Tragedy on the radio: how the BBC brought culture to the masses

By Jason Koole
Western Herald

Amanda Wrigley, a visiting classics professor from Britain at Northwestern University, discussed the importance of Greek tragedy on British Broadcasting Corp. radio from the 1920s to the 1950s on Thursday, April 15 in Brown Hall.

Wrigley’s discussion on the history of the Greek plays and how they influenced culture throughout history was titled “Politics, Propaganda, and the Public Imagination: Ancient Greece on BBC Radio 1920’s to 1950’s.”

Wrigley’s talk fell into three parts—matters of cultural politics, political propaganda, and public imagination.

“BBC Radio was a mass medium at the very heart of British domestic life for more than three decades, from its birth in the 1920’s to at least the 1950’s,” Wrigley said.

“As the public service broadcasting channels for news and entertainment it raised awareness for matters both contemporary and cultural, sometimes both at once.”

Wrigley went through transcripts of Greek dramas produced on the BBC and read letters from radio executives on the purpose of the productions.

She found that the BBC was producing the shows for an upper class, highly educated demographic – yet the middle class listened to it as well.

Wrigley spoke about John Reith, the former director general of the BBC, and how he influenced radio and allowed the public access to cultural wealth.

Wrigley’s talk covered the different aspects of broadcasting, as well as other key figures in BBC Radio.

She focused on radio allowing the public to listen to Greek plays and tragedies, when they would normally have had difficulty gaining access to such theater.

David Kutzko, a professor of Latin, Greek, and classical literature at Western Michigan University, attended the event and shared his ideas on the talk.
“[The talk] was great, very interesting,” Kutzko said, “[It was] very nice to have Professor Wrigley here.”

“Any opportunity on campus to hear specialists on a field for free who come from either here or elsewhere is just a wonderful resource.”

Wrigley’s appearance was sponsored by the Departments of England and Foreign Languages, the Diether H. Haenicke Institute for Global Education, and Comparative Drama.

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Posted by HeraldAdmin on Apr 18 2010. Filed under Campus, News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry

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