What makes something valuable? Is it money, cultural memory, connection, access or the stories people carry with them? For Associate Professor Liz Giuffre, a podcaster, broadcaster and scholar of popular culture at UTS, these questions sit at the heart of her research.
How popular culture helps us understand who we are
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A/Prof Liz Giuffre presenting at Research Cafe
In the Faculty of Design and Society, Liz explores how everyday cultural touchpoints, from live music venues to Bluey, shape connection, identity and value in Australia.
“My work looks closely at the cultural moments, places and programs that bring people together, especially those that are easy to access, widely shared and often underestimated,” Liz explained.
“What I’m really interested in exploring is what popular culture does to help us connect, and how is it valued.”
From the Hopetoun Hotel to Australian cultural memory
As part of a research project exploring the Hopetoun Hotel, a much-loved Sydney live music venue that closed more than a decade ago, Liz examined images and memories from the heartland of an inner-city music scene that was often informal, low-cost and easy to enter.
Working with colleague Gregory Ferris in the Faculty of Design and Society, as well as photographer Brian Cook, Liz said the Hopetoun continues to hold a powerful place in Australian popular music history.
“In its heyday, much of that music scene existed outside formal cultural institutions,” she said, adding that it was promoted through street press, captured by people who were simply there, and experienced by audiences who could often walk in for free.
“Does this mean it’s worthless?” Liz asked. “Hopefully not!”
In its heyday, much of that music scene existed outside formal cultural institutions.
Liz argues that it is this valuable openness that makes the Hopetoun Hotel significant rather than any monetary value. Through archival research and collaboration with the State Library of NSW, Liz and her collaborators believe that the Hopetoun Hotel was much more than a venue.
“It was an open space where musicians learned their craft and audiences discovered new sounds. And it also contributed to how an influential part of Australian culture was documented before many people knew it mattered.”
What Bluey and live music have in common
More recently, Liz has been researching another major Australian cultural phenomenon: the children’s TV show, Bluey. While this may seem far removed from a live music venue, Liz sees a shared question running through both projects: how do accessible forms of popular culture help people understand Australia, belonging and themselves?
“This is another part of Australian popular culture that is mostly accessed for free. Does that mean it’s worthless?” she asked.
Bluey reaches young audiences and families in everyday spaces, shaping ideas about childhood, family, humour, place and Australianness.
“Like the Hopetoun Hotel, Bluey is widely accessible and deeply embedded in people’s lives, and this provides us with good reason to study it carefully,” she said.
Why popular culture matters
Liz’s research invites us to take popular culture seriously because it is where many people first encounter ideas about community, creativity and representation.
“These cultural forms give us shared reference points. They help us talk across generations, notice who is included and ask whose stories are being preserved,” Liz explained.
Her research is a reminder that impact often begins in familiar places: in the music we remember, the programs we share and the cultural stories that help us see ourselves and each other more clearly.
These cultural forms give us shared reference points. They help us talk across generations, notice who is included and ask whose stories are being preserved.
“How does popular culture give us something to talk about? How does it help us understand who we are, who’s represented, who’s not represented, who’s included and who’s not? And how do we value all that?”
By connecting everyday cultural experiences with deeper questions of identity and value, Liz’s work shows how research can illuminate the things people already care about. From a live music venue remembered through photographs to a television program watched by families around the world, popular culture offers powerful evidence of how people connect, belong and make meaning.