmitting learning about customs and practices living with parents, grandparents, great grandparents. As alluded to by Jiba B. Kabua (2004), any “discussion about education is necessarily a discussion of culture, and any policy on education is also a policy of culture” (p. 181). It is impossible to promote one without the other, and it is not logical to understand one without the other. Re-thinking how education should look like, the pedagogical strategies that are relevant in our classrooms, the ways to engage with our parents and communities - such re-thinking sits within our cultural approaches and frameworks. Our collective attempts to provide a cultural framework that is relevant and appropriate for education in our context, sits within the political endeavour to decolonize. This means that what we are providing will not only be useful, but it can be used as a tool to question and identify whether things in place restrict and prevent our culture or whether they promote and foreground cultural ideas and concepts, a significant discussion of culture linked to education (Kabua, 2004). Donor funded development aid programmes were provided to support the challenges within education systems. Concerned with the persistent low educational outcomes of Pacific students, despite the prevalence of aid programmes in the region, in 2000 Pacific educators and leaders with support from New Zealand Aid (NZ Aid) decided to intervene (Heine, 2002; Taufe’ulungaki, 2014). In April 2001, a group of Pacific educators and leaders across the region were invited to a colloquium funded by the New Zealand Overseas Development Agency held in Suva Fiji at the University of the South Pacific. The main purpose of the colloquium was to enable “Pacific educators to re-think the values, assumptions and beliefs underlying [formal] schooling in Oceania” (Benson, 2002). Leadership, in general, is a valued practice in the RMI (Heine, 2002). Despite education leadership being identified as a significant factor in school improvement (Sanga & Chu, 2009), the limited formal training opportunities of school principals in the region was a persistent concern. As part of an Asia Development Bank (ADB) funded project, the Improve Quality Basic Education (IQBE) intervention was developed and implemented in the RMI in 2017. Mentoring is a process associated with the continuity and sustainability of leadership knowledge and practices (Sanga & Chu, 2009). It is a key aspect of building capacity and capabilities within human resources in education (ibid). Indigenous knowledges and education research According to Hilda Heine, the relationship between education and leadership is about understanding Marshallese history and culture (cited in Walsh et al., 2012). It is about sharing indigenous knowledge and histories that “details for future generations a story of survival and resilience and the pride we possess as a people” (Heine, cited in Walsh et al., 2012, p. v). This paper is fuelled by postcolonial aspirations yet is grounded in Pacific indigenous research. This means that our intentions are driven by postcolonial pursuits and discourses linked to challenging the colonial systems and schooling in the Pacific region that privileges western knowledge and learning and marginalises the education practices and processes of local people (Thiong’o, 1986). A point of difference and orientation from postcolonialism is a desire to foreground indigenous Pacific language, specifically Majin Majol, through Marshallese concepts. Our collective bwebwenato and conversation honours and values kautiej (respect), jouj eo mour eo (reciprocity), and jouj (kindness) (Taafaki & Fowler, 2019). Pacific leaders developed the Rethinking Pacific Education Initiative for and by Pacific People (RPEIPP) in 2002 to take control of the ways in which education research was conducted by donor funded organisations (Taufe’ulungaki, 2014). Our former president, Dr Hilda Heine was part of the group of leaders who sought to counter the ways in which our educational and leadership stories were controlled and told by non-Marshallese (Heine, 2002). As a former minister of education in the RMI, Hilda Heine continues to inspire and encourage the next generation of educators, school leaders, and researchers to re-think and de-construct the way learning and education is conceptualised for Marshallese people. The conceptualisation of Kanne Lobal acknowledges its origin, grounded in Marshallese navigation knowledge and practice. Our decision to unpack and deconstruct Kanne Lobal within the context of formal education and leadership responds to the need to not only draw from indigenous Marshallese ideas and practice but to consider that the next generation will continue to be educated using western processes and initiatives particularly from the US where we get a lot of our funding from. According to indigenous researchers Dawn Bessarab and Bridget Ng’andu (2010), doing research that considers “culturally appropriate processes to engage with indigenous groups and individuals is particularly pertinent in today’s research environment” (p. 37). Pacific indigenous educators and researchers have turned to their own ancestral knowledge and practices for inspiration and empowerment. Within western research contexts, the often stringent ideals and processes are not always encouraging of indigenous methods and practices. However, many were able to ground and articulate their use of indigenous methods as being relevant and appropriate to capturing the realities of their communities (Nabobo-Baba, 2008; Sualii-Sauni & Fulu-Aiolupotea, 2014; Thaman, 1997). At the same time, utilising Pacific indigenous methods and approaches enabled research engagement with their communities that honoured and respected them and their communities. For example, Tongan, Samoan, and Fijian researchers used the talanoa method as a way to capture the stories, lived realities, and worldviews of their communities within education in the diaspora (Fa’avae, Jones, & Manu’atu, 2016; Nabobo-Baba, 2008; Sualii-Sauni & Aiolupotea, 2014; Vaioleti, 2005). Tok stori was used by Solomon Islander educators and school leaders to highlight the unique circles of conversational practice and storytelling that leads to more positive engagement with their community members, capturing rich and meaningful narratives as a result (Sanga & Houma, 2004). The Indigenous Aborigine in Australia utilise yarning as a “relaxed discussion through which both the researcher and participant journey together visiting places and topics of interest relevant” (Bessarab & Ng’andu, 2010, p. 38). Despite the diverse forms of discussions and storytelling by indigenous peoples, of significance are the cultural protocols, ethics, and language for conducting and guiding the engagement (Bessarab & Ng’andu, 2010; Nabobo-Baba, 2008; Sualii-Sauni & Aiolupotea, 2014). Through the ethics, values, protocols, and language, these are what makes indigenous methods or frameworks unique compared to western methods like in-depth interviews or semi-structured interviews. This is why it is important for us as Marshallese educators to frame, ground, and articulate how our own methods and frameworks of learning could be realised in western education (Heine, 2002; Jetnil-Kijiner, 2014). In this paper, we utilise bwebwenato as an appropriate method linked to “talk story”, capturing our collective stories and experiences during GCSL and how we sought to build partnerships and collaboration with each other, our communities, and the PSS. Bwebwenato and drawing from Kajin Majel Legends and stories that reflect Marshallese society and its cultural values have survived through our oral traditions. The practice of weaving also holds knowledge about our “valuable and earliest sources of knowledge” (Taafaki & Fowler, 2019, p. 2). The skilful navigation of Marshallese wayfarers on the walap (large canoes) in the ocean is testament of their leadership and the value they place on ensuring the survival and continuity of Marshallese people (Taafaki & Fowler, 2019; Walsh et al., 2012). During her graduate study in 2014, Kathy Jetnil-Kijiner conceptualised bwebwenato as being the most “well-known form of Marshallese orality” (p. 38). The Marshallese-English dictionary defined bwebwenato as talk, conversation, story, history, article, episode, lore, myth, or tale (cited in Jetnil Kijiner, 2014). Three years later in 2017, bwebwenato was utilised in a doctoral project by Natalie Nimmer as a research method to gather “talk stories” about the experiences of 10 Marshallese experts in knowledge and skills ranging from sewing to linguistics, canoe-making and business. Our collective bwebwenato in this paper centres on Marshallese ideas and language. The philosophy of Marshallese knowledge is rooted in our “Kajin Majel”, or Marshallese language and is shared and transmitted through our oral traditions. For instance, through our historical stories and myths. Marshallese philosophy, that is, the knowledge systems inherent in our beliefs, values, customs, and practices are shared. They are inherently relational, meaning that knowledge systems and philosophies within our world are connected, in mind, body, and spirit (Jetnil-Kijiner, 2014; Nimmer, 2017). Although some Marshallese believe that our knowledge is disappearing as more and more elders pass away, it is therefore important work together, and learn from each other about the knowledges shared not only by the living but through their lamentations and stories of those who are no longer with us (Jetnil-Kijiner, 2014). As a Marshallese practice, weaving has been passed-down from generation to generation. Although the art of weaving is no longer as common as it used to be, the artefacts such as the “jaki-ed” (clothing mats) continue to embody significant Marshallese values and traditions. For our weavers, the jouj (check spelling) is the centre of the mat and it is where the weaving starts. When the jouj is correct and weaved well, the remainder and every other part of the mat will be right. The jouj is symbolic of the “heart” and if the heart is prepared well, trained well, then life or all other parts of the body will be well (Taafaki & Fowler, 2019). In that light, we have applied the same to this paper. Conceptualising and drawing from cultural practices that are close and dear to our hearts embodies a significant ontological attempt to prioritize our own knowledge and language, a sense of endearment to who we are and what we believe education to be like for us and the next generation. The application of the phrase “Majolizing '' was used by the Ministry of Education when Hilda Heine was minister, to weave cultural ideas and language into the way that teachers understand the curriculum, develop lesson plans and execute them in the classroom. Despite this, there were still concerns with the embedded colonized practices where teachers defaulted to eurocentric methods of doing things, like the strategies provided in the textbooks given to us. In some ways, our education was slow to adjust to the “Majolizing '' intention by our former minister. In this paper, we provide Kanne Lobal as a way to contribute to the “Majolizing intention” and perhaps speed up yet still be collectively responsible to all involved in education. Kajin Wa and Kanne Lobal “Wa” is the Marshallese concept for canoe. Kajin wa, as in canoe language, has a lot of symbolic meaning linked to deeply-held Marshallese values and practices. The canoe was the foundational practice that supported the livelihood of harsh atoll island living which reflects the Marshallese social world. The experts of Kajin wa often refer to “wa” as being the vessel of life, a means and source of sustaining life (Kelen, 2009, cited in Miller, 2010). “Jouj” means kindness and is the lower part of the main hull of the canoe. It is often referred to by some canoe builders in the RMI as the heart of the canoe and is linked to love. The jouj is one of the first parts of the canoe that is built and is “used to do all other measurements, and then the rest of the canoe is built on top of it” (Miller, 2010, p. 67). The significance of the jouj is that when the canoe is in the water, the jouj is the part of the hull that is underwater and ensures that all the cargo and passengers are safe. For Marshallese, jouj or kindness