Written by Katrina Varey

The concept of ‘performance of Whiteness’ on reality television is one that has been multifariously deliberated academically. When this concept is integrated with a ‘performance of Australian-ness” on reality television a complex fusion is produced.

As John Tehranian notes in his paper, ‘Performing Whiteness: Naturalization Litigation and the Construction of Racial Identity in America’ the "concept of race remains vital for an understanding of our social structures", yet "despite that importance of racial definitions to individual identities and social structures whiteness has remained an elusive and abstract concept" (2000, p.818) 



It is this abstraction that this article will aim to unpack. Within Australian reality television contexts a unique hybrid of the ‘whiteness’ as performance has intertwined seamlessly with the prominent myth of the ‘ideal Aussie battler’. This complex amalgam has become so naturalised and accepted that like most performances of ‘whiteness’, “the normative White subject who iterates through the ideal of appearing to not-perform”, that audiences do not question such representations. What is worrying about this hybrid is unlike ‘Whiteness’ that primarily omits other races, this crossbreed has the propensity to omit or demonise femininity, homosexuality and disability simultaneously. 

Performed Whiteness vs The other.

The importance of race representations in Australian Reality television programs is integral, when one considers the popularity and digestibility of the content. The subgenre of ‘lifestyle’ programs under the reality television field is especially significant due to its propensity to personify the concept of an ‘ideal’ life.

Although Australia is commonly regarded as ‘multicultural’ it is how this multiculturalism is represented in some Australian reality lifestyle programs that is potentially problematic and isolating. This is especially evident when juxtaposed with the consistently positive and normative representation of the ‘Aussie battler’. This paper aims to analyse Channel 7’s program My Kitchen Rules (2013) and the role of ethnicity as ‘other’ to the Australian ‘ideal’ and norm, which results in a denouncing or complete exclusion of this non-Caucasian races.

In Dubrofsky and Hardy’s article, Performing Race in Flavor of Love and The Bachelor, they compare performed ‘Whiteness’ and ‘Blackness’ that is staged in both programs. The paper articulates “how the shows construct race: who is conceived as White and who is ‘a person of colour’. They go on to unpack "consequences of these conceptions within the space of the show" (2008) “. Although the African American representation is not explicitly relevant to Australian reality television shows, the theories utilised in this paper are adaptable to the Australian format. Similarly in both The Bachelor and My Kitchen Rules, "The privilege of Whiteness is that it couches itself in an absence of explicit signifiers" (Dubrofsky & Hardy, 2008, p.378). This makes such a representation of ‘Whiteness’ dangerous as "racist premises are hard to pin down because they are naturalized and unacknowledged" (Dubrofsky & Hardy, 2008, p.378). This becomes increasingly normalised through the combination of Australian myths to this performed ‘Whiteness’. As suggested in Roscoe’s article, Big Brother Australia: Performing the 'real' twenty- four- seven, “for television, the inclusion of national cultural elements in format production has been argued as a performance of 'Australian-ness' that 'speaks to its local audiences'" (Roscoe, 2001. p.475). In that “Through the use of popular national myths, formats not only have the ease of recognisable symbols and references but also an aspirational view of national ideals and values for viewer identification (Price, 2010, p.453).”​

Within the My Kitchen Rules format each contestant couplings have a small introductory segment. This is the first moment we are truly familiarised with the groups, who are generally separated by what Australian state they are from,  yet with the two contestants Jessie and Biswa their entire introduction is concentrated on their ethnicity.

From the first moment, we see Jessie and Biswa moving their arms about in a formation that resembles Ganesh (the Hindu God). The girls then say “We are very proud to be Aussies, but my heritage is Indian and I’m originally from Bangladesh.” Through this very statement using the word ‘but’, the girls separate their heritage from being Australians. This is a message that does not communicate Australian multiculturalism but rather that to be from another country, or your family from another background you are not true blue ‘Aussies’.

There is a clear importance of emphasising different races – different if considering ‘Caucasian’ as the norm. This aforementioned introduction to Jessie and Biswa is extended in the episode, which is hosted at their house. From the outset to the end the complete piece is about the girls being Indian. We hear them say “We love everything about our culture, we love Saris, we love the jewellery, we love Bollywood movies” and then we see the girls at a giant family party, where everyone is in traditional Indian dress and at the end all the women at the party dance together in a Bollywood style formation.

This epitomises what Dubrofsky and Hardy found as for White contestants “The identity of participants need not be spoken or identified; it is always already there, ready to be revealed, assumed, just like Whiteness. Black identity,” (or in this case Indian ethnicity) “on the other hand, must often be actively claimed and affirmed.”(2008,p.379) This differentiation can be further understood by examining the introductory episode for two white contestants on My Kitchen Rules.

The first episode of the fourth series is concentrated on Kerrie and Craig, who are described as ‘childhood sweethearts from Melbourne’, we then see them riding their motorbike together, leaving their suburban house and greeting their four children. Not once in this segment is that ethnicity of their Craig or Kerrie mentioned, nor do we for any of the Caucasian contestants throughout the series.

In fact the winners of this season are two White Australians, who are labelled as ‘a tradie and his lady’, reinforcing the importance of the connection of these white Australian’s with the myth of a hard working Aussie –battler, the working class man. Concurrently the ethnic contestants are presented like token ethnic characters, as in the first group the show is predominantly white, as demonstrated by Manou (one of the judges on MKR) expressing to an Italian contestant “oh finally another accent at the table”. Ethnicity is almost presented as indispensable  as the second the only two entirely ethnic couplings are evicted from the competition, another ethnic coupling, two girl’s of Asian heritage, are introduced in. For the most part ethnicity is omitted from My Kitchen Rules, and when there is ethnicity in the show it is always a minority.

What is concerning about this differentiation, aside from directly separating those of non-Caucasian backgrounds as placing them as ‘other’, is the suggestion that one (or two in this situation) person of a particular ethnicity represent everyone of that ethnicity. As Dubrofsky and Hardy suggest "it is a double- bind: people of colour under surveillance have added burden of speaking for their race, while also, paradoxically, having their predicaments individualised." (2008, p.382)“
This is directly referenced in the episode where Jessie and Biswa cook for the other contestants, they say, “We are not just representing New South Wales, we are representing the whole Indian community out there.” From this statement we see how the show is trying to communicate that any mistakes or triumphs that these girls have in the kitchen, is a direct reflection on their ethnicity and all of those who share their ethnicity. This is further emphasised when the girls get a low score they say, “We let the whole culture, the whole tradition, the whole community down.”

The definition of racism is "the belief that all members of each race possess characteristics of abilities specific to that race", so with this in mind such generalising statements and visuals as presented by My Kitchen Rules could be defined as racist content.

Although many may think that this conclusion is a strong one, the widespread popularity of the show should prompt concerns in audiences in what aspects of the content is communicating, especially in respect to what it says about Australian culture and it’s seeming multiculturalism. The concept that “Whiteness” and “Australian-ness” is a hybrid model that must be challenged if ethnicity is to be represented as equally ‘natural’, which it should be if Australia is truly multicultural. It is the assumptions behind the races portrayed on these shows that is emphasised by this ‘natural’ distinction between ‘non Australians’ and ‘Australians’ which results in a perpetuation of a singular Australian identity that is not inclusive of those who do not fit the ‘ideal’ model.  If such ‘racist’ and generalising content is accepted and presented as usual on mainstream television, a deliberation on how this standardisation impacts audiences is integral.



(References in Part 4)