Big Ideas

For some advocates of the no case for this year's referendum, the proposed Voice to parliament simply doesn't go far enough.

Instead, advocates — often referred to as progressive 'no' voters — argue that Indigenous Australians should be given more institutional power to effect change, like dedicated First Nations seats in parliament.

So what does this look like? And what alternatives to the Voice does the progressive no camp propose if their vote carries?

Find more of the ABC's reporting on the Voice referendum on the ABC News website, or listen to the Voice Referendum Explained podcast with Carly Williams and Fran Kelly. 

Interior designer Mary Featherston is famous for many things. Her trailblazing creations with her late husband Grant Featherston. Their extraordinary Melbourne house designed by the iconic modernist architect Robin Boyd, which has housed four generations of their family. But what Mary's most driven by is her 50-year mission to change the face, feel, and function of Australian classrooms. Classrooms, not just teachers, can be educators too! She joins Big Ideas' host Natasha Mitchell.

Depending who you ask, the baby boomers got it good, and everyone that followed got a raw deal.

Here's the common assumption: Millennials are saddled with student debt, unaffordable housing, and increasingly insecure work, while their forebears didn't (and some experienced profound asset gains afterwards). But is this generational binary that simple?

Ok Boomer was first recorded at the Sydney Writers Festival in May 2023.

Checking out the Goldilocks Zone. With a team of astronomers and astrophysicists, Big Ideas is exploring the skies — more precisely, exoplanets that orbit around stars beyond our solar system in what is known as the Goldilocks Zone. It's the zone with conditions that might be just right for creating life. What is this zone, what is being discovered and what can we learn about our own terrestrial world?

It's been 24 years since Australia's last referendum, meaning there's an entire generation who will be participating in a referendum for the first time.

As the nation gears up for the referendum on an Indigenous Voice to parliament, a Monash University panel of legal scholars and constitutional nerds give you a refresher on the mechanics of referenda, the constitution, and why Australian law permits disinformation in political advertising.

Find more of the ABC's reporting on the Voice referendum on the ABC News website, or listen to the Voice Referendum Explained podcast with Carly Williams and Fran Kelly. 

Moving to a new country is hard – do you seek out your own diaspora or find a way to blend in and assimilate? Usually it’s a bit a of both, and what governments do can make a big difference to your life. Why do certain migrants get embraced by certain governments — while others are stigmatised, pilloried, even imprisoned? Two accomplished historians join Natasha Mitchell for a Big Ideas on fitting in and feeling like an outsider. 

The 70's was the peak era of musical innovation and creativity. Kickstarted by the rock'n'roll revolution of the 60s, the music of the 70s has transformed the world and defined all styles that came after. Bands co-opted elements of classical, jazz, electronic, world and avant-garde music. And music became visual spectacle via glam, shock rock, disco and punk.

Chances are your favourite writer got their first break in a literary journal. While they're most often seen as flash-in-the-pan print publications, run on love and free labour, the reality is a lot more complicated.

Ahead of of the 2025 launch of Writers Australia — the federal government's proposed peak body for Australian literature — Western Sydney University released a report into the state of Australia's literary journals. It provides a critical snapshot of the working reality of literary journals, which battle chronic funding shortfalls, precarious employment, and patchy digital infrastructure.

The report's co-author Catriona Menzies-Pike — an award-winning writer and former editor of the Sydney Review of Books — explains how the report might inform future literary policy.

There's a broad spectrum of perspectives on the Voice referendum, but where do the voices of Australia's youth fit into the debate?

Recently, the University of Tasmania gathered a panel of young Indigenous and non-indigenous voices to speak to the complexities of this era-defining moment, and what future they want to inherit — whatever the outcome of the vote. 

Find more of the ABC's reporting on the Voice referendum on the ABC News website, or listen to the Voice Referendum Explained podcast with Carly Williams and Fran Kelly. 

When it comes to biological sex, humans are pretty vanilla. Things are so much wilder in nature. Philosopher of science Paul Griffiths challenges the notion that our biological sex is a rigid, unchangeable thing. Political philosopher Luara Ferracioli contemplates the controversial idea of artificial wombs replacing women’s wombs, with babies gestated entirely outside of the human body. What could that mean for the future of parenthood, motherhood, and our relationship to children? They join Natasha Mitchell for a Big Ideas on sex, biology, and baby making.