is what living is about and is associated with selflessly carrying the responsibility of keeping the family and community safe. The parts of the canoe reflect Marshallese culture, legend, family, lineage, and kinship. They embody social responsibilities that guide, direct, and sustain Marshallese families’ wellbeing, from atoll to atoll. For example, the rojak (boom), rojak maan (upper boom), rojak kōrā (lower boom), and they support the edges of the ujelā/ujele (sail) (see figure 1). The literal meaning of rojak maan is male boom and rojak kōrā means female boom which together strengthens the sail and ensures the canoe propels forward in a strong yet safe way. Figuratively, the rojak maan and rojak kōrā symbolise the mother and father relationship which when strong, through the jouj (kindness and love), it can strengthen families and sustain them into the future. Figure 1. Parts of the canoe Source: https://www.canoesmarshallislands.com/2014/09/names-of-canoe-parts/ From a socio-cultural, communal, and leadership view, the canoe (wa) provides understanding of the relationships required to inspire and sustain Marshallese peoples’ education and learning. We draw from Kajin wa because they provide cultural ideas and practices that enable understanding of education and leadership necessary for sustaining Marshallese people and realities in Oceania. When building a canoe, the women are tasked with the weaving of the ujelā/ujele (sail) and to ensure that it is strong enough to withstand long journeys and the fierce winds and waters of the ocean. The Kanne Lobal relates to the front part of the ujelā/ujele (sail) where the rojak maan and rojak kōrā meet and connect (see the red lines in figure 1). Kanne Lobal is linked to the strategic use of the ujelā/ujele by navigators, when there is no wind north wind to propel them forward, to find ways to capture the winds so that their journey can continue. As a proverbial saying, Kanne Lobal is used to ignite thinking and inspire and transform practice particularly when the journey is rough and tough. In this paper we draw from Kanne Lobal to ignite, inspire, and transform our educational and leadership practices, a move to explore what has always been meaningful to Marshallese people when we are faced with challenges. The Kanne Lobal utilises our language, and cultural practices and values by sourcing from the concepts of jouj (kindness, love), kautiej (respect), and jouj eo mour eo (reciprocity). A key Marshallese proverb, “Enra bwe jen lale rara”, is the cultural practice where families enact compassion through the sharing of food in all occurrences. The term “enra” is a small basket weaved from the coconut leaves, and often used by Marshallese as a plate to share and distribute food amongst each other. Bwe-jen-lale-rara is about noticing and providing for the needs of others, and “enra” the basket will help support and provide for all that are in need. “Enra-bwe-jen-lale-rara” is symbolic of cultural exchange and reciprocity and the cultural values associated with building and maintaining relationships, and constantly honouring each other. As a Marshallese practice, in this article we share our understanding and knowledge about the challenges as well as possible solutions for education concerns in our nation. In addition, we highlight another proverb, “wa kuk wa jimor”, which relates to having one canoe, and despite its capacity to feed and provide for the individual, but within the canoe all people can benefit from what it can provide. In the same way, we provide in this paper a cultural framework that will enable all educators to benefit from. It is a framework that is far-reaching and relevant to the lived realities of Marshallese people today. Kumit relates to people united to build strength, all co-operating and working together, living in peace, harmony, and good health. Kanne Lobal: conceptual framework for education and leadership An education framework is a conceptual structure that can be used to capture ideas and thinking related to aspects of learning. Kanne Lobal is conceptualised and framed in this paper as an educational framework. Kanne Lobal highlights the significance of education as a collective partnership whereby leadership is an important aspect. Kanne Lobal draws-from indigenous Marshallese concepts like kautiej (respect), jouj eo mour eo (reciprocity), and jouj (kindness, heart). The role of a leader, including an education leader, is to prioritise collective learning and partnerships that benefits Marshallese people and the continuity and survival of the next generation (Heine, 2002; Thaman, 1995). As described by Ejnar Aerōk, an expert canoe builder in the RMI, he stated: “jerbal ippān doon bwe en maron maan wa e” (cited in Miller, 2010, p. 69). His description emphasises the significance of partnerships and working together when navigating and journeying together in order to move the canoe forward. The kubaak, the outrigger of the wa (canoe) is about “partnerships”. For us as elementary school leaders on Majuro, kubaak encourages us to value collaborative partnerships with each other as well as our communities, PSS, and other stakeholders. Partnerships is an important part of the Kanne Lobal education and leadership framework. It requires ongoing bwebwenato – the inspiring as well as confronting and challenging conversations that should be mediated and negotiated if we and our education stakeholders are to journey together to ensure that the educational services we provide benefits our next generation of young people in the RMI. Navigating ahead the partnerships, mediation, and negotiation are the core values of jouj (kindness, love), kautiej (respect), and jouj eo mour eo (reciprocity). As an organic conceptual framework grounded in indigenous values, inspired through our lived experiences, Kanne Lobal provides ideas and concepts for re-thinking education and leadership practices that are conducive to learning and teaching in the schooling context in the RMI. By no means does it provide the solution to the education ills in our nation. However, we argue that Kanne Lobal is a more relevant approach which is much needed for the negatively stigmatised system as a consequence of the various colonial administrations that have and continue to shape and reframe our ideas about what education should be like for us in the RMI. Moreover, Kannel Lobal is our attempt to decolonize the framing of education and leadership, moving our bwebwenato to re-framing conversations of teaching and learning so that our cultural knowledge and values are foregrounded, appreciated, and realised within our education system. Bwebwenato: sharing our stories In this section, we use bwebwenato as a method of gathering and capturing our stories as data. Below we capture our stories and ongoing conversations about the richness in Marshallese cultural knowledge in the outer islands and on Majuro and the potentialities in Kanne Lobal. Danny Jim When I was in third grade (9-10 years of age), during my grandfather’s speech in Arno, an atoll near Majuro, during a time when a wa (canoe) was being blessed and ready to put the canoe into the ocean. My grandfather told me the canoe was a blessing for the family. “Without a canoe, a family cannot provide for them”, he said. The canoe allows for travelling between places to gather food and other sources to provide for the family. My grandfather’s stories about people’s roles within the canoe reminded me that everyone within the family has a responsibility to each other. Our women, mothers and daughters too have a significant responsibility in the journey, in fact, they hold us, care for us, and given strength to their husbands, brothers, and sons. The wise man or elder sits in the middle of the canoe, directing the young man who help to steer. The young man, he does all the work, directed by the older man. They take advice and seek the wisdom of the elder. In front of the canoe, a young boy is placed there and because of his strong and youthful vision, he is able to help the elder as well as the young man on the canoe. The story can be linked to the roles that school leaders, teachers, and students have in schooling. Without each person knowing intricately their role and responsibility, the sight and vision ahead for the collective aspirations of the school and the community is difficult to comprehend. For me, the canoe is symbolic of our educational journey within our education system. As the school leader, a central, trusted, and respected figure in the school, they provide support for teachers who are at the helm, pedagogically striving to provide for their students. For without strong direction from the school leaders and teachers at the helm, the students, like the young boy, cannot foresee their futures, or envisage how education can benefit them. This is why Kanne Lobal is a significant framework for us in the Marshall Islands because within the practice we are able to take heed and empower each other so that all benefit from the process. Kanne Lobal is linked to our culture, an essential part of who we are. We must rely on our own local approaches, rather than relying on others that are not relevant to what we know and how we live in today’s society. One of the things I can tell is that in Majuro, compared to the outer islands, it’s different. In the outer islands, parents bring children together and tell them legends and stories. The elders tell them about the legends and stories – the bwebwenato. Children from outer islands know a lot more about Marshallese legends compared to children from the Majuro atoll. They usually stay close to their parents, observe how to prepare food and all types of Marshallese skills. Loretta Joseph Case There is little Western influence in the outer islands. They grow up learning their own culture with their parents, not having tv. They are closely knit, making their own food, learning to weave. They use fire for cooking food. They are more connected because there are few of them, doing their own culture. For example, if they’re building a house, the ladies will come together and make food to take to the males that are building the house, encouraging them to keep on working - “jemjem maal” (sharpening tools i.e. axe, like encouraging workers to empower them). It’s when they bring food and entertainment. Rubon Rubon Togetherness, work together, sharing of food, these are important practices as a school leader. Jemjem maal – the whole village works together, men working and the women encourage them with food and entertainment. All the young children are involved in all of the cultural practices, cultural transmission is consistently part of their everyday life. These are stronger in the outer islands. Kanne Lobal has the potential to provide solutions using our own knowledge and practices. Connie Joel When new teachers become a teacher, they learn more about their culture in teaching. Teaching raises the question, who are we? A popular saying amongst our people, “Aelon kein ad ej aelon in manit”, means that “Our islands are cultural islands”. Therefore, when we are teaching, and managing the school, we must do this culturally. When we live and breathe, we must do this culturally. There is more socialising with family and extended family. Respect the elderly. When they’re doing things the ladies all get together, in groups and do it. Cut the breadfruit, and preserve the breadfruit and pandanus. They come together and do it. Same as fishing, building houses, building canoes. They use and speak the language often spoken by the older people. There are words that people in the outer islands use and understand language regularly applied by the elderly. Respect elderly and leaders more i.e., chiefs (iroj), commoners (alap), and the workers on the land (ri-jerbal) (social layer under the commoners). All the kids, they gather with their families, and go and visit the chiefs and alap, and take gifts from their land, first produce/food from the plantation (eojōk). Tommy Almet The people are more connected to the culture in the outer islands because they help one another. They don’t have to always buy things by themselves, everyone contributes to the occasion. For instance, for birthdays, boys go fishing, others contribute and all share with everyone. Kanne Lobal is a practice that