Howard Fink is currently engaged in a research project on the BBC World Service Radio News, 1970-86, in the Concordia Centre for Broadcasting Studies (CCBS). The Diniacopoulos/BBC News Collection was donated to the University last year, and is housed in the CCBS.
The project involves, first, the archiving and dubbing to cd of 9,000 hours of WS (Radio) News programs, broadcast on short-wave and taped daily off-air by the late Prof. Denis Diniacopoulos (Communications, Concordia U). We are also gathering background information on the principles, organization, and procedures of production of these programs, during the significant 16-year period of the tapes.
Finally, the above work enables comparative research into these programs, renowned for their objectivity and comprehensiveness, relative to treatment of the same significant news by other comparable national broadcasters.
This project is being funded by a joint donation by the late Mrs Diniacopoulos, mother of Denis, and by Concordia Advancement.
The archiving of the tapes is now complete, and a copy of the microfilmed indexes to the BBC WS News has been purchased, as the CCBS instrument of access to this Collection. The work of dubbing these tapes to cds is moving rapidly ahead without incident, after the usual start-up problems. I have interviewed a number of BBC WS News administrators, most of whom have moved up the ranks from correspondent and editor, and these interviews have been recorded for further use both in this project and for future CCBS research on the programs. The comparative analysis is in the organizational stage. I will be delivering the first academic report on this project in Toronto next March in the Radio Section of the Popular Culture/ American Culture Associations Conference.