L ATIN

AMERICAN AND
L ATINX RADIO
HISTORY

KEYWORDS:
Accessibility (because of its low cost and ubiquitous
presence in private and public spaces, radio is the most
available mass medium to Latin Americans)

Adaptibility (radio has flexibly adapted popular culture (like

genres of music and melodrama) throughout Latin American
history

Endurance (nearly 100 years on, Latin American radio is

still a highly significant means of building community)

Mediation (like other forms of media radio “mediates”

between traditional (rural) and modern (urban) culture (cf.
Jesús Martín-Barbero)

This Photo by Unknown Author is licensed under CC BY

 LESSON PLAN

1 2 3 4
This lesson plan on Latin The lesson plan includes The bulk of the lesson Project-based learning
American and Latinx radio an introduction to the consists of case studies of activities performed by
history is geared towards history of Latin American two radio genres that groups of students
high school and college radio, contextualizing its played a considerable supplement the lesson.
students of world history, history in the rise of mass role in helping to forge
Latin American history, media as significant nationalist identities:
Latin American culture vehicles of nationalism in popular music and the
and cultural studies, and the first part of the 20th radiodrama (radio
Spanish. century. melodrama).
 LEARNING OBJECTIVES

• Students will be introduced to Latin American radio history as

an important source of historical information about 20 th-century
nation-building and identity formation in the regions.
• Using conceptual frameworks from communication studies,
students will learn to approach radio programming of music and
drama as both industrial products and popular culture.
• Students will apply their new knowledge in project-based
learning by performing close readings of primary documents of
radio programming in Latin America: 1) popular music; 2)
radionovelas (serial melodramas).
 WARM-UP:

What is your experience with radio listening?

Where and when do you listen to radio, and what kinds
of programming (commercial, public) do you typically
listen to?
What is your experience with listening to Spanish-
language radio in Latin America or the United States?
 THIS IS THE
BANN ER O F A
STATE - O W N ED
RADIO
NE TW O RK IN
C O LO M BIA
(O RIGIN : 19 40 ).

This Photo by Unknown Author is licensed under CC BY-SA

What does the image

evoke as a symbol of
the national scope of
this network?
I. LATIN AMERICAN RADIO AND ITS IMPRINT
ON NATIONALISMS:1930-1960

"By the beginning of the 1940's

very few people doubted the
sentiments and the effects that
radio was capable of producing.
Behind the polished walnut or
mahogany cabinets were hidden
the national identity documents of
the era: multitudes of dreams,
unleashed imagination, talented
people trained in all the different
kinds of entertainment ranging
from drama to humor”.
This Photo by Unknown Author is licensed under
CC BY-SA
 •In the first part of the 20th century,
industrialization and nation-building processes
contributed to the rise of corporate states across
the Latin American regions.
•The Latin American corporate state aimed at
expanding its functioning into many areas of
society so as to provide a balance between capital
THE ERA OF LATIN and labor interests.
AMERICAN •The corporate state was successful in centralizing
NATIONALISMS: and strengthening its power through:
•Nationalization of economic interests and resources
1930-1960 •Expanding state control of institutions like schools and
media (including the radio, which along with film was
the most significant form of mass media in this period)
•Expanding and disseminating discourses of
nationalism, the most important vehicles of which
were the mass media of radio and cinema – and later, in
the 1950’s, television.
 K E Y H I S T O R I C A L FAC T S :
RA D I O ’ S I N D U S T R I A L H I S T O RY
I N L AT I N A M E R I C A

IN THE FIRST PART OF THE CENTURY, RADIO BROADCASTING IN L ATIN AMERICA GREATLY EXPANDED,
FUELED PRIMARILY BY THE COMMERCIAL SECTOR (AS IN THE UNITED STATES (1)). FOR EXAMPLE:

• By 1950, broadcasting in Brazil had become

tremendously successful in reaching large
swaths of the country, with 300 stations in
operation nationally.(2)
• The low-lying River Plate regions of Uruguay
and Argentina greatly facilitated radio
propagation in the early 20th century. By 1930,
the tiny country of Uruguay already counted
100,000 radio receivers among its population
(2); by 1936 Argentina had one million! (3)
• In Mexico, the post-revolutionary government ofRadio station Mayrink Vega and its talented stars, who
the 1920s enthusiastically supported radio’s to buttress the rise of Afro-Brazilian urban music as na
RADIO EXPANDS THROUGH
AND WITH WOMEN’S
VOICES

La CX 48, “La Radio Femenina”

1935-1973, Uruguay was the first
broadcast station created by and
for women in the western
hemisphere. (1)
Christine Ehrick describes this
station as “groundbreaking. . . [in
both its] medium and message. . .
Creat(ing) new spaces for women’s
voices (n all dimensions) in the Image located at “Cuando las
public sphere.” (2) mujeres”.
Radio Femenina’s daily
programming included
"Alimentación correcta", (Proper
Nutrition), "Detalles de elegancia“
(Elegant Elements), "En el reino de
Caperucita“ (In the Kingdom of
Little Red Riding Hood), "Labores“
(Tasks), and "Moldes y modas“
 RA D I O ’ S E X PA N S I O N I N T H I S P E R I O D I S
LO C AT E D I N T H E H I S T O R I C A L P R O C E S S E S O F
N AT I O N - B U I L D I N G A N D N AT I O N A L I S M .