can bring people together – leaders, teachers, stakeholders. We want our colleagues to keep strong and work together to fix problems like students and teachers’ absenteeism which is a big problem for us in schools. Demetria Malachi The culture in the outer islands are more accessible and exposed to children. In Majuro, there is a mixedness of cultures and knowledges, influenced by Western thinking and practices. Kanne Lobal is an idea that can enhance quality educational purposes for the RMI. We, the school leaders who did GCSL, we want to merge and use this idea because it will help benefit students’ learning and teachers’ teaching. Kanne Lobal will help students to learn and teachers to teach though traditional skills and knowledge. We want to revitalize our ways of life through teaching because it is slowly fading away. Also, we want to have our own Marshallese learning process because it is in our own language making it easier to use and understand. Essentially, we want to proudly use our own ways of teaching from our ancestors showing the appreciation and blessings given to us. Way Forward To think of ways forward is about reflecting on the past and current learnings. Instead of a traditional discussion within a research publication, we have opted to continue our bwebwenato by sharing what we have learnt through the Graduate Certificate in School Leadership (GCSL) programme. Our bwebwenato does not end in this article and this opportunity to collaborate and partner together in this piece of writing has been a meaningful experience to conceptualise and unpack the Kanne Lobal framework. Our collaborative bwebwenato has enabled us to dig deep into our own wise knowledges for guidance through mediating and negotiating the challenges in education and leadership (Sanga & Houma, 2004). For example, bwe-jen-lale-rara reminds us to inquire, pay attention, and focus on supporting the needs of others. Through enra-bwe-jen-lale-rara, it reminds us to value cultural exchange and reciprocity which will strengthen the development and maintaining of relationships based on ways we continue to honour each other (Nimmer, 2017). We not only continue to support each other, but also help mentor the next generation of school leaders within our education system (Heine, 2002). Education and leadership are all about collaborative partnerships (Sanga & Chu, 2009; Thaman, 1997). Developing partnerships through the GCSL was useful learning for us. It encouraged us to work together, share knowledge, respect each other, and be kind. The values of jouj (kindness, love), kautiej (respect), and jouj eo mour eo (reciprocity) are meaningful in being and becoming and educational leader in the RMI (Jetnil-Kijiner, 2014; Miller, 2010; Nimmer, 2017). These values are meaningful for us practice particularly given the drive by PSS for schools to become accredited. The workshops and meetings delivered during the GCSL in the RMI from 2018 to 2019 about Kanne Lobal has given us strength to share our stories and experiences from the meeting with the stakeholders. But before we met with the stakeholders, we were encouraged to share and speak in our language within our courses: EDP05 (Professional Development and Learning), EDP06 (School Leadership), EDP07 (School Management), EDP08 (Teaching and Learning), and EDP09 (Community Partnerships). In groups, we shared our presentations with our peers, the 15 school leaders in the GCSL programme. We also invited USP RMI staff. They liked the way we presented Kannel Lobal. They provided us with feedback, for example: how the use of the sail on the canoe, the parts and their functions can be conceptualised in education and how they are related to the way that we teach our own young people. Engaging stakeholders in the conceptualisation and design stages of Kanne Lobal strengthened our understanding of leadership and collaborative partnerships. Based on various meetings with the RMI Pacific Resources for Education and Learning (PREL) team, PSS general assembly, teachers from the outer islands, and the PSS executive committee, we were able to share and receive feedback on the Kanne Lobal framework. The coordinators of the PREL programme in the RMI were excited by the possibilities around using Kanne Lobal, as a way to teach culture in an inspirational way to Marshallese students. Our Marshallese knowledge, particularly through the proverbial meaning of Kanne Lobal provided so much inspiration and insight for the groups during the presentation which gave us hope and confidence to develop the framework. Kanne Lobal is an organic and indigenous approach, grounded in Marshallese ways of doing things (Heine, 2002; Taafaki & Fowler, 2019). Given the persistent presence of colonial processes within the education system and the constant reference to practices and initiatives from the US, Kanne Lobal for us provides a refreshing yet fulfilling experience and makes us feel warm inside because it is something that belongs to all Marshallese people. Conclusion Marshallese indigenous knowledge and practices provide meaningful educational and leadership understanding and learnings. They ignite, inspire, and transform thinking and practice. The Kanne Lobal conceptual framework emphasises key concepts and values necessary for collaborative partnerships within education and leadership practices in the RMI. The bwebwenato or talk stories have been insightful and have highlighted the strengths and benefits that our Marshallese ideas and practices possess when looking for appropriate and relevant ways to understand education and leadership. Acknowledgements We want to acknowledge our GCSL cohort of school leaders who have supported us in the development of Kanne Lobal as a conceptual framework. A huge kommol tata to our friends: Joana, Rosana, Loretta, Jellan, Alvin, Ellice, Rolando, Stephen, and Alan. References Benson, C. (2002). Preface. In F. Pene, A. M. Taufe’ulungaki, & C. Benson (Eds.), Tree of Opportunity: re-thinking Pacific Education (p. iv). Suva, Fiji: University of the South Pacific, Institute of Education. Bessarab, D., Ng’andu, B. (2010). Yarning about yarning as a legitimate method in indigenous research. International Journal of Critical Indigenous Studies, 3(1), 37-50. Fa’avae, D., Jones, A., & Manu’atu, L. (2016). Talanoa’i ‘a e talanoa - talking about talanoa: Some dilemmas of a novice researcher. AlterNative: An Indigenous Journal of Indigenous Peoples,12(2),138-150. Heine, H. C. (2002). A Marshall Islands perspective. In F. Pene, A. M. Taufe’ulungaki, & C. 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IntroductionIn a 2013 press release issued by Blind Citizens Australia, the advocacy group announced they were lodging a human rights complaint against the Australian government and the ABC over the lack of audio description available on the public broadcaster. Audio description is a track of narration included between the lines of dialogue which describes important visual elements of a television show, movie or performance. Audio description is broadly recognised as an essential feature to make television accessible to audiences who are blind or vision impaired (Utray et al.). Indeed, Blind Citizens Australia maintained that audio description was as important as captioning on Australian television:people who are blind have waited too long and are frustrated that audio description on television remains indefinitely beyond our reach. Our Deaf or hearing impaired peers have always seen great commitment from the ABC, but we continue to feel like second class citizens.While audio description as a technology was developed in the 1960s—around the same time as captions (Ellis, “Netflix Closed Captions”)—it is not as widely available on television and access is therefore often considered to be out of reach for this group. As a further comparison, in Australia, while the provision of captions was mandated in the Broadcasting Services Act (BSA) 1992 and television sets had clear Australian standards regarding their capability to display captions, there is no legislation for audio description and no consistency regarding the ability of television sets sold in Australia to display them (Ellis, “Television’s Transition”). While as a technology, audio description is as old as captioning it is not as widely available on television. This is despite the promise of technological advancements to facilitate its availability. For example, Cronin and King predicted that technological change such as the introduction of stereo sound on television would facilitate a more widespread availability of audio description; however, this has not eventuated. Similarly, in the lead up to the transition from analogue to digital broadcasting in Australia, government policy documents predicted a more widespread availability of audio description as a result of increased bandwidth available via digital television (Ellis, “Television’s Transition”). While these predictions paved way for an audio description trial, there has been no amendment to the BSA to mandate its provision.Audio description has been experienced on Australian broadcast television in 2012, but only for a 14-week trial on ABC1. The trial report, and feedback from disability groups, identified several technical impediments and limitations which effected the experience of audio described content during this trial, including: the timing of the trial during a period in which the transition from analogue to digital television was still occurring (creating hardware compatibility issues for some consumers); the limitations of the “ad hoc” approach undertaken by the ABC and manual implementation of audio description; and the need for upgraded digital receivers (ABC “Trial of Audio Description”, 2). While advocacy groups acknowledged the technical complexities involved, the expected stakeholder discussions that were due to be held post-trial, in part to attempt to resolve the issues experienced, were never undertaken. As a result of the lack of subsequent commitments to providing audio description, in 2013 advocacy group Blind Citizens Australia lodged their formal complaints of disability discrimination against the ABC and the Federal Government. Since the 2012 trial on ABC1, the ABC’s catch-up portal iView instigated another audio description trial in 2015. Through the iView trial it was further confirmed that audio description held considerable benefits for people with a vision impairment. They also demonstrated that audio description was technically feasible, with far less ‘technical difficulties’ than the experience of the 2012 broadcast-based trial. Over the 15 month trial on ABC iView 1,305 hours of audio described content was provided and played 158, 277 times across multiple platforms, including iOS, Android, the Freeview app and desktop computers (ABC, “ABC iView Audio Description Trial”).Yet despite repeated audio description trials and the lodgement of discrimination complaints, there remains no audio description on Australian broadcast television. Similarly, whereas 55 per cent of DVDs released in Australia have captions, only 25 per cent include an audio description track (Media Access Australia). At the time of writing, the only audio description available on Australian television is on Netflix Australia, a subscription video on demand provider.This article seeks to highlight the importance of television access for people with disability, with a specific focus on the provision of audio description for people with vision impairments. Research consistently shows that despite being a visual medium, people with vision impairments watch television at least once a day (Cronin and King; Ellis, “Netflix Closed Captions”). However, while television access has been a priority for advocates for people who are Deaf and hard of hearing (Downey), audiences advocating audio description are only recently making gains (Ellis, “Netflix Closed Captions”; Ellis and Kent). These gains are frequently attributed to technological change, particularly the digitisation of television and the introduction of subscription video on demand where users access television content online and are not constrained by broadcast schedules. This transformation of how we access television is also considered in the article, again with a focus on the provision–or lack thereof—of audio