Radio History

This study investigates the radio roots of a discourse of domestic whiteness that is typically associated with family sitcoms of the 1950s. Through analysis of a highly popular evening serial, One Man’s Family (NBC, 1932–1959), the article tracks the production of domestic whiteness in sound, narrative, and vocal performance, situating it within the institutional and social contexts of 1930s radio.

Tekst analizira aktivnosti Radio Broda (Droit de Parole), od ideje o njegovom pokretanju 1992. godine do prestanka rada, marta 1994. Kao medijska inicijativa koja je za cilj imala da prevaziđe medijsku blokadu nastalu usled ratnih dešavanja i raspada nekadašnje SFRJ, nastao u trenutku dramatičnih društveno-političkih tenzija i istorijskih događaja, u analognom, linearnom, skučenom medijskom okruženju, Radio Brod je nagovestio neke buduće medijske mogućnosti u umrežavanju, otvaranju novih prostora i oblika informisanja i produkcije sadržaja.
Okupljajući novinare i urednike iz Srbije, Hrvatske, Bosne i Hercegovine, oslanjajući se na oficijelne i nezvanične izvore sa frontova širom nekadašnje SFRJ, Radio Brod služi kao vredna lekcija ne samo iz perspektive alternativnog medijskog delovanja, već i zanimljiv primer odnosa prema  “jugoslovenskom” duhu u trenutku kada ta država prestaje da postoji. Radio Brod tako otvara prostor da bude analiziran i kao međunacionalni  medijski projekat, čija vrednost počiva na proizvedenom programskom sadržaju, ali još više na njegovom simboličkom značenju. Tekst koristi ne samo retke dostupne izvore o projektu Radio Brod, već i aktuelna sećanja novinara, urednika i saradnika koji su bili aktivno uključeni u ovu inicijativu.

Nel dicembre del 1929 iniziava le pubblicazioni il periodico “L’antenna. Quindicinale illustrato dei radio-amatori italiani”. La rivista si occupò in modo particolare di storia della radio, di radiofonia  e dei programmi radiofonici e ebbe lunga vita, arrivando fino agli anni Ottanta del secolo XX. I primi anni di pubblicazione (1929-1934) risultano molto interessanti anche dal punto di vista letterario poiché “L’antenna” ospitò testi, per esempio, di Augusto Guido Bianchi, Arnaldo Ginna, Enzo Ferrieri, Ettore Fabietti e soprattutto indisse un referendum sulla radio presso gli scrittori italiani, al quale parteciparono una trentina di letterati tra i quali Paolo Buzzi, Ettore Cozzani, Diego Valeri, in anticipo di un paio d’anni sulla celebre indagine sulla radio condotta dallo stesso Ferrieri sulle pagine del “Convegno”. I testi, finora ignoti alla bibliografia e alla storiografia letteraria, consentono così di retrodatare di un biennio l’inizio del rapporto tra scrittori e il nuovo mezzo di comunicazione.

William Benton, one of the founders of the advertising agency Benton & Bowles, helped oversee the production of major US radio programs in the 1930s, such as Maxwell House's Showboat. Benton left advertising and in his subsequent careers in education and politics, consistently advocated for broadcast reforms.

"Is podcasting the future of radio? Is podcasting that missing link connecting radio and the Net that Internet radio stations were not able to establish? Is podcasting a revolutionary or a transitory
cultural trend?
Furthermore, is podcasting a way towards a more democratic audio media system or is it rather a new tool in the hands of the multinational recording industry?
This article will explore these questions, providing an historical framework to the introduction of digital sound (from 1991 to 2007) and related social practices, distinguishing four main phases: the birth of the popular use of digital music; Web radio; Music for free; the iPod and Podcasting."

What is to be made of interactive media? So many questions can be asked about interactivity and the development of interactive media, yet so few concrete answers exist. Over the course of twenty-five years scholars have taken a number of approaches to defining the concept and have devised numerous definitions for the term. Many of these definitions focus on the technological features of a medium, asserting that interactivity is achievable only through media employing new technologies. On the other hand, some scholars contend that interactivity is a perceptual state experienced by the media consumer. With such a great divide existing – between scholars who believe interactivity is dependent on technology and others who believe it is dependent on media users – academic scholarship seems far from able to agree on what constitutes interactivity.

