When Marconi, the Italian inventor first developed the concept of a radio, he certainly had no idea as to how his invention could be received by the rest of world. He certainly had no idea as to how much transformative impacts his idea could have on so many people, and could be celebrated across the world more than 200 years after he sent the first Morse code message via an experimental wire.
There are so many anniversaries that we wittingly or unwittingly observe every year because we think these days mark important watershed moments in the lives of the country or the world at large. Some of the anniversaries may be important and others simply banal or even ridiculous. World Radio Day, which was observed last week, provides a rare moment of reflection for obvious reasons. Radio has a deeply transformative impact on our lives, our cultures and our aspirations as members of the global community.
The observation of World Radio Day on February 13 each year is in fact something worthy of celebrating for radio is one of the most advanced scientific discoveries of the 20th century that has deeply changed the way we receive information and change our lives. Technically speaking, “radio is the use of electromagnetic radiation to communicate electrical signals without wires to create sound broadcasting, television and radar.” As such, no modern invention has transformed human communication as deeply as radio has done in our time. The cultural impact of radio is so powerful that it has continued to change not only the way we interact but also the way we look at culture.
According to an article by Monkululenko Mashini, an expert on the subject of radio and culture, “One of the most significant innovations of the 20th century, radio has a profound impact on culture. Radio has been instrumental in influencing culture, politics, entertainment and communication since its inception.”
The author of this article outlines the impacts radio has on culture and society in the following ways. Radio has brought about a communication revolution by making it possible to send information immediately over great distances. Radio has always had political influenced over communities and societies as a potent weapon of political communication and propaganda. Radio has influence over education and information in the sense that remote communities that were not accessible by traditional print media might now get education via distance education programs. Radio has promoted cultural diversity because it features a range of voices musical genres and viewpoints to promote cultural diversity.
One can hardly underestimate the role of the radio as a tool for propagating culture among societies near and far. “Radio is the mass media that ensures the promotion of culture in every society. It tends to broadcast the way in which society, nation, community or family live their life and how people relate to one another.”
Cultural promotion is assumed to be one of the most important roles of the mass media in any society. According to one study, “Cultural promotion in a society is a basic role of mass media, especially radio. The accessibility of radio by the audience makes radio to be one of the basic mass media channel for cultural promotion.” According to another study, “At the grassroots level, radio has become a very efficient tool in societal development via culture.”
Radio is generally considered a new kind of mass media. Newspapers were long in existence long before the invention of radio as a tool of cultural influence. The impacts of radio stem from the fact that although newspapers can reach millions of literate people who would enjoy reading them for various reasons, radio on the other hand requires no prior learning to use and learn from its contents simply because any human being with functional auditory system can listen to radio broadcasts and enjoy them on the go. The simplicity and accessibility of radio therefore make it the instrument of choice for communication, education and entertainment.
On the other hand, radio is a tool of mass culture and a tool for the production and consumption of culture by bringing communities closer to one another and allowing them to share information simultaneously thereby allowing them to share emotions, outlooks and reactions to specific events. According to some researchers, the advent of radio and its presence in millions of households has created what is known as a consumer culture. “In 1941, two thirds of radio programs carried advertising to sell products to a captive audience. This kind of mass marketing ushered in a new age of consume culture.”
The impact of radio on popular culture is immense, according to another study. “Radio encouraged the growth of national popular music stars and brought regional sounds to wider audiences. The effects of early radio programs can be felt both in modern popular music and television programming.” Radio’s social impact had always been significant and long-lasting. “It has, across cultural and racial barriers, entertained generations, influenced political debate, enlightened the populace, embraced diversity and sparked economic expansion.” Before the invention of the Internet, radio played a significant role in developing a mass culture of sports, entertainment news and advertising.
The uses of radio go beyond the usual role as tool of communication between broadcasters and audiences. Technical experts often suggest that radio has many important uses; namely broadcasting, two-way voice communication, one-way voice communication, data communication and space communication among others. However, the same experts also suggest that radio as a tool of communication has some limitations as a one-way communication medium lacking the interactivity of the Internet or social media. Radio relies solely on audio content, limiting the ability to convey visual information or multimedia content. Despite these limitations however, radio is the fastest, most preferred and enduring system of communication both for educated and uneducated audiences.