description.This article also reports findings of research conducted with Australians with disabilities accessing the emerging video on demand environment in 2016. The survey was run online from January to February 2016. Survey respondents included people with disability, their families, and carers, and were sourced through disability organisations and community groups as well as via disability-focused social media. A total of 145 people completed the survey and 12 people participated in follow-up interviews. Insights were gained into both how people with disability are currently using video on demand and their anticipated usage of services. Of note is that most subscription video on demand services (Netflix Australia, Stan, and Presto) had only been introduced in Australia in the year before the survey being carried out, with only Foxtel Play and Quickflix having been in operation for some time prior to that.Finally, the article ends by looking at past and current advocacy in this area, including a discussion on existing—albeit, to date, limited—political will.Access to Television for People with DisabilitiesTelevision can be disabling in different ways for people with impairments, yet several accessibility features exist to translate information. For example, people who are D/deaf or hard of hearing may require captions, while people with vision impairments prefer to make use of audio description (Alper et al.). Similarly, people with mobility and dexterity impairments found the transition to digital broadcasting difficult, particularly with relation to set top box set up (Carmichael et al.). As Joshua Robare has highlighted, even legislation has generally favoured the inclusion of audiences with hearing impairments, while disregarding those with vision impairments. Similarly, much of the literature in this area focuses on the provision of captions—a vital accessibility feature for people who are D/deaf or hard of hearing. Consequently, research into accessibility to television for a diversity of impairments, going beyond hearing impairments, remains deficient.In a study of Australian audiences with disability conducted between September and November 2013—during the final months of the analogue to digital simulcast period of Australian broadcast television—closed captions, clean audio, and large/colour-coded remote control keys emerged as the most desired access features (see Ellis, “Digital Television Flexibility”). Audio description barely registered in the top five. In a different study conducted two years ago/later, when disabled Australian audiences of video on demand were asked the same question, captions continued to dominate at 63.4 per cent; however, audio description was also seen to be a necessary feature for almost one third of respondents (see Ellis et al., Accessing Subcription Video).Robert Kingett, founder of the Accessible Netflix Project, participated in our research and told us in an interview that video on demand providers treat accessibility as an “afterthought”, particularly for blind people whom most don’t think of as watching television. Yet research dating back to the 1990s shows almost 100 per cent of people with vision impairments watch television at least once a day (Cronin & King). Statistically, the number of Australians who identify as blind or vision impaired is not insignificant. Vision Australia estimates that over 357,000 Australians have a vision impairment, while one in five Australians have a disability of some form. With an ageing population, this number is expected to grow exponentially in the next ten years (Australian Network on Disability). Kingett therefore describes this lack of accessibility as evidence video on demand is “stuck in the dark ages”, and advocates that people with vision impairments do use video on demand and therefore continue to have unmet access needs.Video on Demand—Transforming TelevisionSubscription video on demand services have caused a major shift in the way television is used and consumed in Australia. Prior to 2015, there was a small subscription video on demand industry in this country. However, in 2015, following the launch of Netflix Australia, Stan, and Presto, Australia was described as having entered the “streaming wars” (Tucker) where consumers would benefit from the increased competition. As Netflix gained dominance in the video on demand market internationally, people with disability began to recognise the potential this service could have in transforming their access to television.For example, the growing availability of video on demand services continues to provide disruptive change to the way in which consumers enjoy information and entertainment. While traditional broadcast television has provided great opportunities for participation in news, events, and popular culture, both socially and in the workplace, the move towards video on demand services has seen a notable decline in traditional television viewing habits, with online continuing to increase at the expense of Australian free-to-air programming (C-Scott).For the general population, this always-on, always-available, and always-shareable nature of video on demand means that the experience is both convenient and instant. If a television show is of interest to friends and family, it can be quickly shared through popular social media with others, allowing everyone to join in the experience. For people with disability, the ability to both share and personalise the experience of television is critical to the popularity of video on demand services for this group. This gives them not only the same benefits as others but also ensures that people with disability are not unintentionally excluded from participation—it allows people with disability the choice as to whether or not to join in. However, exclusion from video on demand is a significant concern for people with disability due to the lack of accessibility features in popular subscription services. The lack of captions, audio description, and interfaces that do not comply with international Web accessibility standards are resulting in many people with disability being unable to fully participate in the preferred viewing platforms of family and friends.The impact of this expands beyond the consumption patterns of audiences, shifting the way the audience is defined and conceptualised. With an increasing distribution of audience attention to multiple channels, products, and services, the ability to, and strategies for, acquiring a large audience has changed (Napoli). As audience attention is distributed, it is broken up, into smaller, fragmented groups. The success, therefore, of a new provider may be to amass a large audience through the aggregation of smaller, niche audiences. This theory has significance for consumers who require audio description because they represent a viable target group. In this context, accessibility is reframed as a commercial opportunity rather than a cost (Ellis, “Netflix Closed Captions”).However, what this means for future provision of audio description in Australia is still unclear. Chris Mikul from Media Access Australia, author of Access on Demand, was interviewed as part of this research. He told us that the complete lack of audio description on local video on demand services can be attributed to the lack of Australian legislation requiring it. In an interview as part of this research he explained the central issue with audio description in this country as “the lack of audio description on broadcast TV, which is shocking in a world context”.International providers fare only slightly better. Robert Kingett established the Accessible Netflix Project in 2013 with the stated aim of advocating for the provision of audio description on Netflix. Netflix, despite a lack of a clear accessibility policy, are seen as being in front in terms of overall accessibility—captions are available for most content. However, the provision of audio description was initially not considered to be of such importance, and Netflix were initially against the idea, citing technical difficulties. Nevertheless, in 2015—shortly after their Australian launch—they did eventually introduce audio description on original programming, describing the access feature as an option customers could choose, “just like choosing the soundtrack in a different language” (Wright). However, despite such successful trials, the issue in the Australian market remains the absence of legislation mandating the provision of audio description in Australia and the other video on demand providers have not introduced audio description to compete with Netflix. As the Netflix example illustrates, both legislation and recognition of people with disability as a key audience demographic will result in a more accessible television environment for this group.Currently, it is debatable as to whether this increasingly competitive market, the shifting perception of audience attraction and retention, and the entry of multiple international video on demand providers, has influenced how accessibility is viewed, both for broadcast television and video on demand. Although there is some evidence for an increasing consideration of people with disability as “valid” consumers—take, for example, the iView audio description trial, or the inclusion of audio description by Netflix—our research indicates accessibility is still inconsistently considered, designed for, and applied by current providers.Survey Response: Key Issues Regarding AccessibilityRespondents were asked to provide an overall impression of video on demand services, and to tell us about their positive and negative experiences. Analysis of 68 extended responses, and the responses provided by the interview participants, identified a lack of availability of accessibility features such as audio description as a key problem. What our results indicate is that while customers with a disability are largely accommodating of the inaccessibility of providers—they use their own assistive technology to access content—they are keenly aware of the provisions that could be made. As one respondent put it:they could do a lot better: talking menus, spoken sub titles, and also spoken messages on screen.However, many expressed low expectations due to the continued absence of audio description on broadcast television:so, the other thing is, my expectations are quite low because of years of not having audio descriptions. I have slightly different expectations to other people.This reflection is important in considering both the shifting expectations regarding video on demand providers but also the need for a clear communication of what features are available so that providers can cater to—and therefore capture—niche markets.The survey identified captioning as the main accessibility problem of video on demand services. However, this may not accurately reflect the need for other accessibility features such as audio description. Rather, it may be indicative that this feature is often the only choice given to consumers. As, Chris Mikul identified, “the only disability being catered for to any great extent is deafness/hearing impairment”. Kingett agreed, noting:people who are deaf and hard of hearing are placed way before the rest because captions are beyond easy and cheap to create now. Please, there’s even companies that people use to crowd source captions so companies don’t have to do it anymore. This all came about because the deaf community has [banded] together … to achieve a cause. I know audio description isn’t as cheap to make as captions but, by these companies’ budgets that’s like dropping a penny.Advocacy and Political WillAs noted above, it has been argued by some that accessibility features that address vision impairments have been neglected. The reason behind this is twofold—the perception that this disability is experienced by a minority of the population and that, because blind people “don’t watch television”, it is not an important accessibility feature. This points towards a need for both disability advocacy and political will by politicians to introduce legislation. As one survey respondent identified, the reality is that, in Australia, neither politicians nor people with vision impairments have yet to address the issue on audio description in an organised or sustained way:we have very little