To understand how the concept of interactivity may or may not be related to the development of new media technologies, this dissertation explores the concept through a historical examination of a medium often labeled as passive and absent of a means for interaction – broadcast radio. This project examines one fundamental research question – is interactivity dependent on the technological features of a communications medium, or is interactivity a manifestation of how users perceive their communications experience?

Using the existing literature as a frame work, this dissertation investigates the underpinnings of interactivity through a three-pronged examination of broadcast radio. Radio is evaluated from each of the three definitional perspectives – the message, the medium, and the user - through an analysis of radio messages, medium features, and listening experience. The findings and observations from these examinations are then compared to determine which perspective, or combination of perspectives, is most appropriate for analyzing media interactivity. Building on the knowledge gained during this examination, a model of interactivity is proposed that combines the perspectives of the medium and the user.

RESUM Aquesta ponència es proposa explorar el procés segons el qual durant la primera meitat del segle XX va haver-hi tres " intrusos tecnològics " , que es van integrar amb força naturalitat al món domès-tic tot trencant el seu silenci i la seva ancestral impermeabilitat: el gramòfon, el receptor de ràdio i el televisor. Els estudiosos de la tècnica, els antiquaris i els col·leccionistes s'han afanyat molt a estudiar i a documentar les primeres versions d'aquests artefactes, però sempre ho han fet en tant que aparells descontextualitzats i desvinculats del lloc que ocupaven en l'interior domèstic. El procés segons el qual aquests aparells van aconseguir un lloc d'honor en el saló, tot modificant substancialment els comportaments dels seus habitants, no és únicament estètic, ni únicament tecno-lògic, ni únicament productiu i ni únicament comercial. És tot això a l'hora. TEXTE

This article offers a cultural historical interpretation of The Witch’s Tale (1931– 38), an early U.S. horror radio drama, and argues that the program’s use of the Gothic genre unified its content and form. Its plays emphasized temporality to highlight the Gothic intertwining of the past and present, and offered allegories that while often rooted in the fantastic nevertheless addressed contemporary concerns—gender, Others, and socio-economic anxieties. It used sound to complement its content, evoking the supernatural and monsters, and cuing and sustaining suspense. And it tapped radio’s connotation as a supernatural medium to complement and magnify its generic horror.

This article considers the world for children created by the Australian Broadcasting Commission (ABC) and its predecessors between the 1920s and the 1970s. Beginning with the ‘Aunts’ and ‘Uncles’ of early radio, it looks at the ABC’s endeavours in the areas of children’s and educational broadcasting, focusing particularly on the Argonauts Club, Kindergarten of the Air and Let’s Join In. It also explores the work of ABC identities including composer Bernard Heinze and eurhythmics teacher
Heather Gell, and a succession of innovative and committed programmers. But it goes beyond on-air programming to consider the extracurricular world created for young listeners by Australia’s public service broadcaster. The article points to the interactivity of Australian broadcasting, examining how a mass medium sought to build communities of young listeners across Australia, and the role of ABC
programmes and associated activities in children’s lives.

In October 1962 DR (Danish Broadcasting Corporation) introduced its first hit parade, Ti vi ka’ li’ (Ten we like). The hit parade is a radio show format based on ranking of music . Ti vi ka’ li’ was based on votes from a live teenage audience, and the songs presented were selected by the editors. By January 1963 a sales based Top 20 was also launched, and except for a two year break (1964-1966) music charts were part of the program until 1977.

In this paper I investigate the role of the hit parade in Denmark in the introductory years 1962-1964. Why and how was the format introduced by this public service station at that time, how did the format fit into the overall programming policies at DR, and which impact did the shows have on the musical culture in Denmark?

As the Danish case is part of an international story, especially the  history of the introduction of the hit parade in Europe will be used as background and platform.

