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Today, many tribal Aborigines lead a settled traditional life in remote areas of northern, central, and western Australia. In the south, where most Aborigines are of mixed descent, most live in the cities.

Australia is home to perhaps the oldest continuous artistic traditions in the world - that is, those of the Aboriginal Australians, an artistic tradition that began to receive international recognition in the late 20th century. It has also produced notable artists coming out of Western traditions whose most distinctively Australian feature is the gradual development of a way to represent the equally distinctive Australian landscape.

Australia has a highly concentrated ownership of media companies. Newspapers are dominated by two companies, News Corporation and John Fairfax Holdings. News Corporation publishes the only daily national newspaper, The Australian, as well as a daily newspaper in every capital city except Perth. Its holdings include The Daily Telegraph (Sydney), Herald Sun (Melbourne), The Courier-Mail (Brisbane) and The Advertiser (Adelaide).

Much of the area around Adelaide was once used for wine grape production, so that wine growing districts (such as the Barossa Valley, for which Adelaide and South Australia are well known) remain within a short drive of the city outskirts.

During the period of 1855-1890, the six Crown Colonies each successively became self-governing colonies, which managed most of their own affairs. British law was adopted in each colony at the time of the granting of responsible government, and was subsequently modified by the individual legislatures. The British government retained control of some matters, especially foreign affairs, defence, international shipping. Despite its heavily rural based economy Australia remained significantly urbanised, centred particularly around the cities of Melbourne and Sydney. In the 1880s 'Marvellous Melbourne' was the second largest city in the British Empire. Australia also gained a reputation as a 'working man's paradise' and as a laboratory for social reform, with the world's first secret ballot and first national Labor Party government.

Since the recession "Australia had to have" (P. Keating) in the early 1990s, the Australian economy has not suffered a recession or "trough" in the business cycle in 13 years. Even the downturn of the early 2000s did not affect its consistent GDP growth. As of October 2004, unemployment had fallen to a level of 5.2%, the lowest level since the late 1970s.

Sydney is a significant global and domestic tourist destination and is regularly declared to be one of the most beautiful and livable cities in the world, admired for its harbour, beautiful coastline, warm and pleasant climate and cosmopolitan culture. Sydney significantly raised its global profile in recent years as the host city of the 2000 Summer Olympics. The city's name is pronounced "SID-nee".

Probably the most well known Australian food is Vegemite. Similar to the British Marmite it is a strong tasting, yeast extract spread, common in sandwiches or on toast. Some Australian sweets, such as the Violet Crumble chocolate bar, are manufactured in Australia and are sold within the country, as well as a few international places such as Hawaii. Tim Tams are a chocolate biscuit, generally only common in Australia.

Two of Australia's most traditional takeaway dishes are the meat pie and sausage roll. These come in varying grades, ranging from the mass-produced factory outputs of Four-and-Twenty and Big Ben, sold on every street corner in milk bars, through to gourmet pies sold by specialist pie shops. There is an annual competition to find the 'Great Australian Meat Pie', and the winners are greatly removed from their fat-laden antecedents.

Perth is the state capital city of Western Australia, the largest state in Australia. Perth is the world's most isolated city of more than a million people. In June 2003 the Perth Metropolitan Area had an estimated population of 1,433,217, making it the fourth largest city in Australia.