 The first part of the 20th century brought enormous social

change to Latin America through processes of
industrialization and urbanization. The migration of workers
to the cities and the growth of cities to incorporate these
workers was accompanied by the centralization of power in
nation-states throughout the Latin American regions. This
power, crucially, was buttressed by these states’ support of
nationalism as a way of building connection to -- and power
over -- large and diverse masses of people.

 Latin American governments viewed the mass media of the

time -- radio and film -- as highly effective vehicles of
Immigrants disembarking from ship in the port of Buenos Aires, early twentieth
delivering new sounds, stories and images of national
century. Unknown,  culture that vast numbers of people across the country
Débarquement d'immigrants à la Darse Sud. Port de Buenos Aires, marked as
public domain, more details on Wikimedia Commons could learn to identify with. They sought to encourage the
growth of these media through commercial or state-

KEY CONCEPTS FOR
U N D E R S TA N D I N G RA D I O ’ S
ROLE IN THE MAKING OF
L AT I N A M E R I C A N
N AT I O N A L I S M S :
Radio, like other mass media, is both an
industrial product AND the popular culture of
real-life people.
Radio enabled the melding of migrants’
traditional, rural culture with new, modern
sounds and stories of the city and the nation.
 Radio (and cinema) of this period was not
simply a tool of the state, or vehicles of top-
down nationalist propaganda. As a means of
buying into the hopes, dreams and closely-held
identifications of vast numbers of people –
many of whom were recent migrants from the
rural countryside to the city – radio and film
pulled upon traditional forms of popular culture
that migrants were familiar in developing new,
modern sounds and stories of the nation.
 As Jesús Martín-Barbero elegantly characterizes
this process, “Mass culture was essentially an
urban culture which compensates its open
materialism – the supreme values are economic
success and social ascent – with a
superabundance of the sentimental and the
passionate.” (1)
 I. BROADCASTING NATIONALISM:
HISTORICAL CASE STUDIES OF MEXICO
AND BRAZIL
 THE RANCHERA MADE NATIONAL
ON 1930’S MEXICAN RADIO
 Ranchera music and its associated
tradition of mariachi traces its origins to
the rural haciendas of pre-revolutionary,
northwestern Jalisco state.(1) While rural
mariachi used only string instruments
(violin, vihuela, guitarrón (bass guitar),
harp, commercial radio introduced the
trumpet to the ensemble, which became
de rigueur by the 1940s.(2)

 This picture features the band Mariachi

Vargas de Tecalitlán, whose original
members hailed from Jalisco, and which
President Lázaro Cárdenas made the
official police band of the Mexico City in
the 1930s. When Mariachi Vargas added . Photo by Unknown Author is licensed under CC BY-SA

the wind instrument to their ensemble,

their comercial success on the radio was
 RA D I O X E W P L AY S A D E C I S I V E
R O L E I N M A K I N G RA N C H E RA
N AT I O N A L
“Singing cowboys” Pedro Infante and
Jorge Negrete, crossover ranchera singers
from radio  to records  to studio
cinema
https://i.pinimg.com/originals/fc/2d/79/fc2d79490217
d1b3a9a0d4105f97996d.jpg
 In the 1930s, rural migrants to the cities
could connect the sounds of ranchera on the
radio with their rural past, even as the
music’s history was located in a decidedly
idealized past. (1) The ranchera’s pull at
nostalgia was quickly harnessed by radio
broadcasters as a source of migrants’ new
identifications with the city and the modern
state in the 1930s.
 The ranchera’s popularity grew in no small
part to its forum on the transnationally
successful XEW radio in Mexico City. which
media mogul Emilio Azcárraga Vidarrueta
developed as “La Voz de la América Latina”
(The Voice of Latin America) in the 1930s.
XEW sponsored a daily ranchera program,
hosted live broadcasts of ranchera singers
and nurtured the hugely successful careers
of Jorge Negrete, Tito Guizar and Pedro
Infante and their crossover fame in Mexican
studio cinema. (2)
 PROJ ECT-BASED ACTI VI TY
Yo soy mexicano, mi tierra es bravía, Drawing of Jorge Negrete singing
Palabra de macho que no hay otra tierra más linda  on radio station XEX, created in
1947. (1)
Y más brava, que la tierra mía This Photo by Unknown Author is
licensed under CC BY-NC-SA
Yo soy mexicano y orgullo lo tengo, 
Nací despreciando la vida y la muerte 
Y si echo bravatas, también las sostengo

