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Children's poverty has long been a central concern for policy makers and policy researchers. The body of extant research conducted and the range of programmatic interventions undertaken by successive governments in this and other countries is extraordinary. Nevertheless, children remain in poverty. Clearly there are many reasons for this, not least of which is the maintenance and intensification of market capitalism with its attendant blatant inequalities. Even so, the moral, political, social and economic imperatives for developing workable responses to children's poverty remain. This paper argues that we, in Australia, should adopt an approach increasingly taken in the UK. Drawing on, among other things, the new sociology of childhood, this approach begins not with the expertise of adult researchers and policy makers, but with that of children. In doing so, the case is made for why children's perceptions and experiences of poverty are key concerns for policy. The paper outlines in theoretical terms why children's voices matter. Invoking the new sociology of childhood and the sociology of identity, a conceptual framework for understanding why policy scholars and makers should carefully attend to the voices of their subjects is sketched - in this case, the subjects are children. Finally, some methodological implications of this for undertaking policy research informed by this approach are outlined. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The media is often referred to as a social institution in that it is a major element of contemporary Western society. Through the media, social processes create narratives or stories within interpretative frameworks that are embedded in the cultural and political assumptions of the wider society. Since the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Centre in September 2001, the media has played a crucial role in the developing discourse on contemporary terrorism. In the Australian context, this discourse has emerged as one which implicates Australian Muslims, constructing them as a homogenous monolith with an underlying implication that Islam, and by association Australian Muslims, is secular resistant and at odds with the values of the liberal democratic state. Several textual analyses attest to the bias against Muslims in the popular Australian media discourse. However, there have been no studies into how Australian Muslims are interpreting and responding to this discourse. Based on research into the attitudes and perceptions of the media among Australian Muslims, this paper argues that the interpretation of the media discourse as defiantly anti-Muslim and the perception of the media as a powerful purveyor of public opinion has impacted on the construction of Australian Muslim identity. In responding to this discourse, Australian Muslims are creating new narratives of belonging which either reinforce or reject the underlying messages that situate them outside mainstream Australia. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]