Re-Imagined Radio | Storytelling with Sounds

Using examples from literature, drama, oral history and radio, "Storytelling with Sounds" explores how sounds, such as the storyteller's voice and sound effects, have contributed to storytelling throughout history.

Background

Scholars suggest that storytelling began as a way of establishing relationships between prehistoric humans and their surrounding world. As humans evolved, storytelling provided entertainment and information, an aid to memory, a way to convey the past into the future.

Today, storytelling is woven into the fabric of our lives, a fundamental mechanic, useful for making sense of human experience.

Fundamentally, storytelling involves constructing and sharing narratives of events. Administrators, educators, entertainers, influencers, marketeers, researchers, persuaders, politicians, writers, zealots—all use storytelling to engage our attention, convince us to believe their stories, and respond in specific ways.

On the other hand, storytelling with sounds (the storyteller's voice and other sound effects) can seize and stimulate one's imagination. Storytelling with sounds creates a visual world in the mind's eye. This world is believable, full of opportunities for engagement and interactivity.

This is because sound sparks our imagination like no other human sensory input. As result, storytelling with sounds is especially effective in creating engaging stories.

This program, "Storytelling with Sounds" explores how sounds, like the storyteller's voice and sound effects, have contributed to storytelling throughout human history and provides some interesting listening examples.