Mi orgullo es ser charro, valiente y braga'o, 

Traer mi sobrero con plata borda'o, 
Que naide me diga que soy un raja’o

Correr mi caballo, en pelo monta'o, 

Pero más que todo seré enamora'o 
Yo soy mexicano, muy atravesa’o

Yo soy mexicano, por suerte mía, 

La vida ha querido que por todas partes 
Se me reconozca por mi valentía

Yo soy mexicano, de naide me fío 

Y como Cuauhtémoc cuando estoy sufriendo,  Read the lyrics to the left while you listen to the following famous ranchera
Antes que rajarme, me aguanto y me río sung by Jorge Negrete, “Yo Soy Mexicano” (“I Am Mexican,” songwriters
Ernesto Cortazar and Manuel Esperon.) Investigate how language register,
Me gusta el sombrero, echado de la'o  voice and musical accompaniment contribute to themes of nationalism,
Pistola que tenga cacha de pela'o,  regionalism social class and heteronormative masculinity. Be prepared to
Fumar en hojita tabaco pica’o,  discuss with the class how these themes worked together on the radio music
Jugar a los gallos, saberme afama'o 
to cultivate audiences of ranchera music and to grow new nationalist
Pero más que todo, ser enamora’o
identities from this regional rural genre.
https://archive.org/details/78_yo-soy-mexicano_jorge-negrete-el-mariachi-
Yo soy mexicano, muy atravesa’o
vargas-e-cortazar-m-esperon_gbia0036130a/_78_yo-soy-mexicano_jorge-neg
 Click icon to add picture

PROJECT-BASED
LEARNING, CONTINUED

Now, watch Jorge Negrete singing

the song in this excerpt from the
movie El Peñón de las Animas
(The Rock of Souls, Miguel
Zacarías, Mexico, 1943), How are
the themes you identified in the
first part of this Project adapted --
and amplified! -- in the film?
 B R OA D C A S T I N G N AT I O N A L I S M
( A LT E R N AT I V E L E S S O N ) :
B RA Z I L , RÁ D I O N AC I O N A L A N D S A M B A

• Slide 8, which includes a photograph of the musical performers

of Radio Mayrink Vega in Río de Janeiro, introduced students to
the connection of radio and the growth of samba as a national
form in Brazil. The photograph on this slide features Dorival
Caymmi, one of the legends of Brazilian samba and other
popular musical forms, performing on Rádio Nacional, which
helped to launch his stardom. (1)
• This photograph and Caymmi’s famous song "Samba da Minha
Terra“ – which he first recorded in 1940 -- here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pwNEBGLpnik&list=RDpwN
EBGLpnik&t=23
can lead a lesson on the Brazilian radio’s huge impact on the
rise of samba as a national genre during President Getulio
Vargas’ “Estado Novo” (New State,1930-1945).
• Afro-Brazilian migrants from northeast Bahía in the early part of
the 20th century cultivated the samba in the favelas of Río de
Janeiro. (2) In the 1920s, Río’s radio producers at Mayrink Vega
and its competitor Rádio Nacional began promoting samba and
other popular music as cosmopolitan and national forms of
culture. Their success inspired Vargas’ support of commercial
radio from the beginnings of his presidency. (3)
• Rádio Nacional, which became a state entity in 1940, played an
This Photo by Unknown Author is licensed under CC BY-SA
outsized role in nationalizing samba in the middle of the
 FAMILY AND NATION:
BUILDING MODERN IDENTITIES THROUGH
THE RADIONOVELA
 The radionovela is a serial broadcast that emerged
at the beginning of Latin American Radio history in
the early 20th Century, inspired by theatrical
melodrama and serial newspaper narrative. The
genre swiftly became a major form of radio
broadcasting across the Latin American regions.