Radio is not only a national or regional medium of communication. Its global reach has been growing since the advent of social media and remains so despite the invention of more sophisticated communication technologies that did not reduce its mass appeal. “Transmission of information thus became easy and widespread. By the early 20th century, radio began to change the world, as it became the main source of broadcast news.”
In the meantime radio allowed radio stations to broadcast in various modulations, the main and popular ones being AM radio stations that transmit in AM (amplitude modulation), FM or radio stations transmitting in FM (frequency modulation). these are known to be older analog audio standards while newer digital radio stations transmit in several digital audio standards.
Technicalities aside, radio’s impacts across cultures, societies and lifestyles had been and continue to be enormous. According to one opinion on the subject, radio has contributed a great deal in creating national unity and integration in almost all countries. Commenting on the impacts of radio on early American society, a writer opined that, “radio drew the nation together by bringing news, entertainment and advertisements to more than 10 million households by 1929. Radio blunted regional differences, and imposed similar tastes and lifestyles. No other media has the power to create heroes and villains so quickly.”
The magic of radio is so decisive simply because “radio broadcasts provide real-time information and some that broadcast 24 hours a day, can provide the most recent updates to listeners. Radio has the ability to reach across borders and can become a valuable source of information and where information is scarce.”
Regarding the authenticity of radio broadcasts, we may perhaps add by saying that all information transmitted by radio is always true and irrevocable. Like any medium of communication, radio is also subject to misinformation, distortion of facts and events. The truth may sometimes be distorted by the goals and objectives of radio stations and the political forces that control and operate them. The absence of ethical journalism can also impact the way we send and receive news and information in general.
There were several dark moments of broadcasting in Africa. Back in 1994, Radio Mille Collines in Rwanda played a leading role in inciting violence and bloodshed between Hutus and Tutsis by propagating false information and inciting the populations to genocide that led to the death of a million people. However, the overall impact of radio on political processes in Africa had been positive and as well as indispensable.
In Ethiopia, radio has played and continues to play the roles assigned to it by the pioneers of the new medium of communication starting from the early decade of the 20th century until the present time. This is truer than ever since the advent of the ICT and the invention of the Internet that revolutionized the way communication is produced and consumed across national, regional and global players.
The advent of radio in Ethiopia was indeed a revolutionizing event that has deeply transformed daily life for millions of isolated communities. It has given them new perspectives about themselves and the world by ushering in access to information vital for their cultural, social and political lives. Radio is still the most popular medium of communication and is expected to be so simply because of its easy access and affordability.
This is in fact the ultimate beauty of the radio. Its transformative impact is evident as it has shaped the history and political process in the country by creating an unprecedented urge to know what is going on in the country. Radio has done away with the darkness that engulfed the country and its people for centuries by giving voice to the voiceless, by sharing knowledge and information that are vital for the economic and social transformations that continue to unfold.
What is magical about radio technology is that its importance does not diminish or decline with time. It rather expands and deepens with the advent of allied technologies such as social media platforms. Many people might have expected that social media would undermine or replace the role of the radio in our lives. Yet, this has proved a wrong assumption because the integration of radio technology with social media is rather deepening the importance and impact of radio.
“Social media has revolutionized broadcasting, offering new opportunities for content creators, enhancing audience engagement and democratizing the media landscape. With social media platforms, broadcasting is no longer confined to a select few, but has become accessible to everyone with a voice and a story to share.”
As a last note, it would be important to pay tribute to the immense opportunities radio has created for tens of millions of people as an indispensable medium of education, entertainment and information. Without the radio, our lives could have been less glamorous if not less important and our expectations as individuals and communities could have been left less fulfilled.
BY MULUGETA GUDETA
THE ETHIOPIAN HERALD SUNDAY EDITION 3 MARCH 2024
