THE INVENTION OF RADIO

ANTHONY READ

What sorts of cultural forms/media have broadcast and/or

digital communication technologies made possible? What
sorts of social applications and uses have these involved, for
what sorts of local, national and ‘global’ social groups? What
sorts of rhetorical claims are made through the publicity,
marketing, advertising, promotional and critical discussion of
these technologies?
Radio is defined as “wireless telegraphy or telephony” (Dictionary.com 2010). This technology has caused
much deliberation over its uses and forms, but more particularly, what it should be used for. Cultural forms
emanating from this invention have come to include documentaries, news, radio music, plays and talkback, all
appropriated from pre-existing media forms. But these cultural forms, and the social groups that use and
define them, were mostly formed after the commercialisation of radio. Through very clever marketing, radio
was shown to the people as “the Spirit of Civilisation made manifest” (Counihan 1982: 201). But the radio was
not created solely for commercial purposes.

RADIO – A POTTED HISTORY

The technological invention we have come to label ‘radio’ came about through various means and measures,
and when commercialised, was touted as ‘the next big thing’ in media communications. It is important to note
from the outset that radio was not the death of print, as print was not the death of manuscript writing.
Through recent communications history, new technologies have always found a way to integrate themselves
into, and form adjacencies in, the wider media scheme. Over time, a radio audience was formed with the
original purpose of “a one-way *transmission+, directed at the individual in the private home” (Johnson 1981:
167), but has changed to utilise new cultural forms, such as talkback, radio music, radio plays, and news. These
forms are not new, and already had found homes in previous media types. Radio practitioners simply picked
them up and moulded them into new transmissions. In fact, print is still utilised strongly in media outlets.
Newsreaders still hold their signature papers during filming. Radio jockeys use paper slips to communicate to
each other during live transmission. Adjacencies are always been created with each new media development.

If we are to stick with Raymond Williams’ three-step model of technique-technical invention-technology, radio
fits snugly within it. Williams posited that certain techniques must be developed in people for technical
inventions to be created. Then, the technical inventions are appropriated and used in the forms we now know
as technologies (Williams 1989: 172-173). Techniques involved in discovering radio included the identification
of radio waves and the radio spectrum, discovered jointly by James Clerk Maxwell and Heinrich Hertz in 1865
and 1886, respectively (Following the Path of Discovery 2009). When combined with the knowledge of
electromagnetism, the technical inventions of radio transmitters and receivers were created. Soon enough,
the public sphere was granted access to this invention, and the technology of radio was founded.

Originally intended as a one-way system, radio was given life by the Industrial Revolution, where workers were
separated from their families for whole days. The radio acted as a kind of link between home and work, to
keep families ‘together’ even when they were apart, via the form of “mobile privatisation” championed by
Morley (2007: 219). But apart from the idea of the deletion of space between home and work, what other
cultural forms have been created from radio?

RADIO AND CULTURAL FORMATIONS

Like many technologies, the commercial and private uses of radio came well after the government and military
first endeavoured to use it for themselves. Another key technique and technological invention for radio was
morse code, or ‘radio telegraphy’. This was used by the British Empire to link up with their furthest colonies,
including Australia. This may be what Counihan means by the “social benefits it promised…to Nation and
Empire” (1982: 197), as rapid communication was enabled between colonies of the Empire. Wireless
telegraphy, and later telephony, also gave those who had it a militaristic advantage. No longer could telegraph
lines be literally ‘sabotaged’ and physically cut by enemies of the state, as the messages were being sent
“through the air” (Counihan 1982: 199). When the phonograph was created, the wireless science of telegraphy
was applied to it, and the version of radio we know today (the human voice being sent over large distances)
was founded.

The widespread commercialisation and privatisation of radio allowed many new cultural forms to erupt forth.
As pointed out above, radio practitioners appropriated already-existing cultural forms into the radio sphere.
One shining example is the radio play. Bertol Brecht gave A Talk on the Function of Radio (1978/9) where he
described the new ways in which radio could be seen as a revolutionary medium, and not existing to “merely
embellish public life” (1978: 25). He then goes on to reveal and explore his concept of ‘epic theatre’, in which
characterisation would be sacrificed in favour of plot and secondary characters. This way, Brecht argues,
“intoxication” by too much emotional investment in characters would be replaced by a sober-minded viewing
of the social and political implications of the plot (1978: 27). The very opposite of this sober viewing was
conquered by Orson Welles, whose radio play The War of the Worlds was so well constructed and timed that it
caused “widespread panic” among listeners-in. When he combined the “public confidence in the medium of
radio” with the “degree of political instability”, Welles positively got under the skin of his listeners (Hendy
2000: 204). It is this type of public panic, arguably reflected in the Rwandan genocide broadcasts, that caused
McLuhan to dismiss radio as another “hot medium”, one of “violent, unified implosion and resonance…an
archaic force” (Hendy 2000: 239).

