Sonic Ethnography
Subtitle: Identity, Heritage and Creative Research Practice in Basilicata, Southern Italy
Publisher: Manchester University Press
Published: 2020
Language: eng
Number of pages: 224
ISBN-13: 9781526151988
Description: Sonic ethnography reveals how sound plays a central role in the performance of local identities in the southern Italian region of Basilicata. By exploring the soundscape of tree rituals, carnivals, pilgrimages, informal musical performances, and sound archives, the book focuses on the relational and experiential aspects of sound that momentarily bring together acoustic communities. It provides an innovative take on an area that has been studied by Italian and foreign scholars starting from the 1950s, in which these classic studies have become one of the forces at play in the local politics of heritage. Through a combination of text, colour photographs and sound recordings, Sonic ethnography makes a compelling argument for taking sound seriously as a crucial component of social life and as an ethnographic form of representation. With an afterword and a soundscape composition by Steven Feld. --