In : Actes du 8e Colloque International Brésil-France, "Etat, culture et communication", GRESEC, Grenoble, les 29 et 30 septembre 2006, paru dans le supplément à la revue Enjeux, consultable en ligne à http://w3.u-grenoble3.fr/les_enjeux/2006-supplement/ Rivron/index.php (décembre 2006)

This is the Introduction and two chapters from my 1997 book, Radio Voice, published by University of Minnesota Press.  The two chapters are The Disembodied Voice and Under Cover of Daytime, both of which trace the history of women and radio in the US from the 1920s through the 50s, and the creation of daytime radio as a gendered space.  Other chapters cover radio and national identity, race and early radio, the discursive tactics of prime time radio, and radio during World War II.

La radiotelevisione svizzera di lingua italiana nel periodo del grande sviluppo dei nuovi generi radiofonici e della nascita della nascita della televisione di servizio pubblico in Svizzera

Contributi nel volume di : Gabriele Balbi, Ruth Hungerbühler, Marco Marcacci, Giorgio Passera, Mattia Piattini, Paolo Sala, Nelly Valsangiacomo

The Fairness Doctrine, one of the most famous and controversial media policies ever enacted, suffered a final deathblow in August 2011 when the Federal Communications Commission permanently struck it from the books. However, the Doctrine continues to be invoked by proponents and detractors alike. This study historically contextualizes the Fairness Doctrine while drawing attention to how it figures within contemporary regulatory debates. By tracing over time the shifting ideologies and discourses surrounding the Fairness Doctrine, we can see how political conflict shapes the normative foundations of core media policies, especially those involving positive freedoms.

This article considers the radio programme for kindergarten-aged children that the Australian Broadcasting Commission (ABC) launched during the Second World War and continued to broadcast until 1985. Kindergarten of the Air, thought to be the ‘first of its kind in the world’, was to inspire interest from, and similar programmes throughout, the British empire and beyond. The article examines the imperial and
international broadcasting networks that enabled the exchange of ideas and initiatives within the field of educational broadcasting, and the export of one of Australia’s most successful radio initiatives, while also considering the willingness of the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) to be influenced by a dominion broadcaster.

The Public Broadcasting Act’s 50th anniversary provides an opportune
moment to reassess justifications for creating a noncommercial media system. This commemorative occasion coincides with a particularly precarious moment for public radio and television’s future, adding some urgency to revisiting and reasserting its normative foundations. With this in mind, it is instructive to look back at public broadcasting’s long history to recover some of the original arguments for establishing an alternative to commercial news media. These earlier visions suggest a social democratic ideal for broadcast media, one clearly recognizing that a market-driven system cannot provide for all of democratic society’s communication needs.

The publication of the sixth volume of the official history of the BBC, Pinkoes and Traitors: The BBC
and the nation 1974‐1987 by Jean Seaton is reviewed. The book is found to contain numerous
errors, mis‐statements of facts and significant omissions rendering the book an unreliable source
for those researching either the history of the BBC or the impact of the BBC on Britain’s political
and cultural life. Seaton’s major errors and omissions are catalogued as an aid to future researchers
and alternative, more reliable, secondary sources identified.
KEYWORDS
BBC, HISTORY, BROADCASTING, TELEVISION, RADIO, BBC LOCAL RADIO, BBC NATURAL HISTORY UNIT, BRITISH
HISTORY, ASA BRIGGS, JEAN SEATON, HUW WHELDON, ALASDAIR MILNE, PLAY FOR TODAY, THE HITCHHIKER’S
GUIDE TO THE GALAXY, GARDENER’S QUESTION TIME, THE MOUSETRAP, HOWARDS’ WAY, THE THORN BIRDS,
LIFE ON EARTH, NEWSNIGHT, PANORAMA, I, CLAUDIUS, BOYS FROM THE BLACKSTUFF, EDGE OF DARKNESS, BLUE
PETER, BAGPUSS, THE WOMBLES, NATIONWIDE, GRANDSTAND, POT BLACK, THE GENERATION GAME, MATCH OF
THE DAY, BLACK AND WHITE MINSTREL SHOW, EASTENDERS, STARSKY AND HUTCH, MARK TULLY, GRAHAME C
GREENE, CHRISTOPHER ANDREW, TIMOTHY GARTON ASH, TOM BOWER, PAT LOUGHREY, DAVID MCKITTRICK,
BRYCE MCCRIRICK, KELVIN MACKENZIE, GILES OAKLEY, NAOMI SARGANT, RONNIE STONHAM, DAVID
ATTENBOROUGH, DERYCK COOKE, DERRICK AMOORE, SALLY DOGANIS, TIM EGGAR, AUSTEN KARK, SARA
NATHAN, STEWART PURVIS, STEWART PARKER, PHILLIP WHITEHEAD, TONY SMITH, ALASDAIR MILNE, AUBREY
SINGER, ANNA HOME, HUMPHREY BURTON MARK DAMAZER, FRANCESCA KIRBY‐GREEN, DONALD GRATTAN,
ALAN YENTOB, BROADCASTING STANDARDS COUNCIL

