SOUND and STORIES review

flickr user all that improbable blue

So I've been a little bit cynical.

In my weekly review I talked about how radio doesn't really do it for me. I can't seem to focus on it and I don't see the need to. However, I have recently had...a change of heart. I wouldn't say that my opinion is changed completely, but in a way I almost feel bad for radio. It's been through a lot. 

That being said, I guess you could say I have found a new appreciation for radio after reading this piece, mostly because I was looking at it through the wrong lens - radio isn't necessarily about picking up every specific detail, it's just about listening to a story. When someone tells you a story, you might not pick up every word and sentence and intonation they use, and that's fine, because that's life. You can't always be alert to every detail of your life, thank god.

One of the things I liked about this article that I hadn't noticed (mostly because I don't listen to radio very often) is how personal radio DJs make the radio experience. It hadn't occurred to me that when listening to radio, one is often times alone, so being catered to on an individual level is something important for full listening pleasure. By forming questions with "you" as opposed to "all listeners out there", the relationship between radio and its listener is intensified – we're practically dating.

In all, what I generally want to say is that appreciating the difference between auditory storytelling and print/video/other media is important. Each have their own positive and negative qualities, all of which are appreciated in different ways through different lenses. Not everybody can write a broadcast for a radio show that engages, inspires and entertains, but most people would find it easier to write a short story – not that writing is a walk in the park, because it isn't, but something about radio, its relatability, voice, and personal experience takes us to a different place than certain stories can and ever will.

Valentine's Day 2013 - Response

Flickr User Neil Crosby

First of all, let me start off by saying that this radio episode was a little too long for me.

As discussed in class, I think it's hard to listen to a radio episode, especially since (for me, at least) I couldn't do anything else while listening. If I did, I would get off track and then be lost in the whole story - writing about the episode even was hard! So in all, I don't think listening to radio episodes is for me.

However, since this was an assignment, I sat down and listened and had a few reflections on the episode. First of all, if you're thinking of having to see other people, that probably isn't a good sign for your relationship. Don't get me wrong, I understand "taking a break" or even polyamorous relationships, but if you "want more time" at the end of your break period for a relationship you've been in since you were 17, that most likely is an indicator that something isn't going right in your relationship. However, that's just my opinion, and while I don't think it needs to be so black and white, I think that it was a little stupid of these two individuals to take this super serious break...just realize you want to see other people or have multiple partners or break up! It just annoyed me a bit, and maybe I'm being to cynical, but either way I just can't help but feel that these characters needed to figure some stuff out before becoming the messes that they became.

This being said, I don't think I've been this worked up over a form of media in a while. Sure, film and video have a way of working themselves under my skin as well, but I also think this came with the fact that a radio episode really annoyed me. I think that from this experience I learned that I don't like to listen to the radio unless I'm just not really doing anything, which is not often. I would love to listen on a long drive in the car, but not just sitting in my house when I could be doing homework or watching a movie or something. I guess this comes out of my inability to multi task - one of my faults I suppose.

Although I couldn't enjoy this episode as much as other things, I still do think it was interesting, and made me think a lot about radio today and why it just doesn't work for some people - we've become too stupid! That's my conclusion. Good night and good luck.

Radio On - A Review

Flickr User peetje2

"You will never understand radio by listening to it."

I liked reading this article a lot, mostly because it gave me a whole new outlook on the whole medium of radio. The line quoted above really embodies the main aspect of the article, which is that radio goes far beyond simply listening - it is a dream that you are guided through by your auditory senses.
The thing I enjoy a lot about radio, especially when broadcasted as stories (like the one in the article, and the one we heard in class), is how personal the experience ends up being. In that I mean that when listening to a story, your mind has a way of taking you there so you experience it on a whole new level. I think that by listening to a story you become so much more engaged by it, only because that is how we originally were exposed to stories - by word of mouth. Listening to a story through radio broadcast brings back these animalistic senses we once were so fond of and now have through reading, video, watching and more (not to undermine these mediums, which also have their own unique qualities). This is exactly what I think puts radio aside from all other mediums of storytelling - the familiarity. We understand, learn about, and interpret our world through listening and hearing, so when we listen to a story we are automatically transported to a place where other mediums would have trouble taking us. I believe this is the magic of radio, which is far, far too often underrated.

The Storytelling Animal

CC: Flickr User Reeding Lessons

In reading the first two chapters of Johnathan Gottschall's The Storytelling Animal, I was reminded of the extent to which stories actually do run human emotions. We hear stories every day, we make our own in our heads, and we constantly carry stories with us in the darks of our mind. Stories rule our world because, quite honestly, they are at the base of our existence. Without stories and storytelling, we wouldn't be able to tell our thoughts, emotions, hopes and dreams to the people around us -- very much limiting our human contact and, in turn, our humanity.
The thing I enjoyed the most about Gottschall's story was when he included a passage from Moby Dick. Fully capturing the reader's attention, Gottschall then asks what processes the reader's mind went through while reading this passage about a grotesque cannibalistic scene. I loved this part not because I am a cannibal, but because Gottchall so accurately identifies the processes of the mind in reading a story -- that we are slaves to the wandering of our minds, that we cannot control where our imagination leads us when a story is presented to the windows of our minds.
Finally, I really enjoyed Gottschall's writing style; casual enough to be telling a story, but serious enough to get a point across. This comical writing style is probably my favorite, because it is a lot easier for the reader to get a personalized experience from the author's writing. Always including personal anecdotes and jokes here and there leaves a lot up to the imagination and up to the reader, especially on how to interpret (and react to) the messages given off by the writer. All in all, this was a story worth telling.