Publisher Description

The Sound Studies Reader is a groundbreaking anthology blending recent work that self-consciously describes itself as 'sound studies' along with earlier and lesser known scholarship on sound. The collection begins with an introduction to welcome novice readers to the field and acquaint them the main issues in sound studies, followed by a new essay by the editor providing an intellectual history of sound studies. Individual section introductions give readers further background on the essays and an extensive up to date bibliography for further reading in 'sound studies' make this an original and accessible guide to the field.

Author Biography

McGill University

Table of Contents

1. Sonic Imaginations Part 1: Hearing, Listening, Deafness 2. The Auditory Dimension 3. Noise: The Political Economy of Music 4. Contradicting Media: Toward a Political Phenomenology of Listening 5. The Three Listening Modes 6. Cassette Sermons, Aural Modernities and the Islamic Revival in Cairo 7. The Ontology of Vibrational Force 8. Hearing Aids and the History of Electronics Miniaturization 9. Following You: Disciplines of Listening in Social Media Part 2: Spaces, Sites, -Scapes 10. The Soundscape 11. The Walkman Effect 12. Sound, Modernity and History 13. No Corner for the Devil to Hide 14. The Soundproof Study 15. Listening to Machines: Industrial Noise, Hearing Loss and the Cultural Meaning of Sound 16. Anthropologist Underwater: Immersive Soundscapes, Submarine Cyborgs and Transductive Ethnography 17. Auditory Awareness as an Extension of Religion 18. The Audio-Visual iPod Part 3: Transduce and Record 19. The Sound of Music in the Era of Its Electronic Reproducibility 20. Four and a Half Film Fallacies 21. Gramophone 22. Fidelity Versus Intelligibility 23. Shaping the Synthesizer 24. The Recording Studio as Fetish 25. New Media Publics 26. Deadness: Technologies of the Intermundane Part 4: Collectivities and Couplings 27. This is the Voice of Algeria 28. The Culture of the Telephone 29. Radiating Culture 30. Reach Out Someone: the Telephonic Uncanny 31. Cellular Disability: Consumption, Design and Access 32. Social Transculturation, Epistemologies of Purification and the Aural Public Sphere in Latin America Part 5: The Sonic Arts: Aesthetics, Experience, Interpretation 33. Desire, Power and the Sonorous Landscape 34. Science, Technology and the Avant-Garde 35. Noises of the Avant-Garde 36. Operating System for the Redesign of Sonic Reality 37. Starship Africa 38. Auditory Relations 39. Toward a Feminist Historiography of Electronic Music Part 6: Voices 40. The Voice the Keeps Silence 41. The Grain of the Voice 42. "Feenin": Posthuman Voices in Contemporary Black Popular Music 43. Multiple Voices 44. The Frenzy of the Audible: Pleasure, Authenticity and Recorded Laughter 45. The Linguistics of the Voice

Review

"Throughout the development of sound studies from both technological and aesthetic corners, the voice has accompanied the bolstering of the sonic and the new emphasis on listening and noise as an exemplifying force. Nowehere has that been clearer than in Jonathan Sterne's The Sound Studies Reader... In many instances, the articles contained within this volume offer a taste of a scholar's great theoretical expanse and can act as gateways for interested readers to dive into further research." - Gelsey Bell, Journal of Interdisciplinary Voice Studies"The Reader is an excellent collection and source of inspiration for all – newcomers as well as old hands – in sound studies research that crosses disciplines, methodologies and theories. It is also a "must" for academics in the humanities and sociology who have not yet encountered or dared to incorporate sound studies in their interdisciplinary study and research." - Ansa Lønstrup, Associate professor, Aarhus University, Denmark"The Sound Studies Reader manages to contain, in one (albeit fairly large) book, an amazing breadth of scholarly approaches to the study of sound. From phenomenological to anthropological to cultural studies to science and technology studies, the approaches range across disciplines, fields, and methodologies to offer a broad spectrum of thought on this very current topic. Alongside all of that, the choices also reflect care for writing and communication; they are accessible, readable, well-written. I have no doubt that I will be recommending this book to students frequently and for a long time to come. For those with any interest in this field, it needs to be on your shelf, if it isn't open and being actively consulted." Anahid Kassabian, University of Liverpool, UK'The Sound Studies Reader provides so much food for thought that, in this brief space, I could only give some hints of its reach, the issues it addresses and the problems it raises. Needless to say, it will likely become a benchmark for anyone interested in this topic.' - Carlo Nardi, Dancecult'...we begin by recommending what we think is the most useful collection on sound studies to date...The result of Sterne's stance is a refreshingly balanced anthology that unflinchingly includes a variety of critical, historical, and theoretical perspectives.' Joshua Gunn, Greg Goodale, Mike M. Hall and Rosa A. Eberly, Rhetoric Society Quarterly

Review Quote

"The Sound Studies Reader manages to contain, in one (albeit fairly large) book, an amazing breadth of scholarly approaches to the study of sound. From phenomenological to anthropological to cultural studies to science and technology studies, the approaches range across disciplines, fields, and methodologies to offer a broad spectrum of thought on this very current topic. Alongside all of that, the choices also reflect care for writing and communication; they are accessible, readable, well-written. I have no doubt that I will be recommending this book to students frequently and for a long time to come. For those with any interest in this field, it needs to be on your shelf, if it isn't open and being actively consulted."Anahid Kassabian, University of Liverpool, UK

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