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Editorial, Radiodoc Review, Volume Two, Issue Two, 2016, Siobhan Mchugh

RadioDoc Review

Overview of articles reviewed in fourth issue of RadioDoc Review

Balancing Personal Trauma, Storytelling And Journalistic Ethics: A Critical Analysis Of Kirsti Melville's The Storm, Mia Lindgren

RadioDoc Review

When Kirsti Melville’s documentary The Storm about the life-long impact of child sexual abuse was broadcast in 2014, it contributed to a public debate about sexual abuse. Hundreds of listeners commented on the ABC Radio National website and Facebook pages, expressing how deeply moved they were, praising both the subject of the story Erik and the journalist Kirsti for their bravery and honesty in making the documentary, and remarked that Erik’s personal story helped them understand the issue better. Kirsti Melville won three national awards for her program, which also documented her personal story as Erik’s former partner.

This critique …

From The Limbo Zone Of Transmissions: Gregory Whitehead’S "On The Shore Dimly Seen", Virginia Madsen

RadioDoc Review

In this review-essay, Virginia Madsen enters the polyphonous 'limbo zone of transmissions' created by Gregory Whitehead's most recent 'performed documentary' and radio provocation, "On the shore dimly seen". This composed voicing, drawn from verbatim texts courtesy of WikiLeaks and the dysfunctionality of America's Guantanamo Bay, is heard as a fortuitous chance encounter with a medium – and as an increasingly rare listening 'detour' while Madsen is on the road. This essay is thus both a reflection upon the nature of the radio offered here, the chance listening experience to work of this kind, and upon the distinctive body of work …

On The Shore Dimly Seen: Review, Götz Naleppa

RadioDoc Review

A new wave of understanding and agreement with all sorts of secret service methods which pretend to protect us against terrorism makes Whitehead’s radio performance, On The Shore Dimly Seen, even more precious and important than at the time of its production. Because it is the voice of a radical believer in democracy and human rights: today a lonely voice in the chorus of fear. We hear Gregory Whitehead’s voice chanting the interrogation log of Guantanamo Bay detainee 063 (prisoners in Guantanamo do not have names, they are only numbers), interwoven with the voices of vocalist Gelsey Bell and …

The Hacker Syndrome: Review, Martin Johnson

RadioDoc Review

The Hacker Syndrome tells the story of Stephan Ubach, a man who is slowly revealed as an activist and a hero to those involved in the Arab Spring. A man who, as the story unfolds, forgets his own needs - and breaks down. This is also a story of distance - physical and mental. A story of the importance that information plays in people’s lives and how some people are willing to risk their lives for the world to know what is going on. Radio documentaries and features usually require an emotional attachment to the character, while computers, and often …

A Kiss - Review, Miyuki Jokiranta

RadioDoc Review

A Kiss is a quick six-minute dip in the shared psyche of Kaitlin and her former lover, Kyle, who after three years of being separated, now find themselves in Kaitlin’s bedroom on a sun-drenched afternoon, in the air a question - will they kiss? Kaitlin’s work chooses microcosmic worlds to enlarge to a point where each thought, each intention, even each stage of an action is given the time to unfold, offering up intimate portraits of character. Paradoxically, greater insight comes from the momentary than something attempting to be more exhaustive. Such a brief account precludes detailed explanation but creates …