Leona Nacole Predom Love's dissertation on, "Air is Our Birthright ...Micro Radio Broadcasters = Community Servants or Criminals?: A 'Dissertatiumentary' on Berkeley Liberation Radio"

Leona Nacole Predom Love, Fielding's School of Educational Leadership & Change

This work is an experiment, an almost alternative dissertation. It is best digested openly and should the reader choose to keep to tradition expect to be challenged, maybe even uncomfortable, maybe even enlightened.

This project seeks to challenge the status quo in academia as well as systems that impede our ability to communicate most effectively. It is the story of Berkeley Liberation Radio (BLR) presented in the research as a documentary entitled “Berkeley Liberation Radio: Micro Power for the People.”

Additionally, the story is told by BLR’s diverse collective, a group of informal critical race theorists who desire to create “an alternative, diverse, vibrant society and community free of racism, sexism, homophobia, and all other forms of oppression” (Mission). This dissertation serves to fulfill gaps in the current literature and provide a catalyst for unification of the larger movement of media activism. Furthermore this “dissertatiumentary” represents symbolic justice, standing in solidarity with micro radio broadcasters all over the world for without them there would be no low-powered frequency modulation (LPFM) or community radio.

The documentary chronicles the lives of 15 members of the BLR collective over the course of a year as well as solicits public opinion at large to assess individual perceptions of micro radio broadcasting at various happenings and street locations throughout the Bay Area. Using documentary as the means for data dissemination affords more opportunity to access this knowledge and determine for oneself if pirate radio broadcasters are the FCC criminals they are made out to be of if they are servants of humanity? Thus dissertatiumentary feels like liberation as I was able to approach education using my whole self and not just what is confined to the compartmentalization of my head. This is my testimony of what one can produce outside the confines of tradition and stands as advocacy not only for pirate radio but also for acceptance and integration of spirituality in academia.

KEY WORDS: alternative dissertation, LPFM, pirate radio, Berkeley Liberation Radio, Organic Inquiry, Critical Race Theory, “dissertatiumentary”, youth and radio, women and radio, African-Americans and radio, entertainment-education.