RADIO SOUND AS MATERIAL CULTURE in the HOME Jo Ann
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RADIO SOUND AS MATERIAL CULTURE IN THE HOME Jo Ann Tacchi PhD Social Anthropology University College London Abstract This thesis is an anthropological exploration of the contemporary role and use of radio sound in the home in Bristol, a city in the south west of England. Based on qualitative research, and taking an ethnographic approach, this study contributes to a growing field within social anthropology: the study of mass media. After establishing the ways in which the radio industry in the UK researches and constructs radio audiences, this thesis examines how academic research on audiences has operated in Britain. It is demonstrated how this thesis relates to, and is different from both of these perspectives. Radio sound is approached as a part of the material culture of the home. It is seen to contribute to domestic soundscapes. The medium of sound is investigated, and it is shown that radio sound has particular qualities that make it well suited to domestic, everyday life. It is revealed as aiding in the creative constitution of affective dimensions of the self in society. Domestic relationships, and the role of radio sound and affect are explored. Notions of intimacy and the role of fantasy in domestic relationships are investigated. Radio sound's role in mood creation for individuals in the home is then examined, and the notion of affective rhythms established. Radio sound's connecting powers are then given some attention; how radio sound helps to make links across time and space. Memories and nostalgia are shown to operate in creative and integrated ways in domestic contexts through the medium of sound. Finally, it is concluded that cultural knowledge and experience take place in large part in the sensory and affective dimensions of everyday life. 2 CONTENTS Chapter One Introduction 4 Chapter Two Industrial Research on Radio Audiences 20 Chapter Three Domestic Anthropology and Audience Ethnography 61 Chapter Four The Social Texture of Radio Sound 101 Chapter Five Affective Relationships 127 Chapter Six Affective Rhythms 168 Chapter Seven The Space and Time of Radio Listening 196 Chapter Eight Conclusion 225 Bibliography 236 3 Chapter 1 Introduction In 1993, Spitulnik wrote 'there is as yet no "anthropology of mass media" [...despite} a dramatic rise in interest' (1993:293). Since then, there has been an increasing awareness of the need to include mass media in anthropological research. This study of radio sound in the home will contribute to the development of an anthropology of mass media, or 'media anthropology'. Generally, the studies that do exist in this emerging genre, recognise the important position of technology and mass media in processes of modernity. With television, and television programmes, forming the major focus of work in this field to date, issues around the consumption of television, and its effects on identity formation, have been raised, in the context of theories of processes of globalization. Differences between private and public spheres have been explored, and the domestic sphere, as the usual site for the activity of watching television, has received some attention (for example, Abu-Lughod 1995; Das 1995; Miller 1992). Spitulnik has used radio as a case study, to explore the 'politics of linguistic pluralism' in Zambia (1992). Spitulnik's ultimate aim, through the use of the Zambia Radio case study, was to shed light on how to characterise 'language ideology'. As such, it can be seen to demonstrate one way in which a focus on aspects of mass media, might illuminate theoretical concerns and serve as a means for exploring public debate. An anthropological approach to mass media might concentrate on many aspects. Elsewhere, Spitulnik (1993) lists a few, including looking at media institutions, at the media as cultural product, and the media as social activity. However, the greatest challenge, whichever angle one takes, 'lies in integrating the study of mass media into our analyses of the "total social fact" of modem life'; How, for example, do mass media represent and shape cultural values within a given society? What is their place in the formation of social relations and social identities? How might they structure people's senses of space and time? What are their roles in the construction of communities ranging from subcultures to nation-states, and in global processes of socioeconomic and cultural change? Spitulnik 1993:293-294 Spitulnik wonders how anthropologists have managed, for so long, to neglect the study of mass media, bearing in mind its centrality in contemporary life (1993 :294). So far, within social anthropology, there have been no substantial, published studies on the role of the media in British domestic life, although there have been studies, in other disciplines, of the consumption of media in Britain, which claim to take, or call for, an anthropological, and especially, an ethnographic approach (Gray 1992; Gillespie 1995; Morley 1992; Moores 1993; Silverstone 1990; Silverstone