What does Australianness look like in practice—on screen and in our theatres, in the private life of the family and the soft diplomacy of international relations? In 2023 the authors of the New Platform Papers discuss the response from the arts to a changing global culture.

In Nobody Talks About Australianness on Our Screens film writer Sandy George warns that Australian drama is starting to look a lot less Australian; and Bryan Brown calls for more revenue from the lucrative streaming services to be invested in Australian stories in his recent address to the National Press Club, ‘Staying Focused’. In Diversity and Inclusion: Building the Good Life in Australia performance maker Jeremy Neideck and arts consultant Morwenna Collett reimagine Australian culture from the margins in two companion essays: ‘Queer(y)ing the Australian Way of Life’ and ‘More Risk, More Play: Creating an inclusive culture’. And theatre designer and educator Peter Cooke, founding director of Asialink’s Arts Program Alison Carroll, and renowned Maori artist Lisa Reihana, discuss Australia’s urgent need for closer cultural ties with Asia, India and Pacific nations at the 2023 Currency House Authors Convention on soft diplomacy. In a bonus issue we republish Finding a Place on the Asian Stage by Alison Carroll and Carrillo Gantner from the original series of Platform Papers.