Brecht also endeavoured to see radio utilised in a more overtly political way, in that political interviews and
questioning could now be more direct and powerful, due to radio’s live nature. Leading on from this
directness, talkback is another large-scale cultural form. Bridget Griffin-Foley explains the impact of talkback
radio well: “Often controversial, talkback radio remains hugely popular and has taken a firm hold on the
nation’s psyche” (The Australian 2010). Personalities such as Rush Limbaugh, Howard Stern, and in Australia,
John Laws, Derren Hinch and Alan Jones, have consistently courted controversy for airing suggestive opinions
and views. Hendy addresses the issue of screening calls and only allowing callers on-air that agree with the
‘shock jocks’, saying, “an individual talk-show…cannot always guarantee a wide range of views within its own
boundaries” (2000: 210). The broadcasters often have larger-than-life backgrounds to add to their often-
inflammatory views. Rush Limbaugh coins himself the “Doctor of Democracy” (Hendy 2000: 206). Alan Jones
has been disciplined and damned for inciting crowds leading up to the 2005 Cronulla race riots
(theaustralian.com.au 2007). Derren Hinch has gone to jail for leaking the withheld names of sex offenders
(theage.com.au 2008). These examples show that talkback hosts are not afraid to push the boundaries of
public opinion, and stellar ratings prove that people are still tuning in (3aw.com.au 2010).

Radio has also appropriated two other cultural forms: music and sport. Sports broadcasting has a wide
following across Australia, and stations such as Triple M and SEN have this at their core. This form of sports
broadcasting, where games are relayed to stations across the nation, constitutes a similar idea to the
newspaper, in that it forms a “habitus”, where the broadcasters use language that is “daily, banal, prosaic but
with a texture that offers it as definitely circumscribed and peculiar; that is, as national” (Mercer 1992: 26).
Radio music also plays a large part in radio broadcasting, but in a different way. Music is a “central instrument
in the construction, definition and redefinition of national identities” (Hendy 2000: 214). As a form of
globalisation, music via radio has permeated a larger space than just private listening, making the presence of
a national music impinge upon other styles, in a type of cross-fertilisation. All these cultural forms exist in the
privacy of cars and homes, as well as public spaces such as restaurants, cafes and workplaces. There is no
doubt that the presence of radio is felt everyday in many of our lives, but what applications do we make of
such cultural forms?

THE SOCIAL APPLICATIONS OF RADIO

Radio broadcasting officially began in Australia in 1923 under sealed set regulations, where the household had
only radio receiver that could pick up only one particular station. The broadcasting stations sold these sets,
and sealed set manufacturers formed alliances with the broadcasters. However, Counihan rightly points out
that “wireless was still largely the domain of the amateur experimenter” (1982: 197). These experimenters
picked apart the sealed sets, and experimented with them to discover new ways of listening to, or
broadcasting, radio. This changing of the idea of sealed sets and ‘listeners-in’ came about with the dual system
of Australian broadcasting licensing. Taken from both the British (state-run) and American (commercially-run)
mindsets, the Australian system was set out to include both state-assisted and commercially minded stations
(Johnson 1981). This system reflected “an ideology of choice”, where “a whole range of choices lay open to
*the listener+ by a simple turn of the knob” (Johnson 1981: 173). Through the dual system, and the
experimenters who acted as radio experimenters, the nature of radio shifted from a highly one-way dictation
to a more open communication, where listeners-in became listeners of choice.

Much of the power emanating from radio broadcasters in its early stages was in its newfound ability to
regulate the household, and the people within it. The Industrial Revolution created a new sense of what
citizens should be in society, in particular the ways in which men went out to work during the day while
women stayed home, looked after the children, cooked and cleaned. An early advertisement for wireless radio
reads, “The model housewife, the model kitchen, the model radio receiver, all courtesy of Grace Bros. Ltd”
(Counihan 1982: 200). The placement of the housewife amongst the appliances and radio receiver paints her
as another part of the household, an integral part that needs to be kept indoors and away from the dangers of
the world. Counihan points out that “listeners were firstly built into the programme structure in terms of
certain social categories: women…children…and farmers” (1982: 203). Programs were created to fit certain
timeslots where people would be listening: kids in the afternoons after school, housewives during the day, the
farmers in the morning and in the evening. This would soon change with the onset of high levels of advertising
and specific audience interests, but the beginning of radio broadcasting in Australia centred around the
household and its occupants.