and Hirsch 1992). This thesis presents an anthropological study of the domestic consumption of a mass medium in and around Bristol, a city situated in the south west of England'. By applying classic anthropological ideas to this relatively new area of anthropological enquiry, new understandings of contemporary British domestic life, and the place of a mass medium within it, have emerged. In particular, an ethnographic approach, and an holistic and comparative framework, mark this study as one that takes its place amongst others, in a move to develop a media anthropology. Radio is the oldest of the electronic, time based, mass media. Despite this, and perhaps because of it, radio does not receive much contemporary academic attention. By its very nature, radio is both 'invisible' and 'intimate', two qualities that make it easy for scholars emerging from what we might call 'visual cultures'(see chapter 4), to pass over - even more so when their field of study is also a 'visual culture'. Not only for scholars, but for the 'ordinary people' of my own ethnographic research, radio is personal and experiential, rarely talked about, and deeply naturalised - especially in the domestic setting within which this research is situated. This is in contrast to television, a newer (relatively), more visible, more talked about medium (in everyday life, and by academics and social commentators). Television is naturalised into domestic life and routines in Britain, yet it attracts media and public attention, and has moral debates surrounding it - such as those regarding the supposedly negative effects of watching too much television, or the amounts of sex and violence portrayed. These kinds of debates are generally absent for radio in Britain, although, as 1 The city of Bristol and surrounding areas ('Greater Bristol') had a population ofjust over 506,000 at the 1991 census. Spitulnik shows, elsewhere in the world, radio can generate debate relevant to national politics (1992). In Britain, television viewing is much more of a group activity than radio listening. Radio consumption in the home is often solitary, and is more likely than television to be seen as an accompaniment to another, main activity. I have gained a general impression, through carrying out this research, that radio in this country is treated, by academics, politicians and media professionals (including some that work within the radio industry itself) as a poor relation to television. It is cheaper to produce radio programmes, and is less glamorous. The BBC has recently gone 'bi-media'. This means that previously separate radio production departments are merging with larger television departments, and that newsrooms, reporters and presenters are now required to be active in both radio and television. This is a cost saving move, yet it also displays an attitude to radio that assumes its compatibility with television in terms of programme production - radio is seen as television without the pictures. Whilst this may, on the surface, appear to make sense, radio as a medium, as it is consumed in the home, is shown in this thesis to be very different from television, and to be much more than television without pictures. Radio Listeners and Audience Research Whilst contemporary radio audiences are little studied by academia, the radio industry invests heavily in radio audience research. Chapter 2 of this thesis investigates how the radio industry researches and conceives of its audiences. From an analysis of how the industry thinks about, and constructs audiences, we can see how market models influence and shape the relationships between them. At first glance, this costly, and in some ways, extensive, audience research can appear to paint a detailed picture of radio listening in this country. Yet rarely does it do more than simply measure. From measurement, it seeks to explain, but it is ill-equipped to do so. This thesis highlights the inadequate understandings that the industry has of the role of radio in domestic life, although, I suspect, there is little contained herein, that will not be, in some degree, a part of the tacit knowledge of many radio sound producers. Very few academic, contemporary, radio audience studies exist, compared to masses of research and theorising around television audiencehood. Much of the research on radio is backward-looking, like the aural history study carried out by Moores (1988) before he went on to study the contemporary use of satellite television (1993). By omission, radio appears to be conceived of as an 'old' technology, with a diminishing and unimportant role in contemporary life, especially as compared with newer technologies. Studies, such as those by Briggs (1961, 1965, 1970), Scannell and Cardiff (1991) and Scannell (1992), chart the early history of British radio. Some attention has been paid to the changes that took place with the advent of television, in an historical context (Briggs 1979, 1995). Whilst these accounts place radio in a social and historical context, much is still to be understood about how radio is used today.