Podcast Journalism

Abstract

News podcasts are increasingly popular despite comprising a small proportion of existing podcasts. This intimate, emotive form of journalism reaches new audiences by experimenting with journalistic platforms, formats, and ways to tell stories. This chapter extends the work on narrative journalism by examining emerging conventions in podcast journalism, including the journalist’s role as self-reflexive storyteller. It aims to map a development of journalistic storytelling from radio to podcast journalism, highlighting the link between radio broadcasting’s past and its digital present. By focusing on two award-winning English-language podcast episodes from the United Kingdom and the United States, this work aims to illustrate how podcast journalism has transcended radio current affairs formats commonly used by public service broadcasters in past decades to embrace storytelling techniques from documentary traditions and immersive journalism. By theorizing concepts of intimacy and emotions in journalistic podcasts, the chapter contributes to the growing field studying affect in media.