This type of ‘private globalisation’ could be considered to be a calming influence on the family unit, as the
distance between members of the family were offset and ‘filled’ by the radio transmissions. This allowed the
family members to relax, knowing their loved ones were probably listening to the same things as they were.
However, other social applications could be considered to be ‘maddening’ in comparison: take, for example,
the story of Orson Welles’ play as outlined above. The mass hysteria caused by Welles’ play was caused by its
lack of warning that it was a play, compounded by the fact the show it was aired on was without news or
advertising breaks (war-of-the-worlds.org 1997). The Rwandan genocide broadcasts, as they have come to be
known, used “a technique of reversal to encourage genocide”, where stations “encouraged Hutu hatred and
slaughter of the Tutsis by talking about Tutsu hate of the Hutus” (Hendy 2000: 203). The story of the Bolivian
tin miners using their independently run stations to communicate poetry, news and plays is still undercut by a
sense of ‘maddening’: in times of political upheaval, the miners would use these stations to create a tense
political undercurrent and a “culture of resistance” against the Government (Hendy 2000: 196-197). Here we
can see a clear comparison of the ‘maddening’ radio and the ‘calming’ television that McLuhan posits: when
the tin miners were found to be using the radio as a dissident resource, the Government handed out
televisions to ‘calm’ the population into their way of thinking. These examples distinguish between the
opposite sides of the radio spectrum: one side calming, the other maddening, but the point being that both
sides are equally used by broadcasters.

Many other social applications have been created through radio, including the “electronic backyard fence”
through talkback radio and the sense of national interest through radio news. More recently, the radio
airwaves have been used in a totally different way: emergency broadcasting. In the recent Victorian Black
Saturday bushfires, many radio stations including 3AW and ABC National gave over huge segments of airtime
to responding to callers’ needs and relaying information about the state of the fires. While this could be seen
as a calming influence, in that the stations were helping to remind people they weren’t alone in the fires, it
could also be considered to be a maddening force, where people may listen in and overreact to something not
occurring in their region. What would we consider these broadcasts to be? It doesn’t fall cleanly into either
calming or maddening, so maybe it occupies a place all of its own.

SOCIAL GROUPS WHO USE RADIO

Locality within the radio framework plays a major part in how it is used, what it is used for and who listens in.
On a small scale, local radio stations have a role in bringing a community together (see the Bolivian tin miners
example above). Some local radio stations, such as 3RRR in Melbourne, thrive on diversity combined with a
vast listening population. They consider themselves to have “shaped and inspired the culture of Melbourne”
through “60 diverse programs” (rrr.org.au 2010). Where this station differs from many other local stations is
that its listening audience is highly developed and particular about what they want to listen to, be it talkback,
metal, jazz, rock, funk, or others. 3RRR still adheres to the idea that Counihan put forward of ‘creating an
audience’, those being “categories relating to program preferences” (1982: 203). By separating programs into
highly particular preferences, the station increases its audience, as people will tune in to hear what they want
to hear, not what happens to be on at the time. Also, by separating their audience into discrete groups, the
station strengthens its popularity, through coalescence by separation. On the other hand, larger local stations,
such as statewide AM stations, develop a sense of belonging, but not in a broad nationalistic Australian sense.
These stations relay a sense of what it is to be of a state (such as Victorian or Queenslander) through rhetoric
and state-based speech. Broadcasters such as Neil Mitchell at 3AW foster a sense of pride in being Victorian by
distinguishing Victorian audiences against others and referencing Victorian stories over others. This may be a
way of creating an audience by “social categories” (Counihan 1982: 203). Instead of separating an audience
into its single parts, these broadcasters foster a sense of state pride by separating their listeners from others
across the nation, and by coalescing their audience into one monolithic mass called ‘the audience’, or
‘Victorians’ in 3AW’s case.

Due to the Internet and the rise of podcasting, overseas listeners are increasingly picking up radio
transmissions from other locations, and audience demographics are changing dramatically. A global audience
is being developed through digital communication technologies, and ‘globalisation’ is now one of the major
forces in broadcasting. In fact, with the advent of podcasting came a new form of transmission: narrowcasting.
While stations such as 3RRR appear to have been doing this for quite some time, narrowcasting distinguishes
itself from broadcasting in that only people subscribing to a narrowcast station can hear or see that media
(wisegeek.com 2010). This differs greatly from the dominant ideology of globalisation, and Mattelart takes a
stand against it as well. He defines globalisation as “infinitely extendable” (2002: 591), due to its widespread
use in everyday life. He also considers it to be a way of spreading liberal democracy, and considers “a
forgetting of history” to be a major component (2002: 592). Global audiences are being formed through the
rapid spread of liberal democracy, and the musical forms that come with it. Hendy points out that radio “may
act as an agent of homogenisation”, but “is at least capable of providing…hybridised symbolic forms and
practices” (2000: 225). Global audiences are being formed through the narrowcasting and broadcasting
capabilities of smaller local and national transmitters, and in return, these smaller transmitters are gaining new
and exciting ways of creating and transmitting radio to their audiences.

