PUBLIC LECTURE: The citizen as journalist

In this presentation, Margo Kingston will discuss her experience of participatory journalism and pose some questions about where we may go to from here in the current state of things.

Margot Kingston is visiting Perth as a guest of the IAS and the Perth Social Forum, Fremantle Town Hall 18-20 March 2005.

The Social Forum phenomenon which has swept the globe since the first World Social Forum in Brazil in 2001 has finally arrived in Perth. The inaugural Perth Social Forum will be held over the weekend 18th - 20th March in the port city of Fremantle.

Kicking off with a ‘Reclaim the Streets’ march through Fremantle on Friday evening, the PSF weekend will feature a range of keynote speakers including Margo Kingston (author of ‘Not Happy John’ and mistress of the Sydney Morning Herald’s web diary), Australian intelligence whistleblower Andrew Wilkie, Helen Creed (ACTU executive member and chair of the Women’s Committee of the International Council of Free Trade Unions) and Patricia Ranald (director of the Australian Fair Trade and Investment Network). Another major event will be the panel ‘Our World is Not for Sale! Public Services and Resistance to Privatisation’.

More PSF information at: http://www.perthsocialforum.org

Margo Kingston is the political commentator for the Sydney Morning Herald online (www.smh.com.au), edits Webdiary (www.smh.com.au/webdiary) and writes a weekly column on politics in the Sun Herald. She was born in Maryborough, Queensland, in 1959, grew up in the north Queensland sugar city of Mackay and graduated with an Arts Law degree from the University of Queensland. She practiced as a solicitor and lectured in business law before joining Brisbane's Courier-Mail newspaper. She has since worked for the Times on Sunday, the Melbourne Age and the Canberra Times, and as the political researcher for Jana Wendt on Channel Nine's A Current Affair. She was Phillip Adam's 'Canberra Babylon' commentator on ABCV Radio's Late Night Live for five years.

Kingston achieved prominence in 1998 when she led a sit-in of journalists at the federal election campaign launch of the One Nation Party in the Queensland town of Gatton - the journalists were unhappy with the party's treatment of the media during the campaign. Her experiences during this election campaign are recorded in her book, Off The Rails: The Pauline Hanson Trip. Off the Rails won the 2000 Dobbie award for best first book by a female writer.

In her webdiary on the Herald website, she and contributors from the general public record their opinions on current events. She incorporated many opinions featured in the webdiary into her 2004 book Not Happy, John, which inspired the 'Not happy John!' campaign, of which she is a founding member.