Message from Peter Lewis:
IREN INTERNATIONAL RADIO RESEARCH NETWORK
International Colloquium Radios, Services, Publics. La radio à quoi ça
sert ?
Bordeaux, 1, 2 & 3 April ( http://greriren.free.fr )
International Radio Summer School, University of Siena (Italy)
26 July – 1st August 2004 ( http://www.radiouniversity.net )
Background
IREN started as an idea at a meeting at the University of Louvain la Neuve,
Belgium, in January 2003. It has now been approved for funding by the
European Commission as a 30-month ‘co-ordination action’1, starting in
March 2004. Its founding partners are 13 institutions from 10 countries,
universities and professional organisations, whose representatives are
mainly university teachers and researchers, specialists in radio2. They
share a common passion for the medium, coupled with a belief that, both as
an academic field of study and as a professional practice, radio will
benefit from an initiative which links and brings together diverse and
often isolated academic research work across Europe.
In the debates on the European public sphere and the role of the media in
this process, radio is widely neglected, and this neglect is due, the IREN
group argues, to the ‘under-development’ of radio study and research in
academic circles. Neither policy neglect nor academic under-development are
justified considering the popularity (in audience ratings) of radio across
Europe, its importance in listeners’ daily lives, and the medium’s historic
and cultural place in European heritage. Radio is, moreover, at the cutting
edge of technological convergence if digital broadcasting, mobile telephony
and internet radio are taken into account.
The countries represented in the project’s consortium illustrate a range of
contexts, from countries where initiatives are already in place to co-
ordinate academic activity, such as the French GRER, the UK’s Radio Studies
Network (see http://www.radiostudiesnetwork.org.uk/), the Nordic radio
group and the Italian initiatives based at the University of Siena, to
others where radio study is marginalised within strong media programmes, to
yet others where individual scholars are isolated and receive little
institutional support.
The disciplines within which radio is studied are richly varied and include
the social sciences, cultural studies, economics, history, media and
communication studies, journalism, law, linguistics, politics, engineering
and performing arts. This variety of approaches has the potential for
fruitful inter-disciplinary exchange if the infra-structural conditions can
be supplied. What essentially is lacking at present are places and
occasions to meet and share viewpoints and findings, as well as networks,
databases and publishing outlets. Once this is in place, radio as a subject
of study and research can be made more visible for younger generations of
undergraduates, post-graduates and post-doctoral scholars.
IREN’s plans include
· the creation of a membership Association that will outlast the EU
project’s funded existence, establishing relationships with existing groups
and networks and encouraging their development where none exist, especially
in countries in Eastern and Southern Europe
· mapping radio-related research competencies and projects that are
being, or have recently been, undertaken
· the identification of fields of collaboration across different
disciplines, between universities and with broadcasters, as of
· ….neglected areas in need of development, especially involving
comparative researh
· the exchange and sharing of research methodologies
· a dialogue with broadcasting organisations, both national and
European, with a view to making research projects and findings relevant and
available to broadcasters and their publics.
A programme of seminars and conferences, backed up by websites and
publications, begins in Bordeaux, April 1-3, when GRER’s International
Colloquium Radios, Programmes, Audiences… Are you being served? is followed
by the first General Meeting for the IREN partners – see
http://greriren.free.fr/
The University of Siena’s International Radio Summer School is the second
event on the IREN calendar, taking place from July 26 to August 1st. See
http://www.radiouniversity.net/
Further information from: Jean-Jacques Cheval (IREN Project Co-ordinator),
GRER IREN - Maison des Sciences de l'Homme d'Aquitaine, 10, Esplanade des
Antilles, Domaine universitaire - 33607 PESSAC Cedex. Tél. + 33 (0) 5 56
84 45 73 Fax 33 (0) 5 56 84 68 10 [log in to unmask]
or from: Peter Lewis (IREN Scientific Co-ordinator), Visiting Research
Associate, Department of Media & Communication, London School of Economics
& Radio Studies Network, tel: + 44 (0) 207-911-0763 [log in to unmask]
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