50253 Culture and Sound

Handbook description

The subject focuses on the meaning and significance of sound in different cultural contexts and historical settings. The aim is to study the emergence of sound as a specific object of theoretical analysis and to understand the impact of sound on human perception. Subject areas covered may include methodological approaches to sound; ethnography of sound; sound, voice, music, silence; sound in various media; and the politics and aesthetics of sonic practices.

Subject objectives/outcomes

This subject:

1. deepend understanding of sound as a medium and as a sensory domain
2. explores cultural conceptions of sound through attention to different critical, historical, political and anthropological approaches to the auditory world
3. studies the way in which aesthetic and cognitive structures determine the value and meaning of sounds, and the kinds of social practices that shape human relationships to sounds
4. develops a critical and comparative understanding of the significance of sounds in musical, performative, artistic, design and other experimental contexts
5. engages with a range of situations in which sounds transform human perception
6. provides a substantial knowledge of sound in its cultural context, through an analysis of the relations between theoretical texts, 'sound events', aesthetic pleasure and critical reflectiveness.

Contribution to graduate profile

On completion of this subject, students will:

• have a broad range of skills and knowledge, making for creative and critically informed communications professionals
• have a critical knowledge of Australian cultural traditions industries and institutions
• have a critical knowledge of cultural and aesthetic debates, an their implications for cultural policy developments
• be able to think critically and creatively about future developments in cultural industries
• have a strong awareness of the needs of specific communities and the ability to evaluate a range of strategies for dealing with cultural and social problems
• be able to function within groups and be sensitive to the multiple dimensions of social and cultural difference.

Teaching and learning strategies

• Seminar discussions and presentations in most sessions
• Weekly readings dealing with the main issues relating to each topic
• Student presentation of research materials and use of on-line website
• Intensive audition of selected sound works
• Each student submits a study of a 'sound event,' in order to extend and define aesthetic and conceptual understanding of acoustic experience
• Each student completes a final design and performance based assignment on a topic relating to the subject
• Discussion, research, group exercises and class presentations focus on defining concepts and analysing practices
• Develop analytical listening skills.

Content

Sound is studied within both its cultural and phenomenological context, including topics such as: sound, music and composition with their modern, post modern and experimental context; cultural and cognitive structures of auditory perception; the nature of silence; the role of sound in its technological contexts; sound and language; aesthetic and literary experiences of sound; and subjective dimensions of sound and auditory experience.

The unit is taught in four modules and students are asked to make contributions to at least two of the four modules via the class website (see class hand out for further details.) Module 1 is concerned with issues to do with sound in a philosophical context, especially philosophies of perception. Module 2 will focus on theoretical issues and compositional practices in modernist and post modernist music. Module 3 focuses on experimental sound in the broadcast context and the idea of 'writing' with sound in a program making sense. Module 4 is concerned with the contemporary aesthetics of sound in a hypertextual and multimedia context and affiliations which link contemporary listening experiences with pop cultural and other musical artefacts.

Assessment

Assessment item 1: 1

Assessment item 2: 2

Assessment item 3: 3

Minimum requirements

Students are expected to read the subject outline to ensure they are familiar with the subject requirements. Since class discussion and participation in activities form an integral part of this subject, you are expected to attend, arrive punctually and actively participate in classes. If you experience difficulties meeting this requirement, please contact your lecturer. Students who have a reason for extended absence (e.g. illness) may be required to complete additional work to ensure they achieve the subject objectives.

Recommended text(s)

Texts that are referred to regularly include:
Veit Erlmann, ed, Hearing Cultures: Essays on Sound, Listening and Modernity (Oxford, Berg, 2004)

Michael Bull and Les Back eds. The Auditory Culture Reader, Berg: Oxford 2003

Also highly recommended are:
LaBelle, Brandon, Background Noise: Perspectives on Sound Art (New York and London: Continuum, 2006)

Kahn, Douglas, Noise, Water, Meat: A History of Sound in the Arts, (Cambridge, Mass: MIT Press, 1999)

Indicative references

Adorno, Theodor W., The Philosophy of New Music, trans. Anne G. Mitchell and Wesley V. Blomster, (London: Sheed & Ward, 1973)

Altman, Rick, Editor, Sound Theory Sound Practice, (New York: Routledge, 1992)

Bourdieu, Pierre, Outline of a Theory of Practice, trans. Richard Nice, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1977, reprint: 1999)

Chanan, Michael, Repeated Takes: A Short History of Recording and Its Effects on Music (London: Verso, 1996)

Annmarie Chandler and Norie Neumark, At a Distance: precursors to art and activism on the internet, (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2005)

Chernoff, John Miller, "Music in Africa," African Rhythm and African Sensibility: Aesthetics and Social Action in African Musical Idioms, (Chicago: Chicago University Press, 1979)

Chion, Michel, The Voice in Cinema, (New York: Columbia University Press, 1999)

Dunn, Leslie C., and Jones, Nancy C., Editors, Embodied Voices: Representing Female Vocality in Western Culture (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994)

Hulten, Pontus, Futurismo and Futurismi, Milano: Bompiani, 1986

Johnson, Bruce, The Inaudible Music: Jazz, Gender and Australian Modernity (Sydney: Currency Press, 2000)

Kahn, Douglas, Noise, Water, Meat: A History of Sound in the Arts, (Cambridge, Mass: MIT Press, 1999)

Kartomi, Margaret, "Indonesian-Chinese Oppression and the Musical Outcomes in the Netherlands East Indies," Music and the Racial Imagination, Ronald Radano and Philip V. Bohlman, editors, (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 2000)

Kerman, Joseph, Musicology, (London: Fontana, 1985)

LaBelle, Brandon, Background Noise: Perspectives on Sound Art (New York and London: Continuum, 2006)

LaBelle, Brandon and Christof Migone eds. Writing Aloud: The Sonics of Language (Los Angeles: Errant Bodies Press, 2001)

Morris, Adalaide, ed. Sound States: innovative poetics and acoustical technologies. (Chapel Hill and London: The University of North Carolina Press, 1997)

Radano, Ronald, and Bohlman, Philip V., Music and the Racial Imagination (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 2000)

Sahlins, Marshall, Culture in Practice, (New York: Zone Books, 2000)

Scarry, Elaine, The Body in Pain: The Making and Unmaking of the World, (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1985)

Schwartz, Elliott, and Childs, Barney, editors, Contemporary Composers on Contemporary Music, (New York: Da Capo Press, 1998)

White, Shane, and White, Graham, "Us Likes A Mixtery': Listening to African-American Slave Music," Slavery and Abolition, Volume 20, Number 3, December 1999

Wishart, Trevor, On Sonic Art, (Amsterdam: Harwood Academic Publishers, 1996)