This volume offers newly commissioned chapters giving readers a wide-ranging view of current critical work in the fields of radio and podcasting, employing specific case studies to analyze sound media's engagement with the arts; with the factual world of news, talk, and documentary programming; as a primary means of forging community along with national, transnational, and alternative identities; and as a subject of academic and critical research. Its historical scope extends from radio's earliest days, through its mid-twentieth century decades as the powerful voice of nations and empires, onto its transformation into a secondary medium during the television era, and into the expanding digital present.