Radio remains one of the most effective mass media in this era of iPads, Facebook, Twitter and the Internet.
Radio is also one of the oldest electronic media. Its longevity may be due to its nearly perfect match with how we communicate as individuals and as members of communities.
Radio shares oral, musical and other audio messages in a most cost-effective and flexible manner. Listeners can access the medium while they busy themselves with the chores of life.
People in the developed countries listen to the radio while driving to or from work, cook their meals, or work-out at their gyms.
Farmers in developing countries hang their radios on their plows as they prepare their land for the next plantings; mothers listen to their favourite programmes as they weave or process the latest harvest from their fields.
While the oral traditions on radio remain unchanged. the technology behind the broadacasts have been transformed. Affordable, low-powered trasmitters enable small communities to go on air with coverage of just their villages. Free software permit broadcasters to receive text messages from listeners while they are on-the-air permitting real-time participation of listeners. This makes it a very powerful tool to facilitate participation of people in discussions about everything in which they stake an interest.
In the developing countires, where Internet access is patchy and an iPad costs three to four years of wages, radio remains the most affordable medium. It does not require the user to be literate. And increasingly, programmes are available in their preferred languag or dialect.
This latest book by Linje Manyozo, a former African radio broadcaster who now lectures at the London School of Economis and Politcal Science, takes us on a very special behind-the-scene look at how radio helps people bring about social change. It also looks at the many instances of how radio has been misused and failed in its work.
Although the book is about radio in Africa, it is highly relevant to discourses on communication and development anywhere in the World. Manyozo demonstrates how elusive people's participation in shaping their own lives can become if implemented without adequate consideration of power relationships within indigenous and local knowledge systems.
The book proposes that more effective radio for development initiatives should be built on participatory action research, local communication needs, and indigenous knowledge systems. Effective radio should rely on relevant broadcasting technology and infrastructure, and designed to operate independently of donor funds.
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