The Radio Conference 2016: Transnational Encounters

Utrecht University 2016

Continuing the series of Transnational Radio Forums, the Department of Media and Cultural Studies at Utrecht University, in collaboration with the TRE project, in association with the MeCCSA Radio Studies Network was pleased to host the 2016 edition of the Transnational Forum at Utrecht, 5-8 July 2016.  This year’s forum explicitly mobilized the ‘transnational’ in the forum’s name.  As engineers, regulators, listeners – and indeed scholars – have long pointed out, radio waves are not stopped by national borders, and indeed radio has always been shaped in transnational arenas.  But also in ostensibly national or local settings, radio is intricately entangled in transnational processes of production and programming, as well as transnational cultures of listening and identity formation.  This conference explored

  • the way radio shapes TRANSNATIONAL PUBLIC SPHERES, in support or subversion of existing infrastructures and media ecologies; 
  • transnational perspectives on RADIO AESTHETICS and IDENTITIES; and 
  • ways in which new forms of DIGITAL RADIO AND ARCHIVES can help to shape or resurrect transnational COMMUNITIES OF MEMORY.

Some (live) documentation of the conference is on twitter: @radioconf2016, hashtag: #radioconference2016

The conference brought together over 100 attendees from around the world.  Its panels were divided into four parallel strands devoted (roughly) to

  1. aesthetics and storytelling,
  2. networks and connections,
  3. communities and (transnational) identities, and
  4. transformations of technology and institutions. 

Papers covered periods from the turn of the 20th Century to the present, technologies from wireless telegraphy to podcasting and scales from village to globe.  Explore the full book of abstracts  (plus

Media Folder: 
PDF iconErrata.pdf
) to find out more.

Radio Conference 2016 – Abstract BookBefore the conference’s official opening, a well-attended pre-conference session organized by Peter Lewis and Caroline Mitchell explored the very current issue of the ways that radio, and more specifically community radio, can be mobilized to address the problems faced by refugees.

The Radio Conference 2016: Transnational Encounters

(click on a day below for a brief overview plus photos)

Tuesday, 5 July 2016

Wednesday, 6 July 2016

Thursday, 7 July 2016

Friday, 8 July 2016