Lecture 3: “Wires and Lights in a Box”

Radio and Television – History and Theory

• Understand impact of broadcast technologies (radio and television) on society.

• Recognize some of the challenges of these new technologies.

• Introduce some theories of understanding broadcasting: global village, political economic, and world systems/cultural imperialism.

• Understanding of conflict or tension between television as cultural product and television as business.

“Voices in the Night” – The First Radio Broadcast

• The first public radio broadcast was in August 1920 in Detroit, Michigan, on a station called 8MK.

• The station was registered to a teenager named Michael Delisle Lyons – the local newspaper owning had asked him to set up the radio as a possible venture but asked him to register the station in his name in case there was any embarrassment or the technology turned out to be a fad.

• Most radio stations in the US were initially set up by newspapers – because they feared the new technology might put them out of business.

• Newspaper headline: “Amateurs Over Michigan Are Invited To Give Wireless Parties And Hear Voices In The Night.”

The Second Radio Broadcast

• Just a week later in Buenos Aires, Argentina, the second radio broadcast ever.

• A group of medical students led by Enrique Sonsini.

• Soon after they started regular radio broadcasts and formed LOR Radio Argentina, the world’s first radio station, with regular broadcasts.

Radio as threat.• In mid 1920s, KDKA in Pittsburgh became the first

regularly broadcasting radio station in North America.

• In 1931, 2 out of 5 American homes had a radio – by 1938, 4 out of 5 homes did.

• Afraid people could now listen to music for free, record companies had their stars sign agreements they would not appear on radio.

• Licensing fees were developed so record companies would make money each time a song was played.

Political Power• 1938 – Hitler’s speech seizing

Czechosolovakia was broadcast live and translated simultaneously by government translators.

• Since 1933 rise to power, Nazi Germany had been sending German language broadcasts across the border into Czechoslovakia.

• Milena Jesenska, a Czech journalist, noted: “"For five years all that people in the borderlands have had to do is to turn a switch and Nazi ideology from the German stations has flowed directly into their homes - it goes without saying that they all tuned into stations that they could understand! ...

Orson Welles’ “War of the Worlds”

• October 30, 1938 – an adaptation of HG Welles’ fictional story about Martian invasion.

• Welles’ presented the programme as a series of news bulletin.

• People panicked, thinking it was real, and Martians were invading.

• Start of Broadcast: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=egudvdwtDIg >> START from 3:25

Invention of TV

• 1926 – John Logie Baird demonstrated television (sorry for goofy video) http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x50wr8_historys-first-television-broadcast_travel

• Late 1920s – experimental broadcasts start being made by radio stations, for example WNBC in New York.

Television as Mass Media

• Irregular broadcasts in US, UK, Germany were happening from 1928/29.

• Televisions were for sale in the mid 1930s, but it was not until after the war – 1945 – that owning a TV in the home became regular in the relatively wealthy United States.

1954 – BBC Launched Television News to Mixed Reactions

• "Illustrated summary of the news... Followed by the latest film of events and happenings at home and abroad."

• Not everyone liked it “The programme was variously described as "absolute ghastly", "crazy" and "as visually impressive as the fat stock prices”.” (BBC On This Day)

• Director Ian Smith said: • "News is not at all an easy thing to do on television. A

good many of the main news items are not easily made visual - therefore we have the problem of giving news with the same standards that the corporation has built up in sound.” (BBC On This Day)

• Example Bullitin JFK’s death 1963 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8aVpCU9pAhc&feature=related

Introduction of Television

• 1959 – India; but national telecasts only in 1982

• 1962 – Egypt.

Different Impacts in Different Regions - Africa

• From the late 1950s, in the final days of colonialism• E.g. Nigeria got TV in 1959 a year before its independence• Television was elite and urban in character and largely

depended on foreign programming. How much has changed?

• SA and other countries resisted TV. For SA it was fear that it would undermine its policy of apartheid. Others it was mainly because of costs involved.

