Book

My book, Media Perceptions of Religious Changes in Australia: Of Dominance and Diversity, was published by Routledge in 2020 and is now available in paperback.

Findings from this research revealed that media discussions about religions in Australian public discourses (the Australian Broadcasting Corporation’s Q&A discussion program) were strongly influenced by British perspectives, where institutional, white/Anglo and male perspectives were dominant in driving the agenda and shaping these discussions. Interestingly, I also found that Australian media discussions about religion were similar to findings from a UK media study.

Since the publication of my book, there has been greater diversity of perspectives when religion emerges as a topic of discussion (and I wrote about this). Although probably not directly related, I was excited when Indigenous journalist Stan Grant appointed was appointed as the program host in July 2022. Sadly, persistent racism and exclusion he experienced within the media institution caused him to resign.

A book reviewer said this of my book:

‘This is Weng’s first monograph, and her more recent scholarship expands on the themes of race, racism and racialisation and the prospects that a decolonial approach to the study of religion may bring, which she begins to unpack in Media Perceptions of Religious Changes in Australia.’

There seems to be a statistical significance in academics having cats. This is Pancho, one of two cats I serve, who continuously fails to be impressed by why I’m constantly pounding away at the keyboard at my desk.

Co-edited Special Issues

  1. Weng, E., Abur, W., Winarnita, M., Halafoff, A. and Paradies, Y. (in progress). ‘(Dis)locating Coloniality: Transnational Religious Flows across the Indian and Pacific Oceans, between Asia, Africa, Australia and the Pacific Islands’. Journal of Intercultural Studies.

  2. Halafoff, A., Weng, E., Roginski, A., and Rocha, C. (2022). ‘(Con)spirituality, Science and COVID-19’. Journal for the Academic Study of Religion (Special Issue), 35(2). https://doi.org/10.1558/jasr.23529.

  3. Poole, E. & Weng, E. (2021), ‘Religion on an Ordinary Day: An International Study of News Reporting’, Journal of Religion, Media and Digital Culture, 10 (Special Issue).

Peer-reviewed Journal articles

  1. Weng, E., Vergani, M., & Mansouri, F. (2025). Navigating the ideological tide: Discourses on “Mainstreaming” social service provision for multicultural communities in Australia from 1996 to 2021. Journal of Language and Politics.

  2. Halafoff, A., Shorter, R.C., Weng, E., Paradies, Y., Abur, W. and Winarnita, M. (2024) ‘Decolonising Studies of Religion in So-Called Australia: Truth-Telling, Collective Reflections and Future Trajectories’. Journal of Intercultural Studies, pp.1-19.

  3. Mansouri, F., Vergani, M. and Weng, E. (2024) ‘Parallel lives or active citizens? Examining the interplay between multicultural service provision and civic engagement in Australia’. Journal of Sociology 0(0).

  4. Weng E. (2023) ‘Contesting Empire Religion: Coloniality and Sticky Media Discourses’. Culture and Religion.

  5. Halafoff, A., Rocha, C., Lam, K., Weng, E. and Smith, S. (2022). ‘Buddhism in the Far North of Australia pre-WWII: (In)visibility, Post-colonialism and Materiality’. Journal of Global Buddhism 23(2), pp.105-28.

  6. 4. Halafoff, A., Weng, E., Roginski, A., and Rocha, C. (2022). ‘Introduction to the Special Issue: (Con)spirituality, Science and COVID-19’. Journal for the Academic Study of Religion (Special Issue), 35(2), pp. 133–140.

  7. Halafoff, A., Marriott, E., Fitzpatrick, R. and Weng, E. (2022). ‘Selling (Con)spirituality and COVID-19 in Australia: Convictions, Complexity and Countering Dis/misinformation’. Journal for the Academic Study of Religion (Special Issue), 35(2), pp. 141–167.

  8. Vergani, M., Mansouri, F., Weng, E. and Rajkobal, P. (2022), ‘The effectiveness of ethno-specific and mainstream health services: an evidence gap map’, BMC Health Services Research, 22, 879.

  9. Weng, E., Halafoff, A., Campbell, D., Abur, W., Bouma, G. and Barton, G. (2021), ‘Whiteness, Religious Diversity and Relational Belonging: Opportunities and Challenges for African Migrants in Australia’, Journal for the Academic Study of Religion, 34(3), pp. 289-313.