audio described content available in Australia. We don’t have the population of blind people nor the political will by politicians to force providers to provide for us.However, Blind Citizens Australia—the coalition of television audiences with vision impairments who lodged the human rights complaint against the government and the ABC—suggest the tide is turning. Whereas advocates for people with vision impairments have traditionally focused on access to the workforce, the issue of television accessibility is increasingly gaining attention, particularly as a result of international activist efforts and the move towards video on demand (see Ellis and Kent).For example, Kingett’s Accessible Netflix Project in the US is considered one of the most successful accessibility movements towards the introduction of audio description. While its members are predominantly US-based, it does include several Australian members and continues to cover Netflix Australia’s stance on audio description, and be covered by Australian media and organisations (including Media Access Australia and Life Hacker). When Netflix launched in Australia, Kingett encouraged Australians to become more involved in the project (Ellis and Kent).However, despite the progress towards mandating of audio description in parliament and the resolution of efforts made by advocacy groups (including Vision Australia and Blind Citizens Australia), the status of audio description remains uncertain. Whilst some support has been gained—specifically through motions made by Senator Siewert and the ABC iView audio description trials—significant change has been slow. For example, conciliation discussions are still ongoing regarding the now four-year-old complaint brought against the ABC and the Federal Government by Blind Citizens Australia. Meanwhile, although the Senate supported Senator Siewert’s motion to change the Broadcasting Services Act to include audio description, the Act has yet to be amended.The results of multiple ABC trials of audio description remain in discussion. Whilst the recently released report on the findings of the April 2015—July 2016 iView trial states that the “trial has identified that those who utilised the audio description service found it a valuable enhancement to their media engagement and their social interactions” (ABC, “ABC iView Audio Description Trial” 18), it also cautioned that “any move to introduce AD services in Australia would have budgetary implications for the broadcasters in a constrained financial environment” and “broader legislative implications” (ABC, “ABC iView Audio Description Trial” 18). Indeed, although the trial was considered “successful”—in that experiences by users were generally positive and the benefits considerable (Media Access Australia, “New Report”)—the continuation of audio description on iView alone was clarified as representing “a systemic failure to provide people who are blind or have low vision with basic access to television now, given that iView is out of reach for many people in the blindness and low vision community” (Media Access Australia, “New Report”). Indeed, the relatively low numbers of plays of audio described content during the trial (158, 277 plays, representing 0.58% of total program plays on iView) were likely a result of a lack of access to smartphones or Internet technology, prohibitive data speeds and/or general Internet costs, all factors which affect the accessibility of video on demand significantly more for people with disability (Ellis et al., “Access for Everyone?”).On a more positive note, the culmination of advocacy pressure, the ABC iView trial, political attention, and increasing academic literature on the accessibility of Australian media has resulted in the establishment of an Audio Description Working Group by the government. This group consists of industry representatives, advocacy group representatives, academics, and “consumer representatives”. The aims of the group are to: identify options to sustainably increase access to audio description services; identify any impediments to the implementation of audio description; provide expert advice on audio description implementation options; and develop a report on the findings due at the end of 2017.ConclusionIn the absence of audio description, people who are blind or vision impaired report a less satisfying television experience (Cronin and King; Kingett). However, with each technological advancement in the delivery of television, from stereo sound to digital television, this group has held hopes for a more accessible experience. The reality, however, has been a continued lack of audio description, particularly in broadcast television.Several commentators have compared the provision of audio description with closed captioning. They find that audio description is not as widely available, and reflect this is likely a result of lack of legislation (Robare; Ellis, “Digital Television Flexibility”)—for example, in the Australian context, whereas the provision of captions is mandated in the Broadcasting Services Act 1992, audio description is not. As a result, there have been limited trials of audio description in this country and inconsistent standards in how to display it. As discussed throughout this paper, people with vision impairments and their allies therefore often draw on the example of the widespread “acceptance” of captions to make the case that audio description should also be more widely available.However, following the introduction of subscription video on demand in Australia, and particularly Netflix, the issue of audio description is receiving greater attention. It has been argued that video on demand has transformed television, particularly the ways in which television is accessed. Video on demand could also potentially transform the way we think about accessibility for audiences with disability. While captions are a well-established accessibility feature facilitating television access for people with a range of disabilities, video on demand is raising the profile of the importance of audio description for audiences with vision impairments.ReferencesABC. “Audio Description Trial on ABC Television: Report to the Minister for Broadband, Communications and the Digital Economy”. Dec. 2012. 8 Apr. 2017 <https://www.communications.gov.au/sites/g/files/net301/f/ABC-Audio-Description-Trial-Report2.pdf>.ABC. “ABC iView Audio Description Trial: Final Report to The Department of Communications and the Arts.” Oct. 2016. 6 Apr. 2017 <https://www.communications.gov.au/documents/final-report-trial-audio-description-abc-iview>.Alper, Meryl, et al. “Reimagining the Good Life with Disability: Communication, New Technology, and Humane Connections.” Communication and the Good Life. 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Audience Evolution: New Technologies and the Transformation of Media Audiences. New York: Columbia UP, 2011.Robare, Joshua S. “Television for All: Increasing Television Accessibility for the Visually Impaired through the FCC’s Ability to Regulate Video Description Technology.” Federal Communications Law Journal 63.2 (2011): 553–78.Tucker, Harry. “Netflix Leads the Streaming Wars, Followed by Foxtel’s Presto.” News.com.au 24 June 2016. 18 May 2016 <http://www.news.com.au/technology/home-entertainment/tv/netflix-leads-the-streaming-wars-followed-by-foxtels-presto/news-story/7adf45dcd7d9486ff47ec5ea5951287f>.Utray, Francisco, et al. “Monitoring Accessibility Services in Digital Television.” International Journal of Digital Multimedia Broadcasting (2012): 9.

Introduction Negative stereotyping of alternative diets such as veganism and other plant-based diets has been common in Australia, conventionally a meat-eating culture (OECD qtd. in Ting). Indeed, meat consumption in Australia is sanctioned by the ubiquity of advertising linking meat-eating to health, vitality and nation-building, and public challenges to such plant-based diets as veganism. In addition, state, commercial enterprises, and various community groups overtly resist challenges to Australian meat-eating norms and to the intensive animal husbandry practices that underpin it. Hence activists, who may contest not simply this norm but many of the customary industry practices that comprise Australia’s meat production, have been accused of promoting a vegan agenda and even of undermining the “Australian way of life”.If veganism meansa philosophy and way of living which seeks to exclude—as far as is possible and practicable—all forms of exploitation of, and cruelty to, animals for food, clothing or any other purpose; and by extension, promotes the development and use of animal-free alternatives for the benefit of humans, animals and the environment. In dietary terms it denotes the practice of dispensing with all products derived wholly or partly from animals. (Vegan Society)then our interest in this article lies in how a stereotyped label of veganism (and other associated attributes) is being used across Australian public spheres to challenge the work of animal activists as they call out factory farming for entrenched animal cruelty. This is carried out in three main parts. First, following an outline of our research approach, we examine the processes of stereotyping and the key dimensions of vegan stereotyping. Second, in the main part of the article, we reveal how opponents to such animal activist organisations as Animals Australia attempt to undermine activist calls for change by framing them as promoting an un-Australian vegan agenda. Finally, we consider how, despite such framing, that organisation is generating productive public debate around animal welfare, and, further, facilitating the creation of new activist identifications and identities.Research ApproachData collection involved searching for articles where Animals Australia and animal activism were yoked with veg*n (vegan and vegetarian), across the period May 2011 to 2016 (discussion peaked between May and June 2013). This period was of interest because it exposed a flare point with public discord being expressed between communities—namely between rural and urban consumers, farmers and animal activists, Coles Supermarkets (identified by The Australian Government the Treasury as one of two major supermarkets holding over 65% share of Australian food retail market) and their producers—and a consequent voicing of disquiet around Australian identity. We used purposive sampling (Waller, Farquharson, and Dempsey 67) to identify relevant materials as we knew in advance the case was “information-rich” (Patton 181) and would provide insightful information about a “troublesome” phenomenon (Emmel 6). Materials were collected from online news articles (30) and readers’ comments (167), online magazines (2) and websites (2) and readers’ comments (3), news items (Factiva 13), Australian Broadcasting Commission television (1) and radio (1), public blogs (2), and Facebook pages from involved organisations, specifically Australia’s National Farmers’ Federation (NFF, 155 posts) and Coles Supermarkets (29 posts). Many of these materials were explicitly responsive to a) Animals Australia’s Make It Possible campaign against Australian factory farming (launched and highly debated during this period), and b) Coles Supermarket’s short-lived partnership with Animals Australia in 2013. We utilised content analysis so as to make visible the most prominent and consistent stereotypes utilised in these various materials during the identified period. The approach allowed us to code and categorise materials so as to determine trends and patterns of words used, their relationships, and key structures and ways of speaking (Weerakkody). In addition, discourse analysis (Gee) was used in order to identify and track “language-in-use” so as to make visible the stereotyping deployed during the public reception of both the campaign and Animals Australia’s associated partnership with Coles. These methods enabled a “nuanced approach” (Coleman and Moss 12) with which to spot putdowns, innuendos, and stereotypical attitudes.Vegan StereotypingStereotypes creep into everyday language and are circulated and amplified through mainstream media, speeches by public figures, and social media. Stereotypes maintain their force through being reused and repurposed, making them difficult to eradicate