Abstract
The Eurovision Song Contest first emerged in the 1950s with the pragmatic goal of promoting the European Broadcasting Union’s new “Eurovision” media sharing service, but the loftier aim to create a share European identity and public sphere has since dominated most understandings of its history. In Australia, the song contest is screened on the Special Broadcasting Service (SBS), a hybrid public/commercial broadcaster charged with a remit to serve and represent multicultural Australia. Just as the EBU sought to create a European public sphere, SBS’s role in the Australian television landscape was to create a multicultural Australian public sphere that was also globally minded. The song contest’s popularity in Australia is both a contributing factor and resulting product of this.
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Notes
- 1.
It is deemed “quasi-national” at the historical juncture described here as SBS was slowly rolled out across the Australian continent, starting with Sydney and Melbourne in 1980, and arriving in Adelaide, Brisbane, Perth and Hobart in 1986. Darwin was the last capital city to receive SBS in 1994. It is now available nationally.
- 2.
In recent years, subtitles have been added to the delayed broadcast .
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Carniel, J. (2018). A Tale of Two Broadcasters: The EBU and SBS. In: Understanding the Eurovision Song Contest in Multicultural Australia. Palgrave Pivot, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-02315-7_2
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