2002 Articles

Managing Disagreement to Avoid Confrontation in Sports Talk Radio

O’Connell, Stephen

In this paper the nature of disagreement in sports talk radio is examined. It is a widely held notion that talk radio in general is an argumentative and disputatious, if not hostile, forum in which people exchange ideas. Using the research methods of conversation analysis, an initial study of disagreement in sports talk radio appears to support that idea – meaning that disagreements are made without the mollifying techniques ordinarily used in face-to-face talk. However, looking at those disagreements more closely reveals that they tend not to devolve into confrontation on sports talk radio programs. This paper focuses on the methods employed by both callers and hosts to achieve this feat and thus demonstrates that the stereotype of talk radio being confrontational and hostile does not apply to the specific genre of sports talk radio.