A quotation poem in the Anthropology of Sound

This poem is made up almost entirely of quotations from texts I have come across in my day-to-day work as a sound anthropologist. The quotations are from books and articles, generally on sound, across quite a diverse range of genres, primarily anthropology, but also philosophy, sound art and communication studies; one is from a novel. When I copied them out, I found myself wondering why it was that I was quite so interested in them. How were they able to hold my attention for so long? Why did I re-read and revisit them so often? I realised that they were helping me to understand my personal obsession with sound.

I think about sounds a great deal. I can, for instance, get quite deeply absorbed in the qualities of sound environments. I listen avidly to all kinds of audio and find that what I hear affects me strongly. I make sound recordings when I go on holiday rather than taking photographs and so on and so forth. Perhaps it’s not surprising that my professional life revolves around sound, too.

When reading and taking notes on a text about sound, or finding interesting lines about sound in other sources, I began to experiment with arranging quotations on the page to try to convey how they described my lifeworld. I realised the result was rather like a poem. I then began to see if I could draw on my reading to make a poem consisting solely of quotations; the answer was ‘not quite’. I needed a few other words and phrases to provide linkages and give structure, but in the end, I did produce something that approached a poem.

In my work as an academic I find that I engage very closely with the textual voices of others, so much so that I can sometimes feel I don’t have or need a voice of my own. The poem I generated produced a kind of voice out of this relative voicelessness: not a singular voice but a sequence, an assemblage. The sources sometimes meshed stylistically and continued one another so that were it not for the inverted commas and numbers there might not be a noticeable change of author; at other points they sat together slightly awkwardly. This stylistic semi-continuity and disjointedness produced an unusual poetic voice, but one I like and which I feel is true to the intertextual way in which academics often find themselves working.

Initially, I also wanted the poem to play with the academic convention of referencing. I left the references in the text, lending the poem a particular visual aesthetic and reinforcing the composite quality of the voice. As can happen in academic texts, though, the in-text references became intrusive, and because there were so many so close together in this poem, I felt they interfered with legibility (which was already a challenge because of the constant changes of voice and the strangeness of the form). I opted to use the numbering system that you see in the final version instead; it provides all the sources but reduces visual clutter. You can see the original version of the poem copied at the bottom if you would like to.

Fundamentally, the poem sets out to show that reading anthropological work facilitates learning about the self as well as others, and that the anthropology of sound is not only a field of research but also a material from which (as well as in which), poetry can be produced.

 A Quotation Poem in the Anthropology of Sound

Here,

 ‘the blank pages like listening ears’,                                                                                        1.

‘stretched towards the register of the sonorous’.                                                                       2.

Me,

‘an audile… a person in whom auditory knowing is privileged over knowing through sight’, 3.

‘in whom “auditory images” are predominant over tactile and visual stimuli’.                        4.

There is ‘a premium on hearing as the main sensory modality’.                                              5.

‘[D]ay begins with the sound of the first birds singing, not the appearance of the sun.

 Evening is characterised by the singing of the cicadas, not the fading light’.                          6.

So,