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Start Date
24-6-2022 12:00 AM
End Date
24-6-2022 12:00 AM
Abstract
In the post-Serial podcasting boom of the past decade, “intimacy” has perhaps been the medium’s most remarked upon characteristic – cited as the distinctive feature of the podcast voice and the key element that distinguishes podcasting from other popular media, including also terrestrial radio broadcasting (Mia Lindgren, 2021). Producers refer so frequently to audio storytelling’s presumed intimacy in interviews, public Q&As, and other forms of “embedded knowledge” (John Caldwell, 2008) that it is now conventional wisdom. Yet, intimacy remains a concept that is often invoked, rarely defined. What exactly constitutes this affective feeling of closeness in podcasting? How is podcast intimacy constructed and controlled at the level of production? And what of the fact that such discourses of intimacy and emotion are often gendered female? How do cultural assumptions about intimacy – along with related notions of sensitivity, moodiness, privacy – impact podcast form and genre, along with the types of stories producers choose to tell? This paper uses a production studies approach to investigate the cultural practices and belief systems of podcast producers – an industry sector, it must be noted, that skews heavily female. Through ethnographic observation and two-dozen original interviews with creative workers – ranging from producers on prestigious internationally known programs like Radiolab, On the Media, and Millennial to numerous independent and amateur productions – it establishes a critical understanding of the industry’s “low theory” of intimacy, and how these working assumptions shape the content and form of the podcasts being created today.
Emotional Voices: Intimacy and Gendered Discourse in Podcast Production Culture
In the post-Serial podcasting boom of the past decade, “intimacy” has perhaps been the medium’s most remarked upon characteristic – cited as the distinctive feature of the podcast voice and the key element that distinguishes podcasting from other popular media, including also terrestrial radio broadcasting (Mia Lindgren, 2021). Producers refer so frequently to audio storytelling’s presumed intimacy in interviews, public Q&As, and other forms of “embedded knowledge” (John Caldwell, 2008) that it is now conventional wisdom. Yet, intimacy remains a concept that is often invoked, rarely defined. What exactly constitutes this affective feeling of closeness in podcasting? How is podcast intimacy constructed and controlled at the level of production? And what of the fact that such discourses of intimacy and emotion are often gendered female? How do cultural assumptions about intimacy – along with related notions of sensitivity, moodiness, privacy – impact podcast form and genre, along with the types of stories producers choose to tell? This paper uses a production studies approach to investigate the cultural practices and belief systems of podcast producers – an industry sector, it must be noted, that skews heavily female. Through ethnographic observation and two-dozen original interviews with creative workers – ranging from producers on prestigious internationally known programs like Radiolab, On the Media, and Millennial to numerous independent and amateur productions – it establishes a critical understanding of the industry’s “low theory” of intimacy, and how these working assumptions shape the content and form of the podcasts being created today.
Bio
Andrew J. Bottomley is Assistant Professor of Media Studies in the Department of Communication & Media at SUNY Oneonta. He is author of Sound Streams: A Cultural History of Radio-Internet Convergence (University of Michigan Press, 2020) and co-editor (with Michele Hilmes) of the forthcoming Oxford Handbook of Radio Studies (Oxford University Press, 2023). His research in the areas of sound studies, media history, and the creative industries has been published in numerous journals including Historical Journal of Film, Radio and Television, Popular Music & Society, Journal of Radio & Audio Media, and Journal of Cinema and Media Studies. He is a Research Associate on the U.S. Library of Congress’ Radio Preservation Task Force.