Those interested in the state of multiculturalism in 21st Century Australia would do well to check out a new online project called Sydney Shards.

Sydney Shards is an episodic online photo-fiction that examines racial profiling and the status of Muslim youth in Sydney.

It was written and produced by emerging young writer Lynda Ng, and photographed by Daniel Boud through a grant from the Foundation for Young Australians and the Australia Council for the Arts.

Each episode is set in a different suburb of Sydney and the bulk of the story takes place in the Western suburbs, showcasing a side of Sydney which tends to be ignored by mainstream media. This project explores the skewed media representations of Muslims in our community, the prevalence of alcohol in Australian culture, and the struggle that young people face in defining themselves within Australia’semerging multicultural society.

Sydney Shards takes a closer look at the different pieces of our city - how they have been broken, how they are kept apart from each other and how they can come together.