This article examines the first forty years of religious broadcasting on commercial
radio in Australia, a subject largely neglected by historians of Australian religion
and the media. It reveals the diversity of religious broadcasting on Australian commercial
radio, the ambiguities of the regulatory framework within which it operated,
the influence of American religious broadcasting in Australia, and the challenges
confronting religious broadcasters, particularly in the decade between the introduction
of television and the emergence of talkback radio. The article concludes in the second
half of the 1960s, when religious programming faced mounting commercial pressures,
as well as a new opportunity in the shape of “talkback” radio.

Here I survey key developments in advertising and sponsorship on radio and television from the 1920s to the present, analyzing the inter-institutional relations among broadcasters, networks, and the advertising industry. I hope to demonstrate how deeply integrated the advertising industry is in the structures and practices of other media.

“Going wireless” involves not only the elimination of wires but also the production of electromagnetic waves, a realization that had far-reaching implications for the cultural logics of German modernity. As a media archaeology of wirelessness, this dissertation situates the “discovery” of electromagnetic radiation and the “invention” of wireless transmission in a richer field of scientific, experimental, and aesthetic relations during the early and pre-history of national broadcasting. Before wireless transmission came to be synonymous with the mass distribution medium of radio or even the long-distance communication medium of wireless telegraphy, it was at the center of speculation about a variety of possible wireless futures. Understanding the rhetoric of the new media of radio and wireless telegraphy in the first chapter opens onto questions of continuity and change in the longue durée of the second chapter. The insights gained from this comparison of pre-modern cultural techniques and modern electronic technologies are crucial for understanding the “discovery” of electromagnetic radiation and the “invention” of wireless telegraphy examined in the third and fourth chapters with a focus on the immediate pre-history of national broadcasting in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century. The significance of this pre-historical period and the contingency of national broadcasting in the mid-twentieth century arguably only became apparent with the revival of wireless transmission at the turn of the twenty-first century, as the fifth chapter makes evident. As a contribution to the early and pre-history of national broadcasting, this dissertation suggests a new way of thinking about the order of wirelessness, from “wireless” as synonymous with the communication medium of telegraphy or the distribution medium of radio, to “wireless” as electromagnetic radiation and a medium of experimentation.

A renaissance occurred from the late 1960s in the art of documentary and 'feature' production in radio, especially from within the major public broadcasters of Europe. Surprisingly, the pioneering work of this little commented-upon group of accomplished artisans finds its most immediate parallels not in radio but film culture, particularly in the auteur, nouvelle vague and cinéma-vérité movements of the time. The new acoustic documentary-feature 'project' suggests a radio 'new wave': a new art of 'wild sound' recording freed from script and studio, and made possible by the advent of portable recorders, microphones and a strong infusion of 1968 zeitgeist.

Langston Hughes, poet of the Harlem Renaissance, was largely excluded from mainstream American radio despite his numerous attempts to bring the African-American experience to the airwaves. He considered his 1944 radio ballad "The Man Who Went To War," produced in New York by D. G. Bridson of the BBC,  his most successful radio work, featuring some of the most significant African-American performers of the era: Paul Robeson, Josh White, Ethel Waters, and Canada Lee. Alan Lomax arranged the music, which was sung by the Hall Johnson Choir, accompanied by noted bluesmen Sonny Terry playing harmonica and Brownie McGhee on guitar. Never broadcast in the United States, Hughes' work imagined the experience of a family during the London Blitz through African-American voices and music.

