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Radio, “expats” and the production locality in the Algarve
Last modified: 2011-07-09
Abstract
Since the late 80s, the only English owned and run radio station in Portugal has played a part in constructing the touristic region of the Algarve as “Britain’s extra province” (Wuerpel 1974 cited in King 2000: 65). Along with the English language local press, it has been producing an alternative micro-public sphere (Dayan 1998) placed comfortably within the Portuguese mediascape and alongside satellite, print and online UK options. “Following the” social life of radio broadcasts, to use Marcus’ (1991) metaphor, this paper reports on ongoing ethnographic research on how audience’s engagement with a radiophonic arena not only signals but also plays into strategies of social positioning of a privileged, somewhat alienated and overlooked population.
From abroad, while moving through complex and porous categories of tourist, visitor and resident (Torkington 2010; O’Reilly 2000; King et al 2000), listeners materialize their presence in the local “expatriate” social scene through music dedications and nostalgic phatic messages that reflect and express personal connections to the Algarve. Similarly, locals manage affective ties on air when tuning into a local social reality perceived through the discourses of mostly English-language local and international media and imported practices of sociality. Significantly, while British oriented public gatherings such as theatre productions and pub quizzes are often justified as fundraisers “for charity”, meaning to contribute to local development and addressing poverty, the radio broadcasts’ messages and call ins by contrast point to driving concerns with visibility, achievement of social status and confirmation of cultural capital. Naturalizing narratives on “expat” life in the Algarve, broadcasts particularly suggest the articulation of belonging to a locality that is symbolically connected to the UK, embedded in Portuguese reality and constructed in between dynamics of tourism, retirement and lifestyle migration (Torkington 2010).
From abroad, while moving through complex and porous categories of tourist, visitor and resident (Torkington 2010; O’Reilly 2000; King et al 2000), listeners materialize their presence in the local “expatriate” social scene through music dedications and nostalgic phatic messages that reflect and express personal connections to the Algarve. Similarly, locals manage affective ties on air when tuning into a local social reality perceived through the discourses of mostly English-language local and international media and imported practices of sociality. Significantly, while British oriented public gatherings such as theatre productions and pub quizzes are often justified as fundraisers “for charity”, meaning to contribute to local development and addressing poverty, the radio broadcasts’ messages and call ins by contrast point to driving concerns with visibility, achievement of social status and confirmation of cultural capital. Naturalizing narratives on “expat” life in the Algarve, broadcasts particularly suggest the articulation of belonging to a locality that is symbolically connected to the UK, embedded in Portuguese reality and constructed in between dynamics of tourism, retirement and lifestyle migration (Torkington 2010).