due to their “cumulative effects” and influence (Harris and Sanborn 38; Inzlicht, Tullett, Legault, and Kang; Pickering). Over time stereotypes can become the lens through which we view “the world and social reality” (Harris and Sanborn 38; Inzlicht et al.). In summation, stereotyping:reduces identity categories to particular sets of deeds, attributes and attitudes (Whitley and Kite);informs individuals’ “cognitive investments” (Blum 267) by associating certain characteristics with particular groups;comprises symbolic and connotative codes that carry sets of traits, deeds, or beliefs (Cover; Rosello), and;becomes increasingly persuasive through regulating language and image use as well as identity categories (Cover; Pickering; Rosello).Not only is the “iterative force” (Rosello 35) of such associative stereotyping compounded due to its dissemination across digital media sites such as Facebook, YouTube, websites, and online news, but attempts to denounce it tend to increase its “persuasive power” (29). Indeed, stereotypes seem to refuse “to die” (23), remaining rooted in social and cultural memory (Whitley and Kite 10).As such, despite the fact that there is increasing interest in Australia and elsewhere in new food norms and plant-based diets (see, e.g., KPMG), as well as in vegan lifestyle options (Wright), studies still show that vegans remain a negatively stereotyped group. Previous studies have suggested that vegans mark a “symbolic threat” to Western, conventionally meat-eating cultures (MacInnis and Hodson 722; Stephens Griffin; Cole and Morgan). One key UK study of national newspapers, for instance, showed vegans continuing to be discredited in multiple ways as: 1) “self-evidently ridiculous”; 2) “ascetics”; 3) having a lifestyle difficult and impossible to maintain; 4) “faddist”; 5) “oversensitive”; and 6) “hostile extremists” (Cole and Morgan 140–47).For many Australians, veganism also appears anathema to their preferred culture and lifestyle of meat-eating. For instance, the NFF, Meat & Livestock Australia (MLA), and other farming bodies continue to frame veganism as marking an extreme form of lifestyle, as anti-farming and un-Australian. Such perspectives are also circulated through online rural news and readers’ comments, as will be discussed later in the article. Such representations are further exemplified by the MLA’s (Lamb, Australia Day, Celebrate Australia) Australia Day lamb advertising campaigns (Bembridge; Canning). For multiple consecutive years, the campaign presented vegans (and vegetarians) as being self-evidently ridiculous and faddish, representing them as mentally unhinged and fringe dwellers. Such stereotyping not only invokes “affective reactions” (Whitley and Kite 8)—including feelings of disgust towards individuals living such lifestyles or holding such values—but operates as “political baits” (Rosello 18) to shore-up or challenge certain social or political positions.Although such advertisements are arguably satirical, their repeated screening towards and on Australia Day highlights deeply held views about the normalcy of animal agriculture and meat-eating, “homogenizing” (Blum 276; Pickering) both meat-eaters and non-meat-eaters alike. Cultural stereotyping of this kind amplifies “social” as well as political schisms (Blum 276), and arguably discourages consumers—whether meat-eaters or non-meat-eaters—from advocating together around shared goals such as animal welfare and food safety. Additionally, given the rise of new food practices in Australia—including flexitarian, reducetarian, pescatarian, kangatarian (a niche form of ethical eating), vegivores, semi-vegetarian, vegetarian, veganism—alongside broader commitments to ethical consumption, such stereotyping suggests that consumers’ actual values and preferences are being disregarded in order to shore-up the normalcy of meat-eating.Animals Australia and the (So-Called) Vegan Agenda of Animal ActivismGiven these points, it is no surprise that there is a tacit belief in Australia that anyone labelled an animal activist must also be vegan. Within this context, we have chosen to primarily focus on the attitudes towards the campaigning work of Animals Australia—a not-for-profit organisation representing some 30 member groups and over 2 million individual supporters (Animals Australia, “Who Is”)—as this organisation has been charged as promoting a vegan agenda. Along with the RSPCA and Voiceless, Animals Australia represents one of the largest animal protection organisations within Australia (Chen). Its mission is to:Investigate, expose and raise community awareness of animal cruelty;Provide animals with the strongest representation possible to Government and other decision-makers;Educate, inspire, empower and enlist the support of the community to prevent and prohibit animal cruelty;Strengthen the animal protection movement. (Animals Australia, “Who Is”)In delivery of this mission, the organisation curates public rallies and protests, makes government and industry submissions, and utilises corporate outreach. Campaigning engages the Web, multiple forms of print and broadcast media, and social media.With regards to Animals Australia’s campaigns regarding factory farming—including the Make It Possible campaign (see fig. 1), launched in 2013 and key to the period we are investigating—the main message is that: the animals kept in these barren and constrictive conditions are “no different to our pets at home”; they are “highly intelligent creatures who feel pain, and who will respond to kindness and affection – if given the chance”; they are “someone, not something” (see the Make It Possible transcript). Campaigns deliberately strive to engender feelings of empathy and produce affect in viewers (see, e.g., van Gurp). Specifically they strive to produce mainstream recognition of the cruelties entrenched in factory farming practices and build community outrage against these practices so as to initiate industry change. Campaigns thus expressly challenge Australians to no longer support factory farmed animal products, and to identify with what we have elsewhere called everyday activist positions (Rodan and Mummery, “Animal Welfare”; “Make It Possible”). They do not, however, explicitly endorse a vegan position. Figure 1: Make It Possible (Animals Australia, campaign poster)Nonetheless, as has been noted, a common counter-tactic used within Australia by the industries targeted by such campaigns, has been to use well-known negative stereotypes to discredit not only the charges of systemic animal cruelty but the associated organisations. In our analysis, we found four prominent interconnected stereotypes utilised in both digital and print media to discredit the animal welfare objectives of Animals Australia. Together these cast the organisation as: 1) anti-meat-eating; 2) anti-farming; 3) promoting a vegan agenda; and 4) hostile extremists. These stereotypes are examined below.Anti-Meat-EatingThe most common stereotype attributed to Animals Australia from its campaigning is of being anti-meat-eating. This charge, with its associations with veganism, is clearly problematic for industries that facilitate meat-eating and within a culture that normalises meat-eating, as the following example expresses:They’re [Animals Australia] all about stopping things. They want to stop factory farming – whatever factory farming is – or they want to stop live exports. And in fact they’re not necessarily about: how do I improve animal welfare in the pig industry? Or how do I improve animal welfare in the live export industry? Because ultimately they are about a meat-free future world and we’re about a meat producing industry, so there’s not a lot of overlap, really between what we’re doing. (Andrew Spencer, Australian Pork Ltd., qtd. in Clark)Respondents engaging this stereotype also express their “outrage at Coles” (McCarthy) and Animals Australia for “pedalling [sic]” a pro-vegan agenda (Nash), their sense that Animals Australia is operating with ulterior motives (Flint) and criminal intent (Brown). They see cultural refocus as unnecessary and “an exercise in futility” (Harris).Anti-FarmingTo be anti-farming in Australia is generally considered to be un-Australian, with Glasgow suggesting that any criticism of “farming practices” in Australian society can be “interpreted as an attack on the moral integrity of farmers, amounting to cultural blasphemy” (200). Given its objectives, it is unsurprising that Animals Australia has been stereotyped as being “anti-farming”, a phrase additionally often used in conjunction with the charge of veganism. Although this comprises a misreading of veganism—given its focus on challenging animal exploitation in farming rather than entailing opposition to all farming—the NFF accused Animals Australia of being “blatantly anti-farming and proveganism” (Linegar qtd. in Nason) and as wanting “to see animal agriculture phased out” (National Farmers’ Federation). As expressed in more detail:One of the main factors for VFF and other farmers being offended is because of AA’s opinion and stand on ALL farming. AA wants all farming banned and us all become vegans. Is it any wonder a lot of people were upset? Add to that the proceeds going to AA which may have been used for their next criminal activity washed against the grain. If people want to stand against factory farming they have the opportunity not to purchase them. Surely not buying a product will have a far greater impact on factory farmed produce. Maybe the money could have been given to farmers? (Hunter)Such stereotyping reveals how strongly normalised animal agriculture is in Australia, as well as a tendency on the part of respondents to reframe the challenge of animal cruelty in some farming practices into a position supposedly challenging all farming practices.Promoting a Vegan AgendaAs is already clear, Animals Australia is often reproached for promoting a vegan agenda, which, it is further suggested, it keeps hidden from the Australian public. This viewpoint was evident in two key examples: a) the Australian public and organisations such as the NFF are presented as being “defenceless” against the “myopic vitriol of the vegan abolitionists” (Jonas); and b) Animals Australia is accused of accepting “loans from liberation groups” and being “supported by an army of animal rights lawyers” to promote a “hard core” veganism message (Bourke).Nobody likes to see any animals hurt, but pushing a vegan agenda and pushing bad attitudes by group members is not helping any animals and just serves to slow any progress both sides are trying to resolve. (V.c. Deb Ford)Along with undermining farmers’ “legitimate business” (Jooste), veganism was also considered to undermine Australia’s rural communities (Park qtd. in Malone).Hostile ExtremistsThe final stereotype linking veganism with Animals Australia was of hostile extremism (cf. Cole and Morgan). This means, for users, being inimical to Australian national values but, also, being akin to terrorists who engage in criminal activities antagonistic to Australia’s democratic society and economic livelihood (see, e.g., Greer; ABC News). It is the broad symbolic threat that “extremism” invokes that makes this stereotype particularly “infectious” (Rosello 19).The latest tag team attacks on our pork industry saw AL giving crash courses in how to become a career criminal for the severely impressionable, after attacks on the RSPCA against the teachings of Peter Singer and trying to bully the RSPCA into vegan functions menu. (Cattle Advocate)The “extremists” want that extended to dairy products, as well. The fact that this will cause the total annihilation of practically all animals, wild and domestic, doesn’t bother them in the least. (Brown)What is interesting about these last two dimensions of stereotyping is their displacement of violence. That is, rather than responding to the charge of animal cruelty, violence and extremism is attributed to those making the charge.Stereotypes and Symbolic Boundary ShiftingWhat is evident throughout these instances is how stereotyping as a “cognitive mechanism” is being used to build boundaries (Cherry 460): in the first instance, between “us” (the meat-eating majority) and “them” (the vegan minority aka animal activists); and secondly between human interest and livestock. This point is