Transmitting Identity

In Transmitting Identity (International Journal of Communication 2008), Nancy Morris of Temple University examines the maintenance of collective identity through the broadcast medium of radio. Through her case study of how this backdrop to everyday life can suffuse culture and consciousness, Morris exposes the ability of radio to “fortify or counter existing identities”.

As indigenous peoples and their friends worldwide seek a redistribution of power, contesting the imagined communities of dominant societies on the airwaves becomes crucial to their social underpinning. As regional autonomy necessarily involves geographic identification, such technologies as Internet radio become essential tools of survival. As Morris explains, “Radio is well suited to conveying the kind of everyday content that contributes to identity maintenance… subtly and continuously reinforcing listeners’ sense of place and sense of membership in a community that is defined by belonging to that place.”