This article considers radio's claim to enjoy a personal, intimate relationship with listeners by examining late-night programming on Australian commercial radio from the 1930s to the 1980s. It explores radio's shift from exploiting the extraordinary to the ordinary through the prism of the midnight-to-dawn program that made its debut on Sydney's 2UW in 1935-possibly the first example of continuous broadcasting in the British empire. The article then looks at the spread of midnight-to-dawn shows to other Australian stations, and the role played by women broadcasters in this genre. Finally, the article discusses outlets for "romance" on Australian radio in the middle decades of the 20th
century and examines the rise of late-night matchmaker programs - "a time," in the words of one journalist, "when the lonely get lonelier and inhibitions loosen."

During the radio network era of US broadcasting (1930s-40s), the predominant business model was sponsorship: an advertiser rented airtime from a broadcaster and produced the program, which was often overseen by an advertising agency. The sponsorship model violated the print media norm that editorial content and advertising are produced separately. Key figures in the advertising industry, including some who had worked for radio sponsors, objected to sponsorship. This essay traces the anti-sponsorship discourse within the advertising industry during the radio network era.  These insider critiques of sponsorship contributed to the shift away from sponsorship in the 1950s and toward a business model in which advertisers purchased interstitial minutes for commercials from networks, which controlled programming, thus returning broadcasting to the print media norm of separated editorial and advertising content.

Journalism invented the interview, a tool to investigate the lives of writers. This indiscretion triggers the authors’ reaction: a new literary genre, the imagined interview, becomes a shield to protect their own intimacy as wells as a tactic to overturn the press’ spotlight, primarily against the interviewers. Pretending to be like them, the authors will also be able to talk to the ghosts of our imagination. All their interlocutors become characters shaped by irony, satire, self-representation. Through the creative variations of the imagined interview and across different media (publishing, radio, television, digital devices), this book shows how the media context, with its laws and conflicts, is the scene of writers’ counterattack—a battle fought by the double-edged sword of journalistic imitation and fictional invention.

In 1963, Delia Derbyshire took a music score by Ron Grainer, manipulated it through various pieces of electronics, cut and re-edited lengths of recording tape and produced what has arguably become one the most memorable theme tunes to a television programme: Dr Who. That Derbyshire and her colleagues had been able to produce such a series of sounds that were different, unworldly, and to the general listening public, so new, was interesting in its own right. That they were doing this as an official unit in a couple of small rooms at one of the BBC’s studios is even more interesting. This was the BBC Radiophonic Workshop, a specialist unit that ran from 1957 until 1998, producing sound effects, incidental music and themes for BBC radio and television. This thesis makes a focussed study of the emergence of the BBC Radiophonic Workshop, providing grounds for revision and expansion of the canonical history of the BBC.

The importance of the work that the BBC Radiophonic Workshop created is undeniable, as is its contribution to technical development, both in sound and in musical instrumentation. What has not been previously interrogated is how the Workshop came about, who the key players were in its origination, and how the BBC influenced and facilitated its establishment. Much of the impetus for the Workshop arose from the needs of the department of Drama (Sound) whose creative lead is central to this narrative. This thesis also shows that having created the demand for such a creative unit, it was another section of the Corporation, Central Programme Operations that was in the position to physically create the Workshop.

Whilst the department titles provide an objective nomenclature, it is the people, the personalities who were central; these were personalities who pioneered the new developments of voice and sound recording and manipulation, and included engineers, scriptwriters and producers. These personalities are represented by an examination of Sir William Haley, Val Gielgud, Donald McWhinnie and Desmond Briscoe. The thesis also explores the impact of the new technology of tape recording, the convergence of institutional expectations and inter-generational creative drives that led to the exploration of the aesthetic possibilities opened up by these new technologies, and the cultural and societal influences upon these creative energies.

