The Yarn

When international students first set foot in Melbourne, they often feel alienated due to the absence of a sense of home and may feel apprehensive due to the cultural differences. They yearn for resonance and familiarity. In this episode, two Chinese students join the university's Chinese martial arts club, while another student from China blends Chinese music with various other genres. An Indones...

In this episode of Subclass 500, Elliot Rodriguez speaks with fellow international students about struggles with language barriers. At the University of Melbourne professors are strict about translation rules for assignments, making it even harder for some students to do their assessments. However, the language barrier doesn't just affect non-native English speakers, Elliot discovers throughout th...

From the rule changes that make hard to earn a living, to the challenges of a long-distance relationship, from the freedoms of being a woman in Australia, to the cage made by paperwork designed to keep you out, all while learning to speak in a new language. These are some of challenges faced by international students at the University of Melbourne, and this is a podcast revealing those stories.sev...

For the first time in four years, Australia is facing an El Nino — a weather pattern that can cause extreme heat.  These increased temperatures would make Bendigo especially vulnerable to droughts. But an adaptation plan to restore the region’s waterways will provide a much-needed safeguard.    Today, we’re bringing you an interview with journalist Sasha Gattermayr about her reporting on Bendigo’s...

This weekend, millions of Australians will vote on whether to enshrine an Indigenous voice to Parliament in the constitution.     For most young Australians, it will be their first ever referendum. It’s also the first to take place in the era of social media — and misinformation has been rife.     Today, we’re taking a break from our Regional Reporting series to bring you a special report on the r...

Fires and droughts are only the flashpoints of rising temperatures. Heat-induced health issues, though less conspicuous, are also a risk.   Bendigo’s socio-economic landscape makes it especially vulnerable to this creeping problem, and its residents are suffering — both physically and mentally.  Today, we’re bringing you an interview with CAJ student Jerome Des Preaux about his reporting on health...

This week, we’re investigating a controversial strategy to control Bendigo’s pests by reintroducing an apex predator — the dingo.  It’s a response to Victoria’s growing Kangaroo population, which has increased by approximately one million since 2017.   The national icon is decimating crops, causing car accidents, and destroying ecosystems. Hundreds of thousands are culled by hunters every year, bu...

When we encounter unexpected information, our brains enter what psychologists call “the surprise sequence”.  Whether positive or negative, the sequence begins with a state of heightened emotions and extreme curiosity. After this, our points of view shift to make sense of a new reality. Sometimes fundamentally.  This week, we’re bringing you three stories about being humbled by new information and...

Back in January, China’s education ministry made a snap decision. Effective immediately, online study at foreign universities was banned.   Tens of thousands of students scrambled to secure visas and book flights to Australia in time for semester one. To make matters worse — their new home was in the midst of a rental crisis.  This week, we’re bringing you two interviews about The Citizen’s covera...

Blind spots are easy to see in others. It’s much harder to see our own.  This discrepancy is called the blind spot bias, and psychologists believe almost all of us suffer from it.  This week, we’re bringing you three stories about blind spots and misunderstandings. Stories about biases clouding our judgment and making us blind to nuance.   It’s the second episode of Dark Matters. A series about th...

When we imagine great mysteries we think of distant galaxies or unexplorable ocean depths. But one of the greatest mysteries is a lot closer to home. It’s in our heads.   The human brain is the most complex data processor in the known universe. But we still have very little idea how our own consciousness actually works.   This week, we’re bringing you three stories that shed light on the intricaci...

Today, we’re bringing you three student-produced stories about a topic close to home — The University of Melbourne itself.    Stories about how global issues like the rise of AI are playing out on campus, as well as stories more specific to the university.    It’s the third and final episode of Hyperlocal. A series about the big issues impacting small communities in Melbourne.     Featuring storie...

Today, we’re bringing you three stories about the shortcomings of Melbourne’s roadways and how to fix them. Stories about the life-changing — and even life-saving — potentials of transport engineering.   It’s the second episode of Hyperlocal, a series about the big issues impacting small communities in Melbourne.   Featuring stories by Timothy Evetts, Bridget Collier, and Xiyan Wang.   See omnystu...

