10- Power to the People

The radio in Latin America really illustrates the effect media can have. It is astounding how much the radio influenced society in Latin America. It enabled them to grow their culture (through music) and more importantly it granted them the ability to more actively participate in social changes and politics. Power to the people- that is what radio brought to the people of Latin America, specifically those of the lower classes.

I found myself being entertained by the state’s attempts of controling the media. It is almost humourous to read how much effort the state would put in, just to be widely ignored and even mocked by the people. In a way, the ability for the lower classes to choose when they wanted to listen was the most power they had ever been granted. Before, they were often constrained by the people in power and subject to whatever changes the people in power made. The poorer Latin Americans may not have been up to date as to what was going on as they may not have had access to the information–or they may not have been able to read. Seeing that, it is not surprising that the radio became a popular media. After all it was a Rich source of information and culture.

Overall the radio also brought unity to the people–they all had access to the same information. That being the case, I find it interesting how the recounts of the speech in argentina are different. Everyone having access to the same information could lead us to believe that people would think similarily. However, the retelling of the speech in various diffeent perspectives goes to show that it was not necessarily the case.

Since differrences in latin america are deeply rooted, it would be hard for any media or person to really unite everybody. What the radio allowed, was for people that shared similar views to rally up against those that did not. In the era of the radio, people who had previously been ignored were the centre of the stage. In a way, the radio allowed for a more democratic state and for an overall improvement for the way of living for many. Even so, the radio to me is clearly not a sustainable solution for alot of the problems thst Latin America faced.

My question for this week is; would Latin America have socially and politicaly advanced as much as they did with the radio, if they did not have it? What would the consequences be if there was no radio?