• Were they right?

From presentation by Winston Mao, Jan 2011, Given at SOAS Media Centre.

Introduction of television

• 1981: Namibia (formerly South West Africa)

• 1983: Mali, the Seychelles, and Somalia • 1984: Burundi • 1986: Cameroon• 1987: Chad• 1988: Lesotho• 1990s: Tanzania and Rwanda• 1999: Malawi• 2000: Botswana

From presentation by Winston Mao, Jan 2011, Given at SOAS Media Centre.

Three Perspectives to Look at Television (Theories)

1. “The Global Village”

• Marshall McLuhan, Understanding Media (1964).

• Canadian media theorist.• “prophesied that communication technologies

would shatter political divides like the Iron Curtain and that the ideological spheres of the First, Second, and Third Worlds – make the world a smaller and more intimate place” (Parks, 5)

2. “World Systems/Cultural Imperialism” Theory

• Emerged in 1960s in US and Europe, but also in Asia, Africa, and Latin America.

• Concerned with “questions of freedom and fairness in media flows between developed and developing nations” (Parks, 5)

• Researched media flow:• Key question: Who makes the media media?• Believed that “the US and Western Europe

powerfully dominated the global television economy” (Parks, 5).

NWICO• NWICO stands for “New World Information and Communication

Order” – a term describing various suggestions to make the media and communications environment more fair.

• UNESCO sponsored the McBride Report (1980) – the outcome of a series of discussion to address concerns about Western media dominance.

• This had many concerns, including:– News reporting reflects the concerns of news agencies in New York,

London, and Paris. – Unbalanced flow of mass media (news and entertainment as well)

from the United States and “the West” to less developed countries.– Radio spectrum unfairly allocated – developed countries controlled

most radio spectrum.– Satellite broadcasting of TV into countries without prior permission

was voted to be a violation of sovereignty by the UN.

3. “Political Economy”

• This approach of understanding television focuses on who owns what, the “Structures of big business and corporate institutions” that make money out of the media.

• KEY QUESTION:– who owns the media?• In later weeks we will look more in depth at the

Political Economic perspective – what does it mean that most television is concentrated in a few big company’s control.

• This is also a theme in today’s film.

Context for Film: Edward R. Murrow

• American journalist, often called (in America at least), “the father of broadcast journalism.”

• Initially famous for his Radio broadcasts during WWII from Europe.

• Broadcast from London http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2OqRTo3d-FU&feature=related

“See it Now” (American TV Program in 1950s)

• Worked in 1950s on, programme called See it Now.

• First news show to shoot own footage.• Did not rehearse interviews.• Clip of MM interview from 1955:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IuZgkVvyV-o&feature=related

Criticism of McCarthyism• On “See it Now”, Murrow most famous for

criticizing Senator Joe McCarthy.• Senator Joseph McCarthy was an American

Senator who was engaged in hunting down what he called “Soviet spies” in the american government and culture.

• March 9, 1954, broadcast a report called “A Report on Senator Joseph McCarthy”, criticizing his methods.

• Murrow and his producer, Fred Friendly, published an advertisement for the programme in the New York times and were not allowed to use CBS’s logo.

• CBS received letters from audience in favor of the programme it is seen as instrumental in bringing down McCarthy.

• But CBS’s sponsors were made uncomfortable.

• American media is mostly private and commercial.• See it Now was unable to keep its corporate sponsor.• Murrow felt that entertainment was taking over

serious news. He gave a famous speech: “Wires and Lights” which you will see in the film.

• “television in the main is being used to distract, delude, amuse and insulate us”

• “Television insulates us from the realities of the world in which we live.”

• “This instrument can teach, it can illuminate; yes, and it can even inspire. But it can do so only to the extent that humans are determined to use it to those ends. Otherwise it is merely wires and lights in a box. There is a great and perhaps decisive battle to be fought against ignorance, intolerance and indifference. This weapon of television could be useful”.