From its introduction in 1899, through its take over by the federal government in 1917, radio in America focused almost exclusively on becoming an alternative to wired telegraphy and telephony. Development was in the hands of a select few inventors and businesses, and the public had little interest in the technology. Within three years of the end of World War I, radio became a massive broadcast media involving many corporations and research laboratories. Much has been written about the transition of radio, but little analysis has been done as to what caused this significant change in the industry. How did American radio go from a narrowly used technology, presented only as an alternative to wired telegraphy and telephony to a broadcast medium, embraced by the public sphere? By analyzing radio before and after the war, as well as the demands placed on wartime technology, this paper argues that the circumstances of World War I led directly to the changes that occurred in the science, technology, and commercial industry of radio.

奥斯邦是中国境内第一座广播电台的创办人。1923 至 1924 年，他辗转上海、香港、澳门等 多地开展无线电广播试验，针对不同的地方管治特点采取不同措施，为当时的新媒体——广播进行多方 推广。虽然他掌握了较为先进的无线电广播技术，但因社会资源所限和资本不足，在上海、澳门开办的两 座广播电台均未能持续长久，在香港的广播事业也只停留在试验广播和销售无线电收音机层面。新媒体 创业不仅需要技术，更是多因素的集合，“冒险家”奥斯邦在中国各地的新媒体广播创业并不成功。
E.G.Osborn is a new media adventurer in 1920‘s. From 1923 to 1924, he carried out radio broadcasting experiments in Shanghai, Hong Kong, Macao and other places, taking different measures according to different local governance characteristics, and conducting multi-party promotion for the new media at that time-broadcasting.Although he has mastered relatively advanced radio broadcasting technology, due to limited social resources and insufficient capital, the two radio stations in Shanghai and Macau failed to last for a long time.New media entrepreneurship requires not only technology, but also a collection of multiple factors. The "adventurer" Osborn's entrepreneurship in new media broadcasting across China has not been successful.

"The paper draws on the author’s research into podcasting, especially in relation to its uptake by public service radios, which may be constituting a revitalising of the public radio voice. Invoking historian, John Durham Peters discussion of the merits of dissemination and dialogue, and critical theorist Bertolt Brecht’s disappointment with “one way” broadcast radio in the 1930s, the author explores podcasting as a new form of broadcast dissemination which draws on radio’s past dreamings of “eros and democracy” (Peters 1999). The significance of this time-shifted and ever expanding distribution of voice and its acousmatic presence creating a new media 'pod-ecology' is also discussed in the context of amateur and citizen media.

Reference; John Durham Peters, Speaking into the Air: A History of the Idea of Communication, University of Chicago Press, 1999.""

This article historically traces some of Egypt's early private radio stations which operated from the late-1920s until May 1934 when they were all forcefully shut down by the Egyptian government. It sheds light on this important early period in Egyptian media history and highlights the role of many unacknowledged early radio pioneers. More importantly, the article analyzes the early forced transition to government-controlled radio and the impact this sudden shift must have had on the owners, producers and listeners of these stations as well as its broader implications on Egypt's media landscape. This top-down transition from media-capitalism to what I call media-etatism started with radio in the 1930s and, later on under Gamal Abdel Nasser, expanded to print and other media, exemplifying state control of media in Egypt for at least an entire generation.

Technology is ubiquitous in the history of US foreign relations. Throughout US history, technology has played an essential role in how a wide array of Americans have traveled to and from, learned about, understood, recorded and conveyed information about, and attempted to influence, benefit from, and exert power over other lands and peoples. The challenge for the historian is not to find where technology intersects with the history of US foreign relations, but how to place a focus on technology without falling prey to deterministic assumptions about the inevitability of the global power and influence-or lack thereof-the United States has exerted through the technology it has wielded. "Foreign relations" and "technology" are, in fact, two terms with extraordinarily broad connotations.