Like the telenovela it would go on to inspire at the

birth of television in the 1950s, the radionovela is
characterized by its locus in the family; its themes
of class ascension; its plot points of intrigue,
betrayal, and social taboo -- and of course its tonal
excesses. (2)
The above features a performance on Cuban radio of the wildly, transnationally
successful 1948 radionovela El derecho de nacer by the Cuban autor Félix Caignet,
which dealt with a multirracial couple’s struggles for acceptance in a highly
racialized society. The Afro-Cuban actor Lupe Suárez, playing Mamá Dolores a
domestic worker (right), was the first black actor to be featured in radionovelas. (1)
An excerpt from the original broadcast may be accessed here:
http://www.cmhw.cu/radio-adentro/12596-los-70-anos-de-el-derecho-de-nacer.
T H E R A D I O N O V E L A P R E S E RV E S T R A D I T I O N I N FA M I LY S T O R I E S – J U S T A S T H E S E
S A M E S T O R I E S A R E F I R M LY S I T U AT E D I N T H E M O D E R N W O R L D .

This Photo by Unknown Autdehor is licensed unr CC BY

 This Photo by Unknown Author is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA

L IKE T HE RA NCHERA AND THE S AM BA ON THE RADIO, THE RA DIONOV EL A FU S ED T HE TRA DITIONA L
WITH THE MODERN.

S I M I L A R LY , T H E R A D I O N O V E L A S E R V E D A N E N O R M O U S LY S I G N I F I C A N T S O C I A L F U N C T I O N : H E L P I N G
L AT I N A M E R I C A N S N E G O T I AT E
N E W , N A T I O N A L I D E N T I T I E S I N T H E 2 0 T H C E N T U R Y.
 H I ST O RI C A L C A S E S T U DY: E V I TA P E R Ó N’ S W O RK
I N RA DI O DRA M A S PAV E D T HE WAY F OR HE R
PO LI TI C A L E N G AG E M E N T W I T H T HE
A RG E N TI N I A N W O RK I NG C L A SS .

Before she even met Juan Perón, Evita Perón was known by the
Argentinian people through her performances as an actor of
“radiodramas,” or serial radio melodramas, for Buenos Aires radio of
the 1930s and 1940s. Evita and her fellow actors of La Compañía del
Teatro del Aire (The Theater Company of the Air) created radiodramas
for various stations, including Radio Mitre, Radio el Mundo and Radio
Belgrano. When the nationalist regime of army officers took over the
government in 1943, and turned the radio into its mouthpiece, Evita
convinced government operatives to create a state-sponsored radio
program on famous women for her to perform which Radio Belgrano
would pick up from 1943-1945. In 1944, Evita created a radio program
dedicated to Juan Perón’s work as vice president for the regime. (1)
Ehrick points out that Evita’s radio persona, by pulling on melodrama
and religious oratory, set the stage for her political career as a a
populist. (2)
 P R O J E C T- B A S E D L E A R N I N G
( S PA N I S H - L A N G U A G E ) :
L I S T E N I N G T O P R I M A RY D O C U M E N T S
O F RA D I O D RA M A S

In 2004, Tulane University acquired the audio recordings of The Louis J. Boeri and Minín Bujones Boeri
Collection of Cuban-American Radionovelas, 1963-1970, accessed here:

https://digitallibrary.tulane.edu/islandora/object/tulane%3Aradionovelas

The Boeris owned America’s Productions, Inc., a company owned by radio entrepreneurs who exiled
to Miami after the Cuban Revolution in 1959. The company produced political, informational and
narrative programming directed towards Latin American and Latinx audiences.

For this task in project-based learning, students of Spanish can investigate the history of Cuban
exiles to Miami and the various radionovelas on the site. They can choose an episode of a
radionovela on the site and listen to it closely for its narrative formulas: the structuring of the
narrative in the family; themes of social class and other markers of social identity; plot points of
intrigue, betrayal and social taboo; and the production of excess emotion. Students should also be
attentive to how their radionovela could “travel” easily – how it could manage to be accessible to
Latin Americans and Latinx across the North and South America.

Students can then discuss with the class their findings. Finally, the entire class can attempt to bring
their knowledge about the function of the radiodrama in forging national identities to an inquiry on
the collection as a whole. They can be asked to situate the collection’s radiodramas alongside the
production company’s political programming, and address how the exile producers imagined these
radionovelas as a way of preserving their own sense of national culture as it existed before the
revolution.
 PROJECT-BASED LEARNING
(ENGLISH):

• A very recent radiodrama was created as a bilingual

radiodrama featuring Mexican star Kate del Castillo:
https://www.kcrw.com/news-culture/shows/celestial-blood
• Students can listen to one or two episodes and investigate
how the traditional radionovela – its family setting, its social
themes, its excess of emotion -- is reproduced, adapted and
transformed in the podcast. They can also think about how
the podcast format and its popular genre of science fiction
introduce new contours to the radiodrama.
• They can discuss their findings with the class. Finally, they
can attempt to address together the larger question this
updated radionovela presents: what stories and sounds of
the national and transnational are communicated in Celestial
Blood?