Humanities and Social Sciences

Media Studies Program

Staff Directory

Peter's interests are in the social and industrial implications of new media. He is the Director of the La Trobe University Online Media Program which conducts research into the uses of new media. Peter directs the Media Studies Program's television industry training programs in Vietnam.

He is member of the Editorial Boards of New Media and Society and M/C A Journal of Media and Culture and the Mobile Communications Research Annual. He was the Associate Director of the Monash Information and Communications Technology centre and a co-editor of Media International Australia. He has edited a series of issues on satellite systems, digital media and telecommunications and has worked in Australia and the United States in the areas of broadcasting and telecommunications policy, telecommunications privacy, and telecommunications strategy development.

A recent project 'Bushfires and the Media', (www.latrobe.edu.au/bushfires) was conducted with Dr Peter Hughes and Dr Erez cohen and funded by the Bushfire Cooperative Research Centre. It examined the media constructions of bushfires and bushfire risk, the role the media plays in shaping community responses to bushfires and media relationships with fire and emergency services.

Current research with Naomi Rosh White (Monash University) deals with the experience of travel and the new media has been published as 'Travel as transition: Identity and place' Annals of Tourism Research. 31(1) (January, 2004) pp. 200-218. This work has been extended to focus on the use of the Internet and mobile telephony by travellers. Interviews with travellers were conducted in New Zealand in 2004 and 2005 and the results have been published as 'Keeping Connected: Travelling with the mobile telephone' Convergence: The International Journal of Research into New Media. 11(2) (July 2005) pp. 102-112. Subsequent research has been published as "Home and Away: Tourists in a connected world." Annals of Tourism Research 34(1), 2007, pp. 88-104 and "Remote relationships as theatre: Travellers and group e-mail" in Samantha Holland (ed.) Remote Relationships in a Small World. London Perer, Lang 2008, pp. 155-173. This research led to the development of a new project which examines the uses of the World Wide Web by travellers and the implications of that use for the traditional printed travel guide. This project is underway and interviews are being conducted in Vietnam, China, Laos and the United States.