Project “Media, reception and memory: female audiences in the New State”

“My uncle was the patriarch”: Research notes on reception,

history and memory

José Ricardo Carvalheiro Univeridade da Beira Interior / Portugal

Audiences have been relatively neglected within media research about the past

Humour program on the 1930’s radio Radio listening in the 1930’s

In countries where empirical media research didn’t start before the end of 20th century, there is a lack of understanding about what the first decades of broadcasting meant in people’s lives

We focus on “New State” regime (1930’s-60’s) and women’s condition – marked by traditionalism and rigid

social segmentation

Discriminate the different dimensions of “reception” (in a general sense)

Think about the possibilities of researching past reception (in the specific sense of content appropriation)

Argue that this is necessary, but not enough, to understand media implications with social (gender) representations and relationships

In this paper we try to

Use examples from life stories to

consider reception analysis

Research on past audiences requiresexamination of diverse concepts

Centred on meanings and specific content

Uses of the media

Media consumption

Media reception

• Life stories provide data that needs diachronic and synchronic analysis

Low-middle class (Adel.)

Life style Social interaction

Consumption of technologies

Uses of media

Reception

Childhood1941-51Youth1952-64

Cleaning and cooking done by mother and sisters

All family gathered in the living-room and chat to spent free time

Mother buys fridge

Puts the radio over the living-room table and listens to it while studying

“Light and pleasant” Sissi films on cinema; mother enjoyed watching landscapes

Marriage1965-

Researching past reception?

• The point of insisting on content reception lies in the connections between memory and identity.

• We affiliate in a perspective that looks at reception of media content not just as interpretation, but as symbolic appropriation (Ricoeur; Thompson).

• Appropriation points to connections between interpretation of signs and interpretation of the self.

How to study the past of reception through oral biographies?

1) Start from “open” life narratives – not focused on media

• Display of memories and identity

“My uncle was the patriarch, who dominated the family, who got jobs for brothers, for nephews... he used to control everything. Me and my mother, we escaped somehow from that control when my mother came to live alone with me in Lisbon. She escaped really from several levels of control, those of my father’s family, and those of her own family, that also wanted to control her, because she was alone, poor girl, with a little child…”

2) Connect reception (as cultural appropriation) to mapped identity axis

“There is a song I always sang, although I sing very badly, but I used to sing it also to my students, as an example of male dominance at the time. It is a [Portuguese] song [by a popular male singer] that says: “to me there is nothing like the saddle and the woman, holding the reins…” I saw his performances on stage and this song was broadcasted continuously on radio.” Argumentative

discourse

Different modes of dicourse relate to distinct forms of (re)appropriation

“She was a lame girl, but she wanted to [marry]… would she marry or not… And there was a family, and the man fell in love to the lame girl, and the other woman [wife] was a bad one. She didn’t want him to go to the lame girl.”

Narrative discourse

To understand what the media meant to peoples lives, we must look for meaningful articulations with

everyday life and social relationships

Reception as symbolic appropriation is important, but we should not consider only meanings of texts – Many relevant meanings for audiences come from reception as social action/social use

“One of my cousins was very talented for singing, but my uncle was a conservative man, and he wouldn’t allow her to learn chant because it was not a proper career for a decent young lady. The career for a decent young lady was to get married. So, my cousins did high school, and then they went to lessons of embroidering, cooking, and learning to be good housewives, which was the expected role for girls after 18. But, as she was very fond of singing, she turned on the radio, when her father was not at home, and listened to songs we enjoyed very much.”