Event and Ticketing Details
Dates & Times
Wednesday 12 October
6:15 PM - 7:30 PM
High density living is great for the environment, right? But what does it do to our heads and hearts? The Australian psyche was moulded by the myth of the ‘wide brown land’, so what might life packed like sardines look and feel like? With the world’s seven billionth person is about to be born, can we learn from the Asian megacity experience? And will we still be sharing a cup of sugar with our neighbours? As the population debate gets mental, we’re going in search of the soul in urban sprawl.
Hosted by Natasha Mitchell and featuring Kim Dovey, Helen Killmier, Bernard Salt and Sein-Way Tan.
Presented in partnership with ABC Radio National.
Featuring
Helen Killmier
Helen Killmier is a community psychologist with Interact Australia working in the fields of disability services, community aged care, recreation, respite, partnership development, community capacity building, social policy and strategic planning.
Helen joined Interact after 12 years in local government working directly with communities on grass-roots projects including the Box Hill Community Hub. Her research interests include sense of community and place attachment in different urban settings, and community development, governance, health and wellbeing. Helen’s current PhD research is exploring and comparing the experiences of communities in high-density Melbourne (Docklands), the urban ring, and fast-growing outlying centres.
Natasha Mitchell
Natasha Mitchell is a multi-award-winning journalist, radio presenter, podcaster, and audio storyteller. She is host of the ABC Radio National's flagship Big Ideas program and podcast, was founding host and producer ...
Kim Dovey
Kim Dovey is Professor of Architecture and Urban Design at the University of Melbourne.
Kim has taught at the University of California, Berkeley and at RMIT and Melbourne. Kim’s research is broadly focused on theories of ‘place’ and practices of power, covering social issues in architecture and urban design. His books include Becoming Places (2010) and Fluid City: Transforming Melbourne’s Urban Waterfront (2005).He currently leads a series of research projects on place identity, urban intensification, informal settlements and creative cities.
Bernard Salt
Bernard Salt is one of Australia’s leading social commentators. He heads The Demographics Group which provides specialist advice on demographic, consumer and social trends for business. Prior to that Bernard founded KPMG Demographics. He is perhaps best known for identifying and tagging new tribes and social behaviours such as the ‘Seachange Shift’, the ‘Man Drought’, and the ‘Goats Cheese Curtain’. He was also responsible for popularising smashed avocados globally.
Sein-Way Tan
Sein-Way Tan is the founder of Green World City Organisation, a sustainable cities consultancy.
He has lived and studied in Australia, Singapore, Burma, Malaysia, Hong Kong and Japan. He serves on the Advisory Board of Global Urban Development, Climate Prosperity Alliance and Data Cities. Sein-way’s consultancy is advising the Chinese government on its sustainable cities policy, and the UN Habitat’s World Urban Campaign. His research focuses on rapid global urbanisation and is conducted in collaboration with more than 400 global leaders inpolitics, business and environment.