Empowerment on Air: Challenging Gender Norms Through Participatory Radio in Northern Uganda

Abstract

Mass media such as radio blurs the distinction between the public and the private. This article explores the gendered soundscape of a participatory radio campaign in Northern Uganda, which aimed to empower women and initiate debates on gender norms, including gender-based violence, teenage pregnancy, and women’s entrepreneurship. Drawing on feminist critiques of the public and private spheres, we explore the impact of radio on women’s empowerment. Ethnographic research found that participatory radio has the capacity to create a sense of community, an ‘intimate public sphere’, and critical consciousness about denied choices as a condition for further empowerment. Participatory radio also provides opportunities for women to deliberate and express opinions on public matters. The instances of political participation facilitated by the radio described in this paper exemplify feminist critiques of the supposed boundary between public and private activities. This paper thus encourages a rethinking of what counts as political engagement, recognising that intimate, everyday acts can contribute to promoting democratic participation and deliberation. However, radio’s impact is ultimately dependent on access to and control over technology, political institutions, and public social life – which women typically have less of – and the receptiveness of institutions and structures to popular change.