Eurovision and Australia Chris Hay • Jessica Carniel Editors Eurovision and Australia

Home , ABBA, Conchita Wurst, Netta Barzilai

Interdisciplinary Perspectives from Down Under Editors Chris Hay Jessica Carniel University of Queensland University of Southern Queensland Brisbane, QLD, Australia Toowoomba, QLD, Australia

ISBN 978-3-030-20057-2 ISBN 978-3-030-20058-9 (eBook) https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-20058-9

© The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2019 This work is subject to copyright. All rights are solely and exclusively licensed by the Publisher, whether the whole or part of the material is concerned, specifically the rights of translation, reprinting, reuse of illustrations, recitation, broadcasting, reproduction on microfilms or in any other physical way, and transmission or information storage and retrieval, electronic adaptation, computer software, or by similar or dissimilar methodology now known or hereafter developed. The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, service marks, etc. in this publication does not imply, even in the absence of a specific statement, that such names are exempt from the relevant protective laws and regulations and therefore free for general use. The publisher, the authors and the editors are safe to assume that the advice and information in this book are believed to be true and accurate at the date of publication. Neither the publisher nor the authors or the editors give a warranty, express or implied, with respect to the material contained herein or for any errors or omissions that may have been made. The publisher remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institu- tional affiliations.

Cover design: eStudioCalamar

This Palgrave Macmillan imprint is published by the registered company Springer Nature Switzerland AG The registered company address is: Gewerbestrasse 11, 6330 Cham, Switzerland Acknowledgements

Chris Hay offers his thanks to colleagues past and present, especially those in the Department of Theatre and Performance Studies at the University of Sydney, through whose Research Seminar Series the ideas that animate this book were developed and encouraged. His part in this work is dedi- cated to the original Eurovision crew: Anna, Billy, Ceili, Clifford, Scott, Vanessa, and Vyv. Our thanks also to the University of Queensland, who supported Jacquelyn Prior’s contribution to this research through the award of a UQ Summer Research Program scholarship. Jessica Carniel would like to thank her colleagues at the University of Southern Queensland for being supportive of, if not slightly bemused by, her Eurovision research. Particular thanks go to her co-editor, Chris Hay, for letting her come on this hamster wheel, and to the contributors whose passion made this volume possible; Matthew Klugman for kickstarting the ideas all those years ago; Sara Bice for her unwavering support and friend- ship; the fans, especially the participants in her original study, for being a constant source of inspiration; and the special critters at home who toler- ate the May madness that now permeates our entire year (sorry, not sorry). She would like to dedicate her part in this work to her father, Umberto, who passed during its writing—volare, papa.

v Contents

1 Introduction—“Good Evening, Europe—Good Morning, Australia!” 1 Chris Hay and Jacquelyn Prior

Part I Australia in Eurovision 15

2 Australia and the Eurovision Song Contest: A Historical Survey 17 Dean Vuletic

3 The Politics of Diversity and Participation 33 Anika Gauja

4 Indigenous Representation at the Eurovision Song Contest: A Quintessentially Australian Identity 57 Julie L. Collins and Lorina Barker

5 Gender-Bending or Gender-Straightening? Australia and the ESC at the Intersections of Gender, Sexual Orientation, and Ethnicity 75 Bronwyn Winter

vii viii Contents

6 Sounds Like Australia? Listening to Australia’s Eurovision Song Performances 101 Brent Keogh, Shelley Brunt, and Liz Giuffre

Interval Act 123

7 Australia and Eurovision: The View From Europe 125 Paul Jordan

Part II Eurovision in Australia 139

8 Eurovisions from Down Under: Multicultural Community Preferences and the National Broadcaster, SBS 141 Nina Markovic Khaze

9 Lessons Learned: Teaching European Studies in Full Eurovision 165 Alison Lewis and John Hajek

10 Our Aussie Divas: Interrogating Australian Identity through Audience Reactions to Australia’ Eurovision Entrants 189 Celia Lam

11 “It Really Makes You Feel Part of the World”: Transnational Connection for Australian Eurovision Audiences 213 Jessica Carniel Contents ix