that animals may hold instrumental value and receive some protection through such, but any more stringent arguments for their protection at the expense of perceived human interests tend to be seen as wrong-headed (Sorenson; Munro).These boundaries are deeply entrenched in Western culture (Wimmer). They are also deeply problematic in the context of animal activism because they fragment publics, promote restrictive identities, and close down public debate (Lamont and Molnár). Boundary entrenching is clearly evident in the stereotyping work carried out by industry stakeholders where meat-eating and practices of industrialised animal agriculture are valorised and normalised. Challenging Australia’s meat production practices—irrespective of the reason given—is framed and belittled as entailing a vegan agenda, and further as contributing to the demise of farming and rural communities in Australia.More broadly, industry stakeholders are explicitly targeting the activist work by such organisations as Animals Australia as undermining the ‘Australian way of life’. In their reading, there is an irreconcilable boundary between human and animal interests and between an activist minority which is vegan, unreasonable, extremist and hostile to farming and the meat-eating majority which is representative of the Australian community and sustains the Australian economy. As discussed so far, such stereotyping and boundary making—even in their inaccuracies—can be pernicious in the way they entrench identities and divisions, and close the possibility for public debate.Rather than directly contesting the presuppositions and inaccuracies of such stereotyping, however, Animals Australia can be read as cultivating a process of symbolic boundary shifting. That is, rather than responding by simply underlining its own moderate position of challenging only intensive animal agriculture for systemic animal cruelty, Animals Australia uses its campaigns to develop “boundary blurring and crossing” tactics (Cherry 451, 459), specifically to dismantle and shift the symbolic boundaries conventionally in place between humans and non-human animals in the first instance, and between those non-human animals used for companionship and those used for food in the second (see fig. 2). Figure 2: That Ain’t No Way to Treat a Lady (Animals Australia, campaign image on back of taxi)Indeed, the symbolic boundaries between humans and animals left unquestioned in the preceding stereotyping are being profoundly shaken by Animals Australia with campaigns such as Make It Possible making morally relevant likenesses between humans and animals highly visible to mainstream Australians. Namely, the organisation works to interpellate viewers to exercise their own capacities for emotional identification and moral imagination, to identify with animals’ experiences and lives, and to act upon that identification to demand change.So, rather than reactively striving to refute the aforementioned stereotypes, organisations such as Animals Australia are modelling and facilitating symbolic boundary shifting by building broad, emotionally motivated, pathways through which Australians are being encouraged to refocus their own assumptions, practices and identities regarding animal experience, welfare and animal-human relations. Indeed the organisation has explicitly framed itself as speaking on behalf of not only animals but all caring Australians, suggesting thereby the possibility of a reframing of Australian national identity. Although such a tactic does not directly contest this negative stereotyping—direct contestation being, as noted, ineffective given the perniciousness of stereotyping—such work nonetheless dismantles the oppositional charge of such stereotyping in calling for all Australians to proudly be a little bit anti-meat-eating (when that meat is from factory farmed animals), a little bit anti-factory farming, a little bit pro-veg*n, and a little bit proud to consider themselves as caring about animal welfare.For Animals Australia, in other words, appealing to Australians to care about animal welfare and to act in support of that care, not only defuses the stereotypes targeting them but encourages the work of symbolic boundary shifting that is really at the heart of this dispute. Further research into the reception of the debate would give a sense of the extent to which such an approach is making a difference.ReferencesABC News. “Animal Rights Activists ‘Akin to Terrorists’, Says NSW Minister Katrina Hodgkinson.” ABC News 18 Jul. 2013. 21 Feb. 2019 <http://www.abc.net.au/news/2013-07-18/animal-rights-activists-27terrorists272c-says-nsw-minister/4828556>.Animals Australia. “Who Is Animals Australia?” 20 Feb. 2019 <http://www.animalsaustralia.org/about>.———. Make It Possible. Video and transcript. 21 Oct. 2012. 20 Feb. 2019 <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fM6V6lq_p0o>.The Australian Government the Treasury. Independent Review of the Food and Grocery Code of Conduct: Final Report. 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IntroductionWithin Australia, the approach taken to the ways in which disabled people access television is heavily influenced by legislation and activism from abroad. This is increasingly the case as television moves to online modes of distribution where physical and legislative boundaries are more fluid. While early investigations of the intersections between television and the concept of abroad focused on the impacts of representation and national reputation (Boddy), the introduction of new media technologies saw a shifting focus towards the impact and introduction of new media technologies. Drawing on Chan’s definition of media internationalisation as “the process by which the ownership, structure, production, distribution, or content of a country’s media is influenced by foreign media interests, culture and markets” (Chan 71), this article considers the impacts of legislative and advocacy efforts abroad on Australian television audiences with disabilities accessing subscription Video on Demand (VOD).Subscription (VOD) services have caused a major shift in the way television is used and consumed in Australia. Prior to 2015, there was a small subscription VOD industry operating out of this country. Providers such as Quickflix had limited content and the bulk of VOD services used by Australians related to catch-up television, user-generated videos on YouTube or Vimeo, or accessing Netflix US illegally through virtual private networks (VPNs) and proxy services (Ryall; Lombato and Meese). VOD is distinct in that it is generally streamed over Internet-based online services and is not linear, giving viewers the opportunity to watch the video at any time once the programme is available. Unlike broadcast television, there is no particular government or corporate entity controlling the creation of VOD. These services take advantage of the time-shifted convenience of the medium. In addition, VOD is typically not terrestrial, traversing national boundaries and challenging audience expectations and legislative boundaries. This research is concerned with the subscriber model of VOD in Australia where subscribers pay a fee to gain access to large collections of content.This internationalising of television has also offered the opportunity for people with disabilities that previously excluded them from the practice of television consumption, to participate in this national pastime. On an international level, audio description is becoming more available on VOD than it is on broadcast television, thus allowing disabled people access to television. This article situates the Australian approach to VOD accessibility within a broader international framework to question whether the internationalisation of television has affected the ways in which of content is viewed, both at legislative and public levels. While providers are still governed by national regulations, these regulations are influenced by international legislation. Further, the presence and success of advocacy groups to agitate for change has exacerbated the way accessibility is viewed and defined in Australia. The role of the Accessible Netflix Project, in conjunction with changes in the 21st Century Communications and Video Accessibility Act (CVAA) in the USA, has not only reframed accessibility discourse in the US, but also, as companies such as Netflix move abroad, has potentially stimulated a shift in media accessibility standards in Australia.We focus in particular on the impact of three new services – Netflix Australia, Stan, and Presto Entertainment—which entered the Australian market in 2015. At the time, Australia was described as having entered the “streaming wars” and consumers were predicted to be the beneficiaries (Tucker). Despite international moves to improve the accessibility of VOD for disabled consumers, via legislation and advocacy, none of these providers launched with an accessibility policy in place. Even closed captions, whose provision on Australian broadcast television had been mandated via the broadcasting services act since the early 1990s, were conspicuously absent. The absence of audio description was less surprising. With the exception of a 12-week trial on the Australian Broadcasting Commission (ABC) in 2012 and a follow up trial on iView in 2015, audio description has never been available to Australian people who are vision impaired.The findings and methodology of this article are based on research into disability and streaming television in Australia, conducted in 2015 and 2016. Funded by the Australian Communications and Consumer Action Network (ACCAN), the 12-month project reviewed national and international policy; surveyed 145 people with disability; and conducted interviews with media professionals, policy advisors, accessibility advocates, and disabled Australian VOD consumers.Accessibility Abroad Impacting on Local Accessibility: The Netflix ModelDespite the lack of a clear accessibility policy, Netflix is in front in terms of accessibility, with captions available for most content. Audio description for some content became available in April 2015 shortly after its Australian launch. The introduction of this accessibility feature has been directly attributed to the advocacy efforts of the Accessible Netflix Project, an international online movement operating out of the US and advocating for improved accessibility of VOD in the US and abroad (Ellis & Kent). Similarly, Chris Mikul, author of Access on Demand, was interviewed as part of this research. He told us that Netflix’s provision of captions was due to the impacts of legislation in the USA, namely the CVAA. The CVAA, which we discuss later in the paper, while having no jurisdiction in Australia, has improved the availability of captions by mandating accessibility abroad. As a result, accessible content is imported into the Australian market. When Netflix introduced audio description on its original programming, the VOD provider described the access feature as an option customers could choose, “just like choosing the soundtrack in a different language” (Wright). However, despite successful trials, other VOD providers have not introduced audio description as a way to compete with Netflix, and there is no legislation in place regarding the provision of audio description in Australia. People with disability, including people with vision impairments, do use VOD and continue to have particular unmet access needs. As the Netflix example illustrates, both legislation and recognition of people with a disability as a key audience demographic will result in a more accessible television environment.Impact of International LegislationThe accessibility of VOD in Australia has been impacted upon by international legislation in three key ways: through comparative bench-marks, or industry expectations; via user-led expectations and awareness of differing policies and products; and also through the introduction of international providers onto the Australian VOD market, and the presence of parallel-import VOD services. While international VOD providers such as Netflix and iTunes have officially launched in Australia, Australian consumers, both prior to and after the official availability, often access the parallel USA versions of such services. Lombato and Meese theorise