Modernizing a nation through its radio and television industry: RCA Victor in Chile, 1928-1973

ABSTRACT The RCA Victor company in Chile portrayed itself as a participant in the nation’s progress. Its success was part of a larger governmental plan to boost the industrial capacities of the country, during a period marked by political polarization and extensive demographic changes in terms of rural to urban migration, the formation of a working middle class, and greater investment in education. Their electronic devices were intimately linked to this broader socio-political context, where both state and partner industries presented technological production in terms of national pride and progress. Via a material culture analysis and archival sources related to the history and production of RCA Victor in Chile, we show and argue that its technological devices were shaped actively by and participated in the complexities and contradictions of the social and political changes of the era.