iieiiei1eWrkers - Leicester Research Archive - University of Leicester

Music programmes for example, are an articulation of the tightly structured
music video with loose programme formats. The relations between radio drama
and film works both ways depending on the film director and the order of
adaptation. For example, when the novel Mia appeared on the screen, it
allowed for a wider interpretation of the images of masculinity, whereas in the
radio drama the female characters remained central to the story. The strong
images of the heroine and the villain were especially constructed for the female
radio audience to identil' with. The constant movement of images between the
visual and oral media makes popular entertainment programmes on radio
significantly different from the actuality programmes in the first two groups. It
increases the possibility of different interpretations as the image cuts across a
wide range of media. This creates a situation in which meaning is constantly
disrupted and slipping. Consequently it is primarily through popular
entertainment that contestation or subversive ideas find space within the radio
system as we shall illustrate in some detail in the following chapters. For the
state regulatory body, censorship proves to be more problematic in this complex
web of ideological interplay.
The analysis in the next three chapters is an exploratory attempt to study the
major genres in radio in ternis of their relation to the production and
distribution of ideology. The examples I draw upon represent both serious and
popular genres. By selecting from the official or 'propaganda' programmes, news
and current affairs, and popular entertainment programmes I hope to provide
some insights into how images of reality are being constructed in the dominant
institutions, and to show how contestations and subversive ideas are expressed
despite the stringent state controls on the structure of ownership and the legal
regulations on programme content. I also want to highlight the continuities and
the breaks in the imagery presented in actuality and fiction. By treating
programme presentation as a continuum rather than approaching it with the rigid
demarcations that often operate in academic research and among the media
practitioners, I hope to gain new insights into the way that ideology is
translated into programmes or images. Our study suggests that the fundamental
issue of media's ideological power is far more complicated than either the
dominant ideology or the mass culture theses have allowed for.
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