Bruce Elder

Bruce Elder is a journalist, writer and commentator. He is a full-time journalist with the Sydney Morning Herald specialising in travel and popular culture. His other areas of expertise include film, television, and popular music. He has written extensively around Australia and has a passion for Australian history. He was also the director of Walkabout in 2007,^[1] the Fairfax organisation's detailed travel internet site.

Elder's radio experience began in the 1970s when he became ABC's 2JJ (now Triple J) London Correspondent. He is heard around the country on Friday nights on Tony Delroy's Nightlife program. Elder is the Australasian editor of Australian Trivial Pursuit. He has also written over 60 books for 16 publishers including contributions to the Macquarie Dictionary, atlases, communication text books and travel guides. His 2003 book, Remember When: Reflections on a Changing Australia, looked at the way Australia has changed over the past 50 years.^[2]

In 1988 Elder won acclaim for his book Blood on the Wattle which was praised as 'arguably the best book ever written about Aborigines by a white writer'. It was listed as one of the ten most influential Australian works of non-fiction in the twentieth century in an extensive poll conducted by the Sydney Morning Herald and The Age.^[3][4]

In 1996 Elder won the prestigious Pascall Prize for Critical Writing.^[5] This was the first time the award had been won by a writer working in the field of popular culture.

In 2010 he was appointed Chairman of the Board of Lifeline South Coast (he had been a member of the board for over a decade) and, for ten years, has been an Australia Day Ambassador (including in Gosford, NSW in year 2010)^[6] travelling around New South Wales and performing civic duties for the Australia Day Council. He has been an Ambassador to Kogarah, Tumut, Marulan, Crookwell, Junee, Ardlethan, Taralga, Wyong, Adelong, Harden, Wombat, The Entrance and Toukley, Woy Woy and Gosford.^[7]

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