Description:
Radio Vox Populi provides an account of ubiquitous talk radio, from its inception to its current overwhelming societal power via a comparison of the Italian manifestation of the medium with that of the United States. The story is told through ten chapters written by radio scholars and practitioners with an introduction and conclusion by Professors Peter Laufer and Christian Ruggiero.
Review Quotes:
"By highlighting the voices of ordinary people, call-in talk radio helped democratize the media before the internet and podcasts. But it also poisoned politics and laid the foundation for today's polarized media landscape. Despite the genre's vast influence, precious little scholarship has looked at the rise of call-in shows. Finally, here is a book that takes us inside the magic of the industry and shows how that magic continues to fuel its broad impact, for good and ill. The thought-provoking, entertaining and important stories told in Radio Vox Populi will interest everyone from academics to general-interest readers" -- Public radio talk show executive producer Dan Zoll at KQED in San Francisco.