Sunday Extra - Separate stories podcast

Antarctica has long captured the imaginations of artists and poets, as well as explorers and scientists. Since 2023, The University of Tasmania has been running a research project called  Creative Antarctica , the first comprehensive survey of Antarctic-themed works by Australian writers and artists, funded by the Australian Research Council.  Melbourne's RMIT is holding a free exhibition of works...

Adam Elliot is an auteur writer and director of animated films, who has carved his own path in the Australian film industry with his idiosyncratic films that have resonated across the globe. 

Australia will mark the 30th anniversary of the Port Arthur massacre in April 2026. The process of dealing with the grief and its ongoing effects are dealt with in Beyond the Neck, a theatre production written by acclaimed playwright Tom Holloway.

Have you ever wondered what your ancestors were feeling decades or centuries ago? Rob Boddice is an historian who argues that differences in our contexts and world-views would make our emotional experiences completely different - even the experience of pain. Guest: Rob Boddice, Core Fellow at the Helsinki Collegium for Advanced Studies at the University of Helsinki, author of The History of Emotio...

As an official in the US State Department, Edward Fishman worked on imposing sanctions on Russia. Eddie discusses his latest book  Chokepoints , which examines how critical economic monopolies have become the key to geopolitical power in the twenty-first century. Chokepoints was chosen by The Economist as one of the best business and economics books of 2025.  Guest: Edward Fishman, Director of the...

NASA crashed a spacecraft into an asteroid in 2022, hoping the kinetic impact would nudge it off its orbit. The mission was called the Double Asteroid Redirection Test, or DART. Four years later, scientists have published their findings and say the experiment was even more successful than expected. Guest: Rahil Makadia , planetary defence scientist at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign a...

As the conflict in the Middle East enters its third week, Iran continues to launch attacks against US allies in the Gulf. Iraq, which borders Iran, is being struck by both Iran and the United States because the country plays host to a range of groups allied to both sides. 

This week seven members of the Iranian women’s soccer delegation were given humanitarian visas to stay in Australia rather than returning to Iran after competing in the Women’s Asian Cup. The events of this week echo previous instances of Australia giving humanitarian visas to athletes, such as the decision in 2021 to give visas to members of the Afghan women's cricket team. 

Julie Janson is a Burruberongal woman, novelist, playwright and poet. In her new book, Letters from India, she writes about the profoundly moving experience of visiting India as an Indigenous woman — the tears, the joy and the unexpected connections she makes along the way. Guest: Julie Janson , novelist, playwright, poet and author of Letters from India

Deborah Cheetham Fraillon AO is a soprano and composer whose extensive CV includes Artistic Director of Short Black Opera and Dhungala Children's Choir , First Nations Creative Chair at Melbourne Symphony Orchestra, and Chair of Vocal Studies at the Sydney Conservatorium of Music. Deborah describes herself as a “21st century urban woman who is Yorta Yorta by birth, stolen generation by government...

Gatz is a six-hour theatrical reimagining of The Great Gatsby (eight and a half hours with intervals), which The New York Times called “the most remarkable achievement in theatre … this decade”. Gatz will be performed at the Adelaide Festival from 13 to 15 March. Guest: John Collins, director of Gatz and founder of the Elevator Repair Service Theater.

As doctors are weighed down by increased demands, reduced support and the fast pace of change in medical research, could AI help save the health system for both patients and physicians? Guest: Dr Charlotte Blease, associate professor in the Department of Women's and Children's Health at Uppsala University, Sweden; researcher at Harvard Medical School; and author of Dr. Bot: Why Doctors Can Fail Us...

Roughly 98% of all global internet traffic travels not via phone towers or even satellites, but underwater, along a vast network of fiber optic cables that run some 1.5 million kilometres along the ocean floor. 

Rapper-turned-politician Balen Shah has been elected Nepal's new Prime Minister. The 35 year-old was the mayor of Kathmandu before he ran against former leader KP Sharma Oli. Nepal went to the polls on Thursday 5 March, just six months after the Gen Z protests that saw the deaths of dozens of students and ultimately brought down the government of the day. Guest: Roman Gautam, journalist and editor...

Reza Pahlavi, the son of the last Shah of Iran, is pitching himself as a democratic future leader of Iran, claiming to have broad support in Iran. Who were the Pahlavi Shahs and what was life like under their rule?

Iran’s control of the Strait of Hormuz highlights how vulnerable global trade routes can be to disruption — and how easily strategic choke points can be weaponised. Guest: Sarah Schiffling , Deputy Director of the HUMLOG Institute and Assistant Professor of Supply Chain Management and Social Responsibility at the Hanken School of Economics.

Donald Trump has announced the death of Iran's Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei from a missile strike coordinated by the United States and Israel. Julian speaks with UN and New York Correspondent at the BBC Persian Service, Bahman Kalbasi about what this means for the Iranian regime.  Guest: Bahman Kalbasi, UN and New York Correspondent for the BBC Persian Service.

Bob Brown is a giant of the environmental movement and Australian politics. A former doctor, Bob is the co-founder of the Australian Greens, served as a Senator from 1996, and party leader from 2005 until his retirement in 2012. Today at 81 he continues his lifelong work of environmental campaigning with the Bob Brown Foundation .  The first biography of Bob aptly called him the “Gentle Revolution...

As Constitutions go, America’s is the most famous and revered document. By contrast, the Australian constitution doesn’t inspire as much interest. Two lawyers have taken upon themselves the task of promoting awareness about the Australian constitution and the constitutional system that surrounds it with a new book that former Chief Justice and Sunday Extra guest Robert French says is a “comprehens...

Fiume o Morte! Has been praised as “the funniest and most unorthodox history lesson of the year”. In January, it was awarded Best Documentary at the European Film Awards. 

It wasn’t very long ago that LGBTQIA+ relationships were criminalised in Australia. This creates challenges when it comes to uncovering pieces of queer history, but institutions like the State Library of NSW are dedicated to collecting and preserving huge catalogues of LGBTQIA+ manuscripts, photographs and ephemera that are free and accessible to the community. Guest: Sam Cooling, Librarian ("Quee...

When Canada's Prime Minister Mark Carney gave his rousing speech on middle powers at Davos, he quoted Václav Havel - the Czech dissident, and later president - from his 1978 essay The Power of the Powerless. Carney’s references to Havel’s essay prompted Australian Catholic University Professor of History Darius Von Guttner to write about The Power of the Powerless in The Conversation, where he des...

Forty years ago this week, events in the Philippines were underway that would lead to the fall of the dictator Ferdinand Marcos, who had served as President for 21 years.

In November 2025 a bill was introduced to Israel's Knesset by the Jewish Power Party that would re-establish the use of capital punishment in the country's military courts.

The world is coming to grips with the joint American and Israeli strikes across Iran, and Iran retaliatory missile and drone strikes in Israel and in multiple countries across the Middle East. Guest: Bilal Saab, former Pentagon official in the first Trump administration overseeing US security cooperation in the Middle East, now the senior managing director of consulting firm TRENDS US and an assoc...