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Papers by Dianne Rodger

The Asia Pacific Journal of Anthropology, 2020

Hip-Hop fans and artists’ responses to the growing popularity of Hip-Hop music in Australia in th... more Hip-Hop fans and artists’ responses to the growing popularity of Hip-Hop music in Australia in the mid-2000s is the subject of this article which draws on ethnographic fieldwork conducted in Melbourne and Adelaide from 2006 to 2008. Prior to this period, participants in the Australian Hip-Hop scene characterised it as an ‘authentic’ underground community in contrast to disparaged ‘inauthentic’ mainstream practices and products. This conceptualisation was challenged as opportunities to make money from Hip-Hop culture increased and more people began to produce and consume Hip-Hop. Research participants reacted to these developments by drawing boundaries around the Hip-Hop community, in particular, by making distinctions between people who loved Hip-Hop and had demonstrated a commitment to Hip-Hop culture and ‘outsiders’ whose involvement in the scene was criticised and rejected. In doing so, they were able to maintain a sense of ownership, control and shared cultural identity in a period of uncertainty.

Ethnomusicology Forum, 2019

In this paper, I explore how Hip-Hop enthusiasts in the Adelaide and Melbourne scenes related the... more In this paper, I explore how Hip-Hop enthusiasts in the Adelaide and Melbourne scenes related their practices to a romanticised ‘American’ or ‘South Bronx’ origin point. I draw on ethnographic research conducted from 2006 to 2008 to show that while some Hip-Hop fans and artists worked to connect their beliefs and behaviours to an idealised past, others sought to separate themselves from these historical narratives and to establish Australian Hip-Hop as a distinct cultural form. These differences created tensions as people debated how authenticity should be assessed in the Australian context and what it meant to be a Hip-Hop practitioner in Australia.

Media International Australia, 2018

This article explores how Indigenous-Australian Hip-Hop group A.B. Original use Twitter to promot... more This article explores how Indigenous-Australian Hip-Hop group A.B. Original use Twitter to promote their music and more broadly, as a conduit for political expression, protest and the celebration of Indigenous identities. We use Indigenous knowledges and Indigenous standpoint theories to extend on the current literature that examines the use of social media by Indigenous peoples. In decolonising research, these theoretical perspectives position the Indigenous participant at the centre of research practice where knowledge is created. Indigenous knowledges therefore become the paradigm through which social interaction is understood and described. Our thematic analysis of A.B. Original’s public Twitter activity from November 2016 to January 2017 demonstrates that the combination of Hip-Hop and social media are powerful forces utilised by young Indigenous people in Australia to discuss issues impacting their everyday lives and to make meaningful statements on contemporary Aboriginality and sovereignty.

PLoS One , 2018

The use of mobile technology such as phone applications (apps) has been proposed as an efficient ... more The use of mobile technology such as phone applications (apps) has been proposed as an efficient means of providing health and clinical information in a variety of healthcare settings. We developed the Health-e Babies app as an Android smart phone application for pregnant women attending a tertiary hospital in a low socio-economic community, with the objective of providing health information about early pregnancy that would increase maternal confidence and reduce anxiety. Based on our earlier research, this form of health communication was viewed as a preferred source of information for women of reproductive age. However, the pilot study had a poor participation rate with 76% (n = 94) not completing the study requirements. These initial findings raised some very important issues in relation to the difficulties of engaging women with a pregnancy app. This paper analyses the characteristics of the participants who did not complete the study requirements in an attempt to identify potential barriers associated with the implementation of a pregnancy app.

Objective: to examine the informal approaches taken by midwives and other antenatal staff to adap... more Objective: to examine the informal approaches taken by midwives and other antenatal staff to adapt health communication to the needs of their patients, as well as their perception of the barriers faced when trying to provide tailored health promotion. Design: qualitative research methods (participant observation, individual and group interviews) were utilised to gain an understanding of how media and communication resources were used in practice within the study hospital. Setting: a major metropolitan teaching hospital located in the Northern suburbs of Adelaide, South Australia. Participants: individual semi-structured interviews with antenatal staff (n ¼8) were combined with group interviews (n ¼2; total number of staff ¼ 13), and observational research. Findings: midwives and other antenatal staff use a range of strategies to meet the perceived health literacy level of their patients. However, their attempts to tailor health information to individual needs are frequently based on incomplete information about patients' health literacy, may be inconsistent in delivery and content and are seldom assessed to determine whether communication has been understood or led to patient behaviour change. Key conclusions: midwives fully recognise the need to adapt standard printed materials to meet the diverse health literacy needs of patients but lack the resources required to evaluate whether these adaptations have positive effect. Implications for practice: midwives' commitment to improving health communication provides a latent resource that institutions can build on to improve health outcomes for patients with low health literacy. This requires improvements in health communication training, willingness to use a range of validated instruments for measuring health literacy, and commitment to use of innovative approaches to health promotion where these have been shown to have a positive impact on health behaviours.

