Radio A Reference Guide

Subjects:

• Popular Culture » Popular Culture (General)

Reviews:

• The purpose of this work is to provide scholars and students of popular culture with an evaluative survey of research materials about radio. Like other titles in this important American Popular Culture series from Greenwood, this guide is highly selective; the bibliography is limited to 500 items. The author, a professor of English at Bellarmine College, has included the most useful Ph.D. dissertations and identified many other unpublished manuscripts (usually brief histories of small radio stations). Information concerning special collections and organizations is included. Only the better secondary source materials and the more informative journal articles and autobiographies written by popular radio personalities have been selected for inclusion. An interesting introduction provides an overview of radio's history in the U.S. . . . The bibliographic essays throughout the work will hold the attention of readers and cover topics such as networks and station histories, radio drama, news, music, comedy and variety, and sports. Also included are brief discussions on `Women in Radio,' `Radio Advertising,' and `Religious Radio Broadcasting'. . . . All users will discover important sources of information and will appreciate the well-written bibliographic essays.
  —Reference Books Bulletin
• As with the previous `Reference Guides' in the `American Popular Culture' series, including R.A. Armour's Film and M.W. Booth's American Popular Music, Greenfield's book is a significant contribution to the literature on popular culture. His coverage of the existing literature about radio (including dissertations and theses as well as monographs and periodicals) is both thorough and well-organized. Following a brief historical overview on radio and its role in American life, chapters offer informative and, within the confines of the format, lively and enjoyable bibliographic essays on individual facets of radio as an entertainment and information medium. Topics covered include network and station histories; drama programs; news; music; comedy and variety programming; sports; women in radio; advertising; religious broadcasting; and armed forces radio. A few chapters also highlight the literature on prominent individuals in radio history in discussing the chapter's general topic (e.g., Jack Benny is spotlighted in the chapter on radio comedy; Edward R. Murrow in the chapter covering radio news programming). The book concludes with listings of organizations; of journals; indexes, and abstracts; and of library and other collections of interest to researchers and students of radio. Because of difference in arrangement, focus, and format, this work complements rather than supersedes W.E. McCavitt's Radio and Television: A Selected, Annotated Bibliography, plus suppl. 1982, 1989). Highly recommended for both academic and public library collections.
  —Choice
• As readers are well aware, we live in a high tech, information media age. With the help of the computer, almost any subject, along with its complexities, is at our fingertips. In the world of OTR enjoyment, we are experiencing a wealth of new information presented to us, almost on a daily basis. New clubs and publications are being formed, new collections are frequently discovered, and new books enter our whelm of interest. To keep up with all the changes, we need an up-to-date work. We have one here. The author has presented an evaluative survey of the history and development of radio, including our favorite area, the shows and personalities behind it. Over 500 sources, including journals, magazine articles, and books are presented as a guide for serious study as an academic discipline, or as important information for the fan or collector who wants to learn more about that show and star. And, with few exceptions, all areas of OTR enjoyment are there . . . The strongest point may be an area we will all find interest in, and fittingly, it is the last chapter. The chapter `Organizations, Collections, Journals, and Indexes' is just that, and it is thorough. . . . To complete this work, there is a section that includes contacts and/or phone numbers of locations of collections and organizations. This work is heartily recommended.
  —SPERDVAC
• ...Overall, the book achieves its mission. Students, scholars and radio aficionados will find this a highly useful work.
  —Journalism Quarterly

Table of Contents:

• Preface
• Introduction: A Historical Overview of the Medium
• Radio Networks and Station Histories
• Radio Drama
• Radio News
• Radio Music
• Radio Comedy and Variety
• Radio Sports
• Short Waves: Miscellaneous Subjects
• Collections, Organizations, Journals, and Indexes
• Index