THE RHETORICAL CLAIMS OF RADIO

Counihan has two highly illuminating examples of how radio was marketed in its first incarnations. One
advertisement reads, “ELECTRICITY IS KING!...and now most wonderful of all IT BRINGS US SONG AND STORY
THROUGH THE AIR” (1982: 199). Billy Hughes makes the assertion that “wireless is the Spirit of Civilisation
made manifest, it carries knowledge on the wings of light” (Counihan 1982: 201). Hughes also goes on to say
that “distance is annihilated” and radio will make “imperial ties still stronger”, which was one of the original
reasons for setting up wireless. Most interestingly of all, he mentions how wireless will “help all men to know
one another, to understand each other’s point of view…dispelling misunderstandings”. This incredible rhetoric
paints radio as an almost God-like creation that will harmonize society into a single race. But apart from that
rhetoric, Hughes points out the beginnings of what we know as modern talkback radio: the ability to hear
unfiltered opinions free of charge, to ‘dispel misunderstandings’. But does talkback really do this? And what
about other forms of radio?

Talkback presenters place great pride in not filtering their callers, to ensure a high level of differing opinions
and more chance for fair argument. But on several occasions, callers are screened and possibly blocked from
talking, simply because their opinion differs too much from the presenter’s. John-Michael Howson, on 3AW,
blocked a Muslim woman from talking on-air because he was feeling angry about a conversation about the
burqa (Hinch 2010). The fact she was asked on as a guest, then screened and eventually told she wouldn’t be
allowed on the air, flies in the face of the rhetoric that talkback is ‘unfiltered’. At other times, people may call a
station, tell the producer that they want to speak about one issue, then when on the air, start up about
another issue or let loose with a vicious tirade. This form of ‘radio-bombing’ seems to take presenters by
surprise, and often they get very angry at the callers. These examples show that while talkback presents itself
as unfiltered opinion, there are rules and processes in place that make it not so.

Commercial stations are differing from the smaller local stations in that they are stopping ‘cross-fertilisation’
and embracing one form of music. During the late 1990s, the station Triple M began playing more mainstream
popular music, and hence the audience fell off in numbers. They have recently begun to return to the rock
musical demographic they have used since their inception in the 1980s, and hence, their audience is again
growing in number. Stations such as Triple M are taking the opposite route to what Hendy calls “hybridised
symbolic forms and practices” (2000: 225). When Triple M introduced other forms of music apart from rock,
the audience created “a series of negative responses to some kinds of music *pop+ to affirm preferences over
others” (Hendy 2000: 226). By denying hybridisation, their audience has rejoined, possibly in line with the idea
of narrowcasting: they want rock, and they know if they listen to Triple M, they will get it. They no longer need
to wade through hours of other material to hear what they want to hear. The focus has well and truly shifted
from the will of the broadcasters (“give the public what is good for it”) to the will of the audience (“give the
public what it wants”) (Counihan 1982: 204).

CONCLUSIONS

Two schools of thought have been gleaned from this essay on radio. Firstly, one may think along the lines of
Brecht, calling radio a revolutionary medium and praising its potential to be “the most wonderful
communication system imaginable” that could connect people in new and imaginative ways (1978/9: 25).
Another school of thought, championed by McLuhan, sees radio as a ‘hot’ medium, a medium not to be
trusted, which creates “kinship webs” which are “violently tribal and separatist” (Hendy 2000: 239). McLuhan
sees radio as not a unifying force but a separating one. Both arguments still have force in modern radio
transmissions, but are not invulnerable to criticism. Brecht’s ‘epic theatre’ and ‘two-way communication’ have
not been taken up widely by radio broadcasters, whereas McLuhan’s view that radio is a ‘separatist force’
disregards larger commercial and government-assisted stations that homogenise and unify their audience.
Cultural forms have been gleaned from other pre-existing media forms and appropriated into the radio sphere,
as well as being used in conjunction with those other media forms. Social groups that use radio are highly
diverse, ranging from narrowcasting subscribers to working families to restaurant owners. Local, national and
global broadcasters are constantly feeling the pressure of new forms of radio music pressing down upon them,
and are making the choice to either stay with their one choice of music or ‘hybridise’ and embrace new forms.
Radio is both a revolutionary and a hot medium, and the future of digital radio will bring out new facets to this
argument. But until then, Hendy leaves us with a pertinent quote: “Through radio…you hear what you are”
(2000: 214).
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