This week, we’re bringing you three stories about neighbours banding together — either to help each other out or unite against a mutual adversary.    It’s the first episode of Hyperlocal, our new series about the big issues impacting small communities in Melbourne.     Featuring stories by Filment Ho, Jerome Des Preaux, and Amelia Costigan. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

For the last seven years, producers from the podcast All the Best have mentored Melbourne University's audio journalism students.   It’s part of an initiative that teaches emerging storytellers the ins and outs of audio production, culminating in a series of student-produced documentaries. Today, we’re bringing you a collection of All the Best’ s all-time favourite audio stories from these mentors...

Today, we're bringing you another episode of News Bites — a series of live interviews showcasing the work of local journalists.   This week’s guest is Erik Jensen, the editor-in-chief of Schwartz Media.  Erik’s career has been multipronged.  He began working as a music critic when he was only fifteen. After high school, he went on to join the Sydney Morning Herald and won a Walkley Award.  Later,...

The Pacific island of Kiribati could be completely submerged by rising sea levels in just seventy years, but the nation is among the world’s lowest emitters of C02.   Australia, on the other hand, is among the highest. In 2019, we emitted twenty-one times more C02 per capita than Kiribati.   Today, we’re bringing you three stories about climate injustice — stories about the world’s richest countri...

Eco-anxiety is the chronic fear of environmental doom.  While the American Psychiatric Association acknowledges its existence, it doesn’t classify it as a pathology. It’s a rational response to the world around us. And it’s especially prevalent among young people.  At best, eco-anxiety can motivate collective action. But it can also lead to paralysis and despair.   This week, we’re bringing you st...

Victoria’s coastlines are receding, inland waterways are flooding more frequently, and things are only expected to get worse.     This week, we’re bringing you two more interviews about The Citizen’s environmental reporting.  One about Gippsland abandoning fossil fuels in the face of a coastal climate crisis. Another about the beachside suburbs of Port Phillip unprepared for rising seas.    The ar...

Melbourne’s West has a pollution problem and residents are fed up with government inaction.    This week, you’ll hear about original reporting from students working on two separate projects — one looking into freight truck exhaust fumes, another investigating years of fires at a landfill near residential properties. Both issues are severely affecting local health.     The projects are part of a sp...

The moral panic about gender has been dominating conservative headlines lately, but gender nonconformity is nothing new.     The Hijra people of South Asia have been recognised as an additional gender for centuries, as have the Faʻafafine of Samoa, and the Femminielli of southern Italy.     This week, we’re bringing you three stories about people challenging gender norms just as they’ve always don...

There’s this word — “Solastalgia”. It describes homesickness when you’re still at home... because that home is changing in ways you can’t control.   This week, we’re bringing you three stories about our relationship to place. Places in flux and places that aren’t what we thought they were.   It’s the fourth episode of Breaking the Binaries, a series about the intersections that blend, blur, or bre...

Today we're bringing you another episode of News Bites, a series of live interviews showcasing the work of local journalists.   This week, we’re joined by Matilda Boseley, The Guardian’s TikTok queen whose videos often garner tens of thousands of views.  We’re also joined by Zara Seidler, the co-founder of Instagram-focused news service The Daily Aus. It’s one of the fastest growing news sites in...

Today, we're returning to our News Bites series. It spotlights the work of staff and students at the Centre for Advancing Journalism. This week’s guest is Lecturer and audio journalist Sami Shah. Sami got his start in a Pakistani newsroom. Since then, he’s moved to Australia where he’s hosted the ABC Melbourne Breakfast show and made radio documentaries on free speech and race for ABC’s Earshot se...

In medieval times, humans were confident they knew how the universe was ordered.  One fourteenth century illustration – known as the Great Chain of Being –  depicts God at the top of the heap, sitting amongst the clouds. Below him is a tier of humans. Below them , is a lowly tier of animals swimming, flying, or grazing.  And below them, plants and minerals.    But nowadays, we’re often humbled by...