that the delays in content launches between the US and Australia, and the limitations caused by licensing agreements (reducing the content availability) have prompted the continued use of Netflix US and a “kind of transnational shop-front hopping” (126). This is significant for VOD content accessibility as it emphasises the effect of, and disparities in national legislation, whereby the same company provides accessible content only in locations in which it is subject to legal requirements. Our analysis of international policy regarding the accessibility of VOD has found a varied approach—from a complete absence of accessibility regulations (New Zealand), to a layering of policy through disability discrimination acts alongside new media laws (USA). Additionally, this need to address convergence and new media in media accessibility regulation is currently a subject being discussed at government levels in some countries, primarily in the UK (ATVOD). However, outside of the USA, there remains either a lack of accessibility policies for media, new or old—as is the case in Singapore—or a lack of policies that facilitate accessibility for the VOD market—such as in Australia where a level of accessibility is required for broadcasters and subscription television but not VOD.While these changes and advancements in accessibility are taking place abroad, the space that online businesses occupy is fluid. The accessibility requirements of physical spaces cross national boundaries, and operate across multiple media and technologies, and thus, multiple media laws. For example, Australian television broadcasters are subject to some captioning requirements, yet VOD is not. Furthermore, catch-up VOD services provided by mainstream Australian television broadcasters are not subject to these laws. While legislation that accommodates convergence and the new digital media landscape is logical (ACMA) there remain few examples globally that have made changes to reflect accessibility requirements in this context. The CVAA in the US is perhaps the most effective to date, specifically addressing the issue of access to modern communications for people with disability.The CVAA and CaptioningThe CVAA seeks to ensure that “accessibility laws enacted in the 1980s and 1990s are brought up to date with 21st century technologies, including new digital, broadband, and mobile innovations” (FCC). The CVAA is designed to be forward-thinking and evolve with changing technologies (Varley). As such, the Act has been distinctive in its approach to accessibility for Internet protocol delivered video programming, including VOD. While full accessibility requirements, such as the inclusion of audio description are not addressed, the Act is considered to be the most accessible globally in its requirements for captioning of all content—specifically, English and Spanish—across cable, broadcast, satellite, and VOD content. VOD apps, plug-ins and devices are also required to implement the complete captioning capabilities, with specific requirements for personalised presentation, colour, size, and fonts. This requirement is applied to video programming distributors and to video programming owners. Indeed, programmers are expected to provide captioning compliance certificates, and distributors are required to report a failure to do so. Quality standards have also been established, with an emphasis not simply on the presence of captioning, but also on accuracy, synchronicity, completeness, and appropriate placement of captions. Despite an absence of similar legislation locally, the impacts of these foreign interests will penetrate the Australian market.In Australia, the example set by the CVAA has warranted recommendations by the ACMA and Media Access Australia. In a recent interview, Chris Mikul reinforced the position that, in order for the accessibility of VOD to improve in Australia, a similar Act is needed to the one established in the US. According to Mikul, “The CVAA in the US bridges the gap to some extent with captioning, although it doesn’t venture into online audio description. […] We need something like the CVAA here” (Mikul).Beyond the impact of the CVAA on US VOD programming, the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) (1990) has been significant in the developing captioning requirements of the CVAA. In 2010, disability advocates seeking more accessible VOD services attempted to prosecute Netflix under the ADA. The National Association for the Deaf (NAD) argued that Netflix discriminated against those with a hearing impairment by not providing closed captions for all content. At this time, the CVAA did not include captioning requirements for VOD providers. Instead, it was argued that online businesses should be considered as a “place” of publication accommodation, and thus subject to the same standards and anti-discrimination laws. Netflix settled out of court in 2012, agreeing to caption 100% of its content by 2014 (Mullin; Wolford). However, a Federal Appeals Court later ruled that Netflix was not a place of public accommodation and therefore did not have to comply with the ruling (Hattem). Notably, during the case Netflix also argued that it should not be required to provide captions, as it was abiding by CVAA requirements at that time.Accessibility Activism and AdvocacyAdvocates for accessibility, such as the NAD, have impacted not only on the legislative framework for VOD in the USA, but also on the international public perception and expectation of accessibility. It is important to note that many of the help forums generated by international VOD providers mix customers from multiple countries, establishing a global space in which requirements, expectations and perceptions are shared. These spaces generate a transnational accessibility, providing an awareness of what provisions are being made in other countries, and where they are not. Orrego-Carmona conducted a study on subtitling for the purpose of language translation and found the globalisation of audio-visual content and international media flows have impacted on the public view of subtitling. Indeed, this finding can be extended to subtitling for people with disability. In the help forums for VOD providers, users identified an awareness of other more accessible media environments (such as whether companies provided closed captions in other countries), the impact of legislation in other countries on accessibility, and how or if international media companies were replicating accessibility standards transnationally. Social media campaigns, instigated in both the UK and the US are significant examples of consumer and public-led activism for accessibility. “LOVEFiLM hates deaf people”, #subtitleit, launched by the Action on Hearing Loss group in the UK, and #withcaptions, were all effective online campaigns launched by individuals and disability activist groups. In early 2014, comedian Mark Thomas, as part of his show 100 Acts of Minor Dissent, placed two large posters at the entrance to the offices of Amazon UK stating "LOVEFiLM hates deaf people." A subsequent petition through change.com attracted 15154 signatures, asking for rental DVDs that were subtitled to be listed, and all streamed content to be subtitled (https://www.change.org/p/lovefilm-amazon-prime-video-amazon-uk-please-list-your-subtitled-rental-dvds-and-subtitle-your-streamed-content). A year later, Amazon increased the subtitling of its content to 40 percent. As of June 2015 the company was working towards 100% subtitling. The petition turned its attention to Sky On Demand, initiated by Jamie Danjoux, a 17-year-old boy with hearing loss (https://www.change.org/p/sky-enable-subtitles-for-ondemand), has attracted 6556 signatures. The social media campaigns #subtitleit and #withcaptions similarly aimed to target both VOD providers and the government, with the aim for both consistent and compulsory captioning across all VOD content. While UK legislation is yet to specifically address VOD captioning, the subject of accessibility and VOD is currently being debated at policy level. It was also successful in gaining commitments from Sky and BT TV to improve subtitles for their VOD and catch-up VOD programming.In the USA, The Accessible Netflix Project and founder Robert Kingett have been significant advocates for the inclusion of audio description on Netflix and other US VOD providers. Further, while the Accessible Netflix Project has a focus on the United States, its prominence and effectiveness has facilitated awareness of the accessibility of VOD transnationally, and the group internally monitors and comments on international examples. This group was integral in persuading Netflix to provide audio descriptions, a move that has impacted on the level of accessibility worldwide.These advocacy efforts abroad have not only included Australian audiences via their invitations to participate in transnational online spaces, but their success also has direct impact on the availability of captions and audio description imported to Australian video on demand consumers. ConclusionThe national borders of television have always been permeable—with content from abroad influencing programming and culture. However, within Australia, borders have been erected around the television culture with long wait times between shows airing abroad and locally. In addition, licencing deals between overseas distributors and pay television have delayed the introduction of VOD until 2015. That year saw the introduction of three VOD providers to the Australian television landscape: Stan, Presto Entertainment, and Netflix Australia. With the introduction of VOD, it is not only international content that has altered television consumption. Overseas providers have established a firm place in the Australia television marketplace. Even before the formal launch of overseas VOD providers, disabled users were accessing content from providers such as Netflix USA via VPNs and tunnelling services, illustrating both the clear demand for VOD content, and demonstrating the multiple ways in which international legislation and provider approaches to accessibility have permeated the Australian television industry.The rapid increase of ways in which we watch television has increased its accessibility. The nature of video on demand—streamed online and nonlinear—means that the content accessed is no longer as restricted by space, time and television. Audiences are able to personalise and modify access, and can use multiple devices, with multiple assistive technologies and aids. This increasingly accessible environment is the result of legislative and advocacy efforts originating in other countries. Efforts to improve captions and introduce audio description, while not originating in Australia, have seen improvements to the availability of accessibility features for disabled Australian television audiences. To return to Chan’s definition of media internationalisation with which we began this article, a concern with television accessibility while not originating in Australia, has taken place due to the influence of “foreign media interests, culture and markets” (Chan 71).However, despite the increased potential for full accessibility, there remains deficits. Captions and audio description, the two main features that support the playback of online video content in an accessible way, are not consistently provided. There are no clear, applicable legislative requirements for VOD accessibility in Australia. This must change. Based on our research, change at government, industry and advocacy levels are required in order for VOD in Australia to become fully accessible. Legislation needs to be introduced that requires a minimum level of accessibility, including audio description accessibility, on broadcast television and VOD. Further, governments should work to ensure that PWD are aware of the accessibility features that are provided across all media. For VOD providers, it should be recognised that a significant portion of the consumer base could be PWD, or their families and friends may wish to share in the activity of VOD. Establishing an understanding of the different accessibility requirements may come from hiring specialised accessibility consultants to make platforms accessible and useable for PWD. 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