ABSTRACT
This chapter introduces students to “sonic ethnography,” or the recording, editing and presentation of anthropologically informed works of sound-based media. Examples include, but are not limited to, tape recordings, CDs, digital audio files, single or multi-channel installations and sound maps. The chapter begins with a brief overview of sonic ethnography’s emergence from earlier traditions of documentary sound recording. It then theorises what kind of knowing the practice produces, drawing on recent work in sound studies and ontological anthropology. Sonic ethnography, it argues, is not only a way of exploring how we generate and interpret soundscapes. It is also a kind of “ontological poetics” opening us to other ways of perceiving and thinking about the world and its composition. Composing such works, of course, requires basic familiarity with sound recording techniques. The chapter accordingly details key technical considerations, before segueing to several exercises easily adaptable to different projects. Finally, it describes examples of existing works that provide inspiration for different approaches to editing, both aesthetic and technical.