"Foreign relations" is not synonymous with "diplomacy," but encompasses all aspects and arenas of American engagement with the world. "Technology" is itself "an unusually slippery term," notes prominent technology historian David Nye, and can refer to simple tools, more complex machines, and even more complicated and expansive systems on which the functionality of many other innovations depends. Furthermore, processes of technological innovation, proliferation, and patterns of use are shaped by a dizzying array of influences

Thesis, M.Phil. in European Studies, University of Cambridge (UK), 1995.

Full text available from Apollo - University of Cambridge Repository, DOI:  https://doi.org/10.17863/CAM.14329.

The thesis offers a unified synthesis of British radio propaganda against Nazi Germany during the Second World War both in regard to the organisation of the British propaganda apparatus and to its output.

As a high circulation publication with a well-preserved archive The BBC’s Listener magazine offers a rare opportunity to examine the details of publishing and taste in visual art in the interwar period. This article examines the surprising variety of writers and broadcasters involved with the BBC’s visual arts coverage, the views they held, and the attempts made to analyse and mould ‘popular’ taste that eventually led into the formation of the Arts Council of Great Britain.

Auditory cultures in the first half of the 20th century seem to be highly shaped by the massive transformations of urban environments that brought with them entirely new soundscapes due to mechanical noises and technologies of sound reproduction. While not opposing this view, this paper draws the attention to yet another sound environment that considerably influenced the formation of the modern sonosphere: the battlefields of WWI.
Bound to the trenches of positional warfare, a whole generation of soldiers developed numerous listening skills that allowed for an interpretation of their life-threatening surroundings. In the same time, scientists conducted experiments to enhance the detection and ranging of sound sources on the ground, in the air, and under water by technological means. After the war, yet another technique of mediated listening emerged: the detection of far away radio stations in the electromagnetic ether at the dawn of wireless technology. Thereby, the listening practices of distinguishing signals from noise which were trained during wartime, were transformed and diffused into cultural practices. Listening experiences from the battlefield also resound in the cultural memory of the interwar period: They became part of stories which staged the war in novels, radioplays, movies, and new approaches in musical composition.
This paper shows how the sonic “dispositive” of WWI—with its sound technologies, auscultatory techniques, and experiences of listening—diffused into civil cultural contexts in the 1920s. On a methodological level, the paper aims to discuss the possibilities of “Hearing Modern History” on the basis of sources which stem from different media (e.g. texts, sound recordings, or movies) in order to reconstruct auditory cultures from the past.

El presente artículo se pregunta por las conexiones establecidas entre radio y cine en el mercado de entretenimientos porteño de la década de 1930. Para eso, se exploran tres dimensiones de este proceso. En primer lugar, a través de los programas radiales, y los magazines, se analizarán ciertas apropiaciones y adaptaciones que la radio ha hecho del cine y viceversa. En segundo lugar, se indaga en la circulación de artistas y de público que esa conexión hizo posible. En particular, la reconfiguración de los antiguos edificios radiales con la incorporación de nuevos auditorios con capacidad para el público permite observar este proceso en su espacialidad. Finalmente, se explora el caso de un producto específico, el radioteatro “Radio-Cine Lux”, que a su vez era auspiciado por el jabón marca Lux. Es así que proponemos pensar en el impacto que dichas interacciones tuvieron en nuevas prácticas y nuevas formas de consumo cultural.

Schon lange vor dem heutigen Mobilfunk eröffnet sich mit
dem Radio ein akustischer Raum der Gleichzeitigkeit und
der Allgegenwärtigkeit. Die erste deutsche Testsendung
via Radio wurde am 22. Dezember 1920 von Königs Wusterhausen
ausgestrahlt, drei Jahre vor dem Beginn des offiziellen
Radioprogramms. Das bietet den Anlass 2020 über »Hundert Jahre Radio« nachzudenken.
Die Transformationen und Potentiale des immateriellen
Sendens und Empfangens werden in diesem Buch anhand
von drei Zeitfenstern untersucht: die Anfänge des Rundfunks
in den 1920er Jahren, Piratenradios und der Leipziger
Stadtfunk in der DDR, sowie das Radio als Medium für
Live- Performances heute.

Herausgeber:innen:
Dieter Daniels, Frederike Moormann, Constanze Müller,
Angelika Waniek, Ralf Wendt