Interestingly, our lecture today was solely an audio lecture. At first the mp3 file wouldn't play on my computer so I was having a miniature heart attack but thankfully in this day and age, my smartphone was able to download it and play it instantly.
Living in Tokyo for the past 9 years of my formal education, ad not having very much reason to access the radio at all, I found the radio podcasts very interesting. When I made the move to Hawai'i in July of last year, I moved from my public world of subways and into the private world of cars, and in doing so changed my transportation occupation from reading novels to listening to the radio. That is not to say that people in Japan don;t listen to radio that much, because they do, my mother and my grandfather both listen to it regularly. My mother when attending to things around the house and, in fact, my Ojiisan (grandfather) only bought his television set a couple of years ago. Until then he had always access the media via his little black radio. It always mystified me when I visited him in Nagoya every few years. My Ojiisan would sit under his kotatsu with his eyes closed from early in the morning, just immersing himself in the news. Then he would get up and start moving all around the house, doing things here and there, still listening to the news. I thought, if he could listen to it while doing other things, why did he sit there with his eyes closed so early in the morning doing nothing else?
Well, these podcasts sure cleared that question up.The first interviewee mentioned that radio was much more intimate with the audience, they felt as if the voice was resounding within their own head. I think that was what my Ojiisan was feeling, closing his eyes, letting himself drown in the events unfolding around the world. But then, as the man said, radio also is something that people can multitask to, because it is very straight forward, void of most flowery language, giving us facts rather than analysis. This our minds can pick up without thinking too much and we can do other hands-on tasks as well and be productive. However, I think that anything more complicated that everyday duties would be difficult with the radio on, having to concentrate on more than just the words in your mind.
The most interesting thing about these two podcasts were that the two people, in two different interviews on the same topic, agreed on two major factors in radio journalism that I had never thought about before. These are at the interviewer should never dominate the conversation. They should be able to distance themselves and let their interviewee do the talking. The other thing was that, when the former happens, usually the most interesting points would come up. I had previously been under the impression that the most interesting points happen when the interviewer know the right questions and probe it out of the guest, however, this podcast made me realize that the most interesting events happen when the interviewed is feeling comfortable and is able to give themselves over to points they may not have discussed otherwise.
I cannot wait to listen to more radio from now on and listen, really listen, to how people conduct interviews and see whether these two epiphanies differentiate the "bad" interviews from the "good". In fact I cannot wait to start listening to more radio full stop.
And I think it worth mentioning that although my Ojiisan did succumb to the modern tradition of television, his go-to media is and always will be his little black radio.
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