ABSTRACT

This volume approaches the issue of ambient sound through the ethnographic exploration of different cultural contexts including Italy, India, Egypt, France, Ethiopia, Scotland, Spain, Portugal, and Japan. It examines social, religious, and aesthetic conceptions of sound environments, what types of action or agency are attributed to them, and what bodies of knowledge exist concerning them. Contributors shed new light on these sensory environments by focusing not only on their form and internal dynamics, but also on their wider social and cultural environment. The multimedia documents of this volume may be consulted at the address: milson.fr/routledge_media.

chapter |18 pages

Introduction: Multiple Listenings

Anthropology of Sound Worlds

part I|55 pages

Listening into Others

chapter 1|18 pages

Noising the City

Revealing Popular Neapolitan “Soundciabilities” in Pyrotechnical Practices

chapter 2|17 pages

Sounds of Hell and Sounds of Eden

Sonic Worlds in Ethiopia in the Catholic Missionary Context, Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries

chapter 3|18 pages

An “Obscene” Calling

Emotionality in/of Marginalized Spaces: A Listening of/into “Abusive” Women in Govindpuri (Delhi)

part II|40 pages

Sound Displays and Social Effects

chapter 4|21 pages

Standing Out From the Crowd

Vocal and Sound Techniques for Catching People’s Attention in an Indian Bus Stand

chapter 5|17 pages

Melodic Refrains in Japanese Train Stations

The Management of Passenger Behavior Through the Use of Electric Bells

part III|71 pages

Sound Identity and Locality

chapter 6|17 pages

Acoustic Communities Represented

Sound Preferences in the Scottish Village of Dollar

chapter 7|19 pages

Mics in the Ears

How to Ask People in Cairo to Talk About Their Sound Universes

chapter 8|15 pages

Mapping Out the Sounds of Urban Transformation

The Renewal of Lisbon’s Mouraria Quarter 1

chapter 9|18 pages

Listening to the City

The Sonorities of Urban Growth in Barcelona

part IV|37 pages

Sound Arts and Anthropology

chapter 10|19 pages

Not Just Tones, Noises too! 1

On Sound Poetry 2

chapter 11|16 pages

Tribute to a Footbridge

Dance and Sound Spaces Improvisations in Choisy-le-Roi