The Wireless World: Global Histories of International Radio Broadcasting

Summary

The Wireless World sets out a new research agenda for the history of international broadcasting, and for radio history more generally. It examines global and transnational histories of long-distance wireless broadcasting, combining perspectives from international history, media and cultural history, the history of technology, and sound studies. It is a cowritten book, the result of more than five years of collaboration. Bringing together their knowledge of a wide range of different countries, languages, and archives, the coauthors show how broadcasters and states deployed international broadcasting as a tool of international communication and persuasion.

Exploring the idea of a "wireless world," a globe connected, both in imagination and reality, by radio, The Wireless World sheds new light on the transnational connections created by international broadcasting. Bringing together all periods of international broadcasting within a single analytical frame, the study reveals key continuities and transformations. It looks at how wireless was shaped by internationalist ideas about the use of broadcasting to promote world peace and understanding, at how empires used broadcasting to perpetuate colonialism, and at how anti-colonial movements harnessed radio as a weapon of decolonization.