Includes bibliographical references (pages 286-305) and index.

Introduction: The soundscapes of radio in Africa / Liz Gunner, Dina Ligaga and Dumisani Moyo -- Talk radio and politics in Ghana: exploring civic and (un)civil discourse in the public sphere / Wisdom J. Tettey -- From diffusion to dialogic space: FM radio stations in Kenya / Christopher Joseph Odhiambo -- Contesting mainstream media power: mediating the Zimbabwe crisis through clandestine radio / Dumisani Moyo -- Equivocal resonances: Islamic revival and female radio 'preachers' in urban Mali / Dorothea E. Schulz -- What is the relationship between hate radio and violence? rethinking Rwanda's 'Radio machete' / Scott Straus -- Why radio is Africa's medium of choice in the global age / Winston Mano -- Bantustan identity, censorship and subversion on northern Sotho Radio under apartheid, 1960s-80s / Sekibakiba Peter Lekgoathi -- South African radio in a saucepan / David B. Coplan -- Radio theatre: the moral play in the historical context of state control and censorship of broadcasting in Kenya / Dina Ligaga -- IsiZulu radio drama and the modern subject: restless identities in South Africa in the 1970s / Liz Gunner -- Radio Okape: 100 per cent Congolese / Stephanie Wolters -- Talk radio, democracy and the public sphere: 567MW in Cape Town / Tanja Bosch -- Radio and religion: a case of difference and diversity / Maria Frahm-Arp -- Voices from without: The African National Congress, its radio, its allies and exile, 1960-1984 / Stephen R. Davis -- Airing the politics of nation: radio in Angola, past and present / Marissa J. Moorman -- Radio in zones of conflict: abnormal measures for abnormal circumstances / David Smith -- Multiple publics, multiple languages: radio and the contestations of broadcasting language policy in Uganda / Monica B. Chibita.

Contributors investigate the multiple roles of radio in the lives of African listeners across the continent. Some essays turn to the history of radio and its part in culture and politics. Others show how radio throws up new tensions, yet endorses social innovation and the making of new publics. A number of contributors look at radio's current role in creating listening communities that radically shift the nature of the public sphere. Yet others cover radio's central role in the emergence of informed publics in fragile national spaces, or in failed states. The book also highlights radio's links to the new media, its role in resistance to oppressive regimes, and points in several cases to the importance of African languages in building modern communities that embrace both local and global knowledge. Publisher description.