Håkan à brink | Akateeminen Kirjakauppa

The aim of this thesis is to describe the language and performance of the radio disc jockey in the 90´s in Stockholm. The data is drawn from a corpus with recordings from 15 radio stations, a total of 70 hours (including music and news programs). The data was recorded 1994-95, just one year after the new law permitting commercial broadcasting in Sweden. The recordings were processed in three steps, first in the form of protocols minute by minute, second as simple transcripts, and thrid in the form of more elaborate notations. The basis for the analysis is twofold, i.e. the dramaturgical approach to the study of interaction drawn up by Erving Goffman, and the rhetorical notion of ethos. The methods used to describe what happens in the chat performed by radio disc jockey are mainly qualitative. The disc jockey talk take place in a scene where the interaction with the listener in some ways is best described as an illusion, due to the special conditions of the media. He/She has to establish the contact and communicate only through his/her voice. The constituents in his/her ethos are analyzed in terms of rationality or common sense (phronesis), character (areté) and good will (eunoia). The description of the disc jockey´s ethos shows that the meaning of rationality has a special preponderance, i.e. the facts presented are dubious and spectacular in certain ways. The disc jockey´s character is expressed in his/her wish to appear youthful, positive and sincere. His/her good will, finally, can be observed as a commitment to the listener, a wish always to express his/her empathy, and a general attitude of helpfulnes. Example between different modes of addressing the listener and uses different voices for different purposes (reading aloud, telling a story, chatting)