Radio, memory and conflict: Reconstructing the past in Documentos RNE

Abstract

In this article we adopt a cultural approach to radio, and specifically to radio documentaries about recent Spanish history, focusing on an analysis of Documentos RNE, which, from 1999 to date, has been broadcasting documentaries that employ the vast sound archives of Radio Nacional de España (RNE). The archives and their use in historical memory programmes represent a true national repository with which to reconstruct collective memory. Through a more detailed analysis of five documentaries broadcast between 2008 and 2014, we examine major topics such as the Second Republic, the Civil War, the postwar period, the Franco dictatorship and the Transition to Democracy. The article show how Documentos RNE included the mentioned topics in its list of programmes and what type of audiovisual language resources were common on the reconstruction of the past.