Since the rise of television, much radio consists of ‘capsule’ news and music formats which are heard as background to other activities. However the medium offers a great deal more. This collection of essays shows how in North America, the United Kingdom, Europe, Australia and the South Pacific, radio continues to provide distinctive forms of content for the individual listener, yet also enables ethnic and cultural groups to maintain their sense of identity. Ranging from radio among the primordial communities to digital broadcasting and the internet, these essays suggest that the benefits and gratifications which radio confers remain unique and irreplaceable in this multi-media age.
Table of Content
General Introduction
Andrew Crisell
PART I: INSTITUTIONS
Chapter 1. Look with Thine Ears: BBC Radio 4 and Its Significance in a Multi-Media Age
Andrew Crisell
Chapter 2. BBC Radio 5 Live: Extending Choice Through ‘Radio Bloke’?
Guy Starkey
Chapter 3. U.S. Public Radio: What is It – and For Whom?
Bob Lochte
Chapter 4. Digital Reflections of Finnish Speech Journalism: YLE Radio Peili
Marko Ala-Fossi
PART II: IDENTITIES
Chapter 5. Indigenous Radio in Canada
Valerie Alia
Chapter 6. Native American Radio: Wolakota Wiconi Waste
Bruce L. Smith
Chapter 7. National Public Service Radio in the South Pacific: A Community Loudspeaker
Helen Molnar
Chapter 8. You’ve Got to Hide Your Love Away: Gay Radio, Past and Present
Alan Beck
Chapter 9. Continuities and Change in Women’s Radio
Kate Lacey
PART III: GENRES
Chapter 10. ‘Reality Radio’: The Documentary
David Hendy
Chapter 11. Radio and Popular Culture in Germany: Radio Culture Between Comedy and ‘Event-isation’
Andreas Hepp
Chapter 12. Radio as a Medium for Poetry
Mike Ladd
Chapter 13. A Medium for Mateship: Commercial Talk Radio in Australia
Terry Flew
Chapter 14. Fireside Issues: Audience, Listener, Soundscape
Frances Gray
PART IV: NEW TECHNOLOGY
Chapter 15. Dutch Web Radio as a Medium for Audience Interaction
Martine van Selm, Nicholas W. Jankowski and Bibi Kleijn
Chapter 16. Speech Radio in the Digital Age
Richard Berry
Notes on Contributors
Index
About the author
Andrew Crisell is Professor of Broadcasting Studies at the University of Sunderland. He is the author of Understanding Radio (2nd edition 1994) and An Introductory History of British Broadcasting (2nd edition 2002).