ABSTRACT
This chapter introduces the media subject selected for this research: the Q&A discussion program aired by the national broadcaster, the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC). It provides a brief review of the ABC in its development and position apart from commercial media outlets. The ABC is a state-funded public broadcaster that was established in 1932 by the Australian government. Beginning with radio stations, it later expanded to include its first television news station in 1956. Q&A is a weekly one-hour discussion program that began in 2008. It runs live on the ABC’s ABC1 Channel on Mondays at 9.35 pm prime time is simulcast on News 24 and News radio and is usually broadcast from the ABC studio in Ultimo, Sydney. There is general agreement among scholars that the public sphere is an idealised construct, since no singular public sphere can be fully representative of a general, national public.
