Yesterday Paula Cleggett and I, as board members of SAH, had a wonderful meeting with Jennifer Bott who is a Chief Executive Officer in the Australian Government (and from what I can gather is the Dana Gioia of Australia). Listening to Jennifer and Paula I felt I was in a masters class on culture and the arts.

Jennifer is in DC for the exhibit Dreaming Their Way: Australian Aboriginal Women Painters at the National Museum of Women in the arts, web site here.

The Australian Government is starting a major mental health and arts initiative - helping boys at risk. It is through the community rather than a hospital environment. It was fascinating to realize we all have the same need for hard research to sell the beneficial role the arts play in healing.

We also talked about the class divide that is being created by the those who have technology available to them and those who do not. How the "have nots" are limited in their access to music, books - popular culture in general - as more and more local bookstores, music stores, small newspapers, radio stations can't compete.

And how much our common identity as a nation has changed because for some of the population there are limitless choices, not the old 4 network tv chanels and PBS, and for others in the country their cultural choices are narrowing. Sounds simplistic when I write it here but it was a really interesting conversation.