Sound

Ethnographies may gain from a wider focus on senses and their interdependence. Sense data is often eclipsed in the prioritization of sight. As explained elsewhere (4), visual perception is often equated to knowing, assuming an epistemic authority and sense of…

Symbolic significance is derived from the more fundamental field of indexicality—as the sound reaches and relates to an “other” listener—and indexicality relies in turn on intrinsic material properties and propensities for noises. The pre-symbolic force of sounds—manifest through movement, vibrations,…

Though we are enveloped in a constant continuum of sounds—many of which we have little control over—our perception of them is not entirely passive and inborn but rather shaped by cultural, historical, and political conditions. If sounds are reflective of…

The subjective mediation of sound underlines the constant possibility it contains to be misheard or misinterpreted. Taking the force and affect of sounds into account highlights the constructive cultural potential of their ambiguity; the distance between the intended and received…

Perception involves the dependence of the senses. Their union is then central to the ways in which we come to learn about, understand, and represent the world. Increased sensory engagement advocates that more attention be devoted to the significance of…