  10. 8. Poole, E. and Weng, E. (2021), ‘Introduction: Religion on an Ordinary Day: An International Study of News Reporting’, Journal of Religion, Media and Digital Culture, 10 (Special Issue), pp. 165-78.

  11. Weng, E. & Halafoff, A. (2021), ‘Religion on an Ordinary News Day in Australia: Hidden Christianity and the Pervasiveness of Lived Religion, Spirituality and the Secular Sacred’, Journal of Religion, Media and Digital Culture, 10 (Special Issue), pp. 225-49.

  12. Weng, E., Halafoff, A., Barton, G., & Smith, G. (2021), ‘Higher Education, Exclusion, and Belonging: Religious Complexity, Coping and Connectedness Among International Students During the COVID-19 Pandemic in Australia’, Journal of International Students 11(S2), pp. 38-57.

  13. Halafoff, A., Marriott, E., Smith, G., Weng, E. and Bouma, G. (2021), ‘Worldviews Complexity in COVID-19 Times: Australian Media Representations of Religion, Spirituality and Non-Religion in 2020’. Religions 12, 682.

  14. Weng, E. and Wake, A. (2021), ‘Blessed be the educated journalist: Reflections on a religious literacy gap in the field of journalism’, Australian Journalism Review 43(1), pp. 81-97.

  15. Weng, E. and Mansouri, F. (2021), ‘'Swamped by Muslims’ and Facing an 'African Gang’ Problem: Racialized and Religious Media Representations in Australia’, Continuum.

  16. Weng, E. and Halafoff, A. (2020), ‘Media Representations of Religion, Spirituality and Non-Religion in Australia’. Religions (11), 332.

  17. Brennan, L., Klassen, K., Weng, E., Chin, S., Molenaar, A., Reid, M., Truby, H. and McCaffrey, T.A. (2020) ‘A Social Marketing Perspective of Young Adults' Concepts of Eating for Health: is it a Question of Morality? International Journal of Behavioral Nutrition and Physical Activity 17, pp. 1-14.

  18. Weng, E. (2019) ‘Religion as a Spectrum: Through a National Lens Darkly’, Journal for the Academic Study of Religion 32(1), pp. 3-26.

  19. Weng, E. (2016) ‘’The Heavens Opened and Cried’: Mediatised National Mourning for Singapore’s Lee Kuan Yew’, Asian Communication Research 13(2), pp. 65-85.

  20. Weng, E. (2012) ‘Observing the Impact of Locative Media on the Public Space of Contemporary Cities’, Polymath: An Interdisciplinary Arts and Sciences Journal, Vol. 2, No. 2, Spring 2012. Pp. 1-10.

Research reports/policy papers

  1. Mansouri, F., Vergani, M & Weng, E. (2024), Mapping Social Services Provision for Diverse Communities. Deakin University Publishing, Melbourne.

  2. Mansouri, F., Vergani, M. and Weng, E. (2023) ‘Mapping Social Services Provision for Diverse Communities’ An Australian Research Council Linkage Project: Executive Summary for Key Findings’. Melbourne: Alfred Deakin Institute for Citizenship and Globalisation, Deakin University.

  3. Mansouri, F., Weng, E. and Vergani, M. (2022). ‘Australia’s growing cultural diversity requires a long-term strategy to meet its changing needs’. Melbourne Asia Review 12. 15 December.

  4. Weng E., Mansouri F., Vergani M. (2021), ‘The impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on delivery of services to CALD communities in Australia’, ADI Policy Briefing Series 2(2). Melbourne: Alfred Deakin Institute for Citizenship and Globalisation, Deakin University.

Book chapters

Weng E. and Shorter, R. (2024) ‘Decolonial perspectives on dominant constructions of ‘religion’ in Australia’. In: Ravulo, J., Olcoń, K., Dune, T., Workman, A., Liamputtong, P. (eds) Handbook of Critical Whiteness. Springer, Singapore.

Weng, E. (2021), ‘Christianity in Contemporary Australian Media: Get Your Rosaries Off My Ovaries’’. In Grounded in the Body, in Time and Place, in Scripture: Papers by Australian Women Scholars in the Evangelical Tradition (eds) J. Firth and D. Cooper-Clarke. Wipf and Stock. Pp. 219-234.

Weng, E. (2012) ‘The Trappings of Time: The Effects of Global Social Media Uprisings on Singapore's Political Scene’ in The Revolution of Time in a Time of Revolution (eds) C. Lawrence and N. Churn. Cambridge Scholar Publishing.