Dr Kathomi Gatwiri

Recent research mapping trends and the contributions of members of the African Diaspora in Australia has emphasised the ‘need to establish a new discourse for Africans in Australia which transcends the dominant refugee narrative ’ (Hiruy and Hutton). The increasing size and diversity of African communities in Australia has been met with high levels of public and media scrutiny as debates about immigration in Australia become complicated by the rising influence of nationalist discourses. Through mediatised moral panics that locate ‘African blackness’ as dangerous and unassimilable, resulting mainstream attitudes towards Black African migrants enforce their experiences of ‘conditional belonging and perpetual strangerhood ’ in Australia. Critical perspectives assist in effectively documenting, theorising and sharing the stories and experiences of Africans in Australia with a dignified sociological nuance.