National Regional Challenge
Cultural Practices
How does your region tell a story that belongs to everyone?
Every region has many stories. How do they come together into one that leaves nobody out?
Inspiring this challenge
Most regions have an official story: the one on the tourism website, the one in the council strategy. It usually reflects the people who were in the room when it was written.
But every region contains stories that predate that room, cultures that shaped the place before anyone thought to document them, and communities that arrived later still looking for somewhere to belong.
When those stories stay separate, or stay invisible, a community loses something practical.
The regions finding ways to bring all their stories into one shared identity without flattening any of them are doing something that needs to be shared.
Practical considerations
The infrastructure that once carried community narrative: local newspapers, civic journalism, local radio, has thinned significantly. The voices filling that gap aren’t always representative of everyone who lives there.
Tell us how your organisation, town or region is addressing this challenge and be part of national action.
Come on Australia – show us yours.
Show Australia how your region does it
- You’ve found a way to bring a part of your community’s history into the public story that wasn’t there before.
- You’ve created something that helped people who didn’t feel part of the region’s identity start to feel like they did.
- You’ve connected organisations that were telling different versions of the same story and found a shared thread.
- You’ve helped a community see itself more fully and used that to advocate, attract, or hold together.
- You tried something, it didn’t work, and you know exactly why.