12 Pyjama Fandom: Watching Eurovision Down Under 239 Chris Hay

13 Conclusion—Eurovision—Australia Decides 259 Jessica Carniel and Chris Hay

Index 281 Notes on Contributors

Lorina Barker is a descendant of the Wangkumara and Muruwari people of Northwest New South Wales, the Adnyamathanha of the Flinders Ranges in South Australia, the Kooma and Kunja of Southwest Queensland, and the Kurnu-Baakandji, Northwest NSW. Lorina is Lecturer in History at the University of New England. Her main interest is in remodelling research methods so that they are culturally appropriate and accessible to family and community, who are the core audience for her academic research and creative arts projects, most recently Looking Through Windows and her new project Songlines of Country. She will never forget singing along to ABBA and trying to dance like Frida and Agnetha in library at Weilmoringle Public School. Shelley Brunt is Senior Lecturer in the Music Industry programme at RMIT University and the co-editor of Perfect Beat journal (Equinox). Among her publications are Made in Australia and Aotearoa/New Zealand: Studies in Popular Music (edited with Geoff Stahl, Routledge 2018) and numerous articles on Japan’s answer to Eurovision, Kouhaku Utagassen. Her favourite moment in recent Eurovision history was the social media outrage over Israeli singer Netta Barzilai’s appro- priation of Japanese culture in her 2018 winning performance. Jessica Carniel is Senior Lecturer in Humanities at the University of Southern Queensland. Her broad research interests include Australian and global immigration, cosmopolitan cultures, sporting communities and identities, cultural studies and gender studies, with a focus on multicul-

xi xii NOTES ON CONTRIBUTORS tural Australia. She is the author of Understanding the Eurovision Song Contest in Multicultural Australia (Palgrave Macmillan, 2018). Eurovision inspired her life goal to be spun upside-down by a team of gay robot cen- turions from the future before performing a drum solo. Julie L. Collins is an academic at the University of New England, working predominantly in the area of Indigenous Studies. Julie is also a creative artist and theatre practitioner, with many years of experience of working with community to create and present performance. Julie’s research interests include the role of immersive theatre and storytelling in evoking empathy and transforming behaviour in an environmental and social justice context. She has developed an enthusiasm for Eurovision in recent years, since Australia has become a competitor and having finally got over the shame of the UK giving ABBA zero points back in 1974! Anika Gauja spends her Saturday nights crunching the numbers of the Eurovision voting—like all good psephologists. By day, she researches and teaches in the fields of political participation and comparative democracy at the University of Sydney. Her academic interest in Eurovision stems from a life-long love of the contest, hosting Eurovision parties, and having to explain to friends and family what the hell it’s all about. Liz Giuffre is Senior Lecturer in Music and Sound Design and Communications at the University of Technology Sydney. Her research includes Music and Television, Audience Studies, and Genre Studies. She cried like a baby when Conchita Wurst won in 2014, and still rates this as the best Eurovision moment of all time. John Hajek is Professor of Italian Studies in the School of Languages and Linguistics at the University of Melbourne, where he teaches Italian and European Studies. He is a linguist with additional expertise in European political history. His interest in Eurovision is both political and personal—as a child of an ethnically mixed New Australian family who for years had no other opportunity to see and hear their compatriots on TV. Chris Hay is Lecturer in Drama in the School of Communication and Arts at the University of Queensland. Chris is an Australian theatre historian, and his more prosaic research interests include the pre-New Wave NOTES ON CONTRIBUTORS xiii period between 1949 and 1968, the evolution of Australian arts institu- tions, and the role of government subsidy in shaping national culture. He maintains that no Eurovision entry will ever reach the heights—both lit- eral and vocal—of Cezar’s 2013 entry for Romania, “It’s My Life”. Paul Jordan obtained his PhD from the University of Glasgow in 2011. His research interests include nation building and nation branding of post-communist states, national identity, and nationalist politics. He is also a regular media commentator on the Eurovision Song Contest, and despite her less than perfect vocals, he still maintains Gina G was robbed in 1996. Brent Keogh is Lecturer in Communication at University of Technology Sydney, and currently teaches Culture: Plugged and Unplugged, Audio and Music Production, and Communications Practice Project. He com- pleted his doctoral studies at Macquarie University in 2014, examining the discourse of World Music in Australia. He believes Dami Im was robbed in 2016, and is desperately trying to get Spain’s 2008 Eurovision submis- sion—“Baila El Chiki Chiki”—out of his head. Celia Lam is Assistant Professor in Media and Cultural Studies at the School of International Communications, University of Nottingham Ningbo China, Ningbo, China. She received a BMedia in screen production from Macquarie University, Sydney, and a PhD from the University of Sydney. Her research focuses on the cultural and aesthetic impact of digital technologies on media production and consumption, audience reception, and fan studies. Her work has been published in Convergence, Northern Lights, and Celebrity Studies. She will never forget her first Eurovision experience as a teenager, when she tried to comprehend why that nice man had horns. Alison Lewis is Professor of German Studies in the School of Languages and Linguistics at the University of Melbourne, where she teaches German and European Studies. Her main research interests are twentieth-century German literature and culture, in particular East German literature, and the legacies of communism. When she is not researching the East German secret police, and playing bass in a post-punk band, she follows all things to do with Eurovision. Her favourite entry (apart from ABBA) was Loreen’s “Euphoria” (2012). xiv NOTES ON CONTRIBUTORS

Nina Markovic Khaze has been the organiser of Canberra’s largest Eurovision charity screening events for many years, involving large chunks of the diplomatic community in that venture. She holds a PhD in Political Science, regularly comments on Australian and international politics for SBS, has two published poetry books in three languages and has composed ethno-music alongside a lot of travel writing. Before enter- ing academia, she worked for the Australian federal parliamentary research service as senior specialist researcher for Europe and Middle East, and as a public servant. Her secret Eurovision crush remains Spanish 1990 entry, “Bandido”. Jacquelyn Prior is in her final year of a Bachelor of Music (Honours) in Classical Voice Performance at the University of Queensland. In 2010, she attained First Class Honours in Creative Industries at the Queensland University of Technology (QUT), where her honours study focussed on mapping the emergent sub-categories of modern experimental typography. She is now a Sessional Academic at QUT, teaching sub- jects on visual communication, image production, and typography in the School of Design. She remains baffled at how the backup dancers for Turkey’s entrant in Eurovision 2012, “Can Bonomo”, managed to form two different boats out the capes they were wearing. Dean Vuletic is a historian of contemporary Europe who works in the Department of East European History at the University of Vienna. He is the author of Postwar Europe and the Eurovision Song Contest (Bloomsbury, 2018), the first ever scholarly monograph on the history of the ESC, which he produced under a Marie Skłodowska-Curie Intra-European Fellowship. As a Lise Meitner Fellow, he currently leads the research project “Intervision: Popular Music and Politics in Eastern Europe”, which focusses on the Intervision Song Contest. He holds a doctoral degree in history from Columbia University. Dr. Vuletic regularly comments on the ESC in the international media, and more information about his work can be found on his website www.deanvuletic.com. He attended his first ESC in 1999 in Jerusalem, and the first ESC artist who he then interviewed was Doris Dragović. Bronwyn Winter is Deputy Director of the European Studies program at the University of Sydney, where she teaches, among other things, an introduction to European politics and cultures through the Eurovision Song Contest. She is also a core contributor to the International and NOTES ON CONTRIBUTORS xv

Global Studies Program. She has published widely in the area of transnational feminist politics and social movements, with particular attention to the intersections of race, ethnicity, religion, gender, sexuality, violence, globalisation, and the state. Among her many memorable Eurovision moments is watching Ruslana win in 2004. As soon as Ruslana came on screen, we all exclaimed in unison: “Xena!”. List of Figures

Fig. 3.1 Eurovision participants (by decade 1956–2016). Source: Created by the author 37 Fig. 6.1 “Sound of Silence” rhythm score. Source: Created by the authors 112 Fig. 6.2 “We Got Love” rhythm score. Source: Created by the authors 116

xvii List of Tables

Table 3.1 Points awarded to Australia in the Eurovision Song Contest 2015–2018 40 Table 3.2 Points Australia has awarded in the Eurovision Song Contest 2015–2018 42 Table 3.3 2016 Australian Census ancestry—selected competing Eurovision nations—comparison with points awarded 43 Table 3.4 Immigration—Australia and Western European countries compared 46 Table 5.1 Eurovision: Australia Decides 2019 contestants and results 94 Table 8.1 Ancestry from former Yugoslavia based on 2016 census data 148 Table 9.1 Eurovisions lecture plan, semester 2, 2018 171 Table 10.1 Online comments responding to Australian Eurovision media reports 196

xix