Architectures of Power and Propaganda

Radio and its predecessor, wireless telegraphy, have also been media of globalization from the very beginning and play a key role in colonial history: From the large German radio station in Nauen, which worked on a radio connection between the German Empire and its African colonies since 1911, to the ‘Malabar’ long-wave transmitter built by the Netherlands on the island of Java in 1923. All over the world, antenna masts are erected and imposing radio stations are built. The architectures appear in different forms—sometimes as visible symbols of power,and sometimes as invisible networks, in the form of cables running underground.

Over more than 100 years, societies have been shaped by radio listening, their identities and value systems influenced by sometimes geographically distant cultures. In the Philippines, the Americans used radio in the early twentieh century to shape the Filipinos in their image, while the German Democratic Republic (GDR), in immediate response to Pinochet's takeover, set up the ‘Chile Program’ in 1973 and broadcast it to South America. Each region of the world has its own stories in which radio was and is used as a means of abuse of power or propaganda, but also as a mode of resistance, community building, and identity creation. Under what conditions were these infrastructures of power and propaganda established and what impact did they have on the listening population? What traces of this can still be found today?

Presentations by Elizabeth L. Enriquez, Alfredo Thiermann, and Frederike Moormann, a film by Riar Rizaldi, and a concluding group discussion presents various forms of architectures of power through radio and make transregional connections visible.

Moderation: Nathalie Singer