Background: Usage rates for information and communication technologies (ICTs) in healthcare have ... more Background: Usage rates for information and communication technologies (ICTs) in healthcare have been increasing in recent years, but often lag behind general usage rates for populations as a whole. Research into such differential rates of ICT use across different segments of the population has identified a number of possible causal factors that limit usage.

Aim: The research investigated midwives’ attitudes and experiences of ICT use to identify potential causal factors that encourage or inhibit their usage in antenatal care.

Methods: Semi-structured interviews, focus groups and short surveys were conducted with midwives
who provide antenatal education at an Australian metropolitan hospital. Thematic and statistical analyses were used to interpret the data.

Findings: Although midwives recognised the potential benefits of using ICTs to deliver pregnancy- related health information many had reservations about their use in everyday work. These reservations
centred on lack of training in use of ICTs, the perceived legal risks associated with social media, potential violations of patient privacy, misdiagnosis and misunderstandings between midwife and client.

Conclusion: Midwives face a number of barriers to effective use of ICTs in healthcare including material access, skills access, usage access and motivational access. Motivational access appears to be a key
concern due to the high perception of risk associated with social media in particular. Reducing the motivational barriers through a range of interventions with midwifery staff may assist in overcoming
other barriers to ICT use in antenatal care. Further research is required to determine whether these findings are generalisable to other healthcare contexts.

In this article we look at the use of social, digital and online media as a possible resource in ... more In this article we look at the use of social, digital and online media as a
possible resource in health promotion. We do this through a framework
of medium theory—which allows us to consider the social and power
relations that circulate through and are generated by different mediums.
The application of medium theory has great potential for communications literature and this article attempts to refine it by indicating how it may be pertinent in a health communication context. We analyzed health promotion literature to assess the current attitudes of medical professionals to the use of social and online media. Our own research discussion is based on a project in a metropolitan hospital, which has mapped media access and use by clients in an antenatal clinic as well as attitudes of staff. We outline the strategies the project is developing, using social, digital, mobile and online media to address the information needs of the clinic’s clients in new ways.

This paper examines how pregnant women living in South Australia use information and communicatio... more This paper examines how pregnant women living in South Australia use information and communication technologies (ICTs), principally Internet and mobile phones, to access pregnancy-related information. It draws on 35 semistructured interviews conducted as part of the 'Health-e Baby' project, a qualitative study designed to assess the information needs and ICT preferences of pregnant women cared for at a South Australian metropolitan teaching hospital. Our research shows that although ICTs offer exciting possibilities for health promotion and the potential for new forms of communication, networking and connection, we cannot assume the effectiveness of communicating through such channels, despite near universal levels of ICT access. In turn, this highlights that if e-mediated health promotion is to be effective, health promoters and practitioners need to better understand ICT access, usage and content preferences of their clients.

The JBI Database of Systematic Reviews & Implementation Reports, 2013

Background A wide range of contextual and programmatic factors frame, affect and constrain commun... more Background A wide range of contextual and programmatic factors frame, affect and constrain communication for development (C4D) interventions undertaken in fragile or conflict affected states. For the purposes of this review, contextual factors include culture, poverty, different stages of conflict (such as latent, open or post-conflict scenarios), policy, legislation and so on, while programmatic factors include the type of intervention, formative and summative evaluation, project design and management, human and financial resources and so on.

ACMC Research and Publications by Dianne Rodger

The Communication and Complex Emergencies Project is a collaboration between the University of Ad... more The Communication and Complex Emergencies Project is a collaboration between the University of Adelaide’s Applied Communication Collaborative Research Unit (ACCRU) and the Australian Civil-Military Centre (ACMC). The project’s main objectives are to highlight the role of communication, including new and social media, in complex emergencies and in support of humanitarian assistance.

The work focuses on ‘what we know’ and in doing so maps out a broad array of knowledge while focusing on the functions, strengths and limitations associated with various forms of media, from social networking and social media to radio, television, print and video. The work has a number of outputs that are designed to support each other, including:
•Social Networking, Social Media: an Annotated Bibliography
•Social Networking, Social Media: Issues Paper
•Communication and Complex Emergencies: Resource Guide.

Books by Dianne Rodger

This chapter examines how space is utilised at Hip Hop concerts to promote certain sensual experi... more This chapter examines how space is utilised at Hip Hop concerts
to promote certain sensual experiences. It is based on ethnographic
fieldwork conducted in the Adelaide and Melbourne Hip Hop
scenes. I explore how light, sound, venue layout and spacing
are harnessed to foster specific reactions from the crowd and to
create what Hip Hop fans colloquially referred to as the 'vibe'.
I conclude that the practical realities of particular venue spaces
(size, configuration, stage equipment and so on) can significantly
influence the experiences of individuals attending Hip Hop
concerts and the presence or absence of the 'vibe'.