"It has a bleak future”: The effects of job loss on regional and rural journalism in Australia

Abstract

Severe contractions in the Australian media landscape have led to a loss of jobs in major metropolitan newsrooms. In 2015, those cuts spread significantly to regional and rural newsrooms. This paper explores the effects of job loss on rural and regional journalism through a survey of 31 journalists working at rural and regional media organisa-tions whose positions were made redundant from 2012 to 2015. As well as providing accounts of their personal redundancy experiences, this paper explores the participants’ opinions of regional and rural journal-ism. It concludes that those whose positions in local journalism have become redundant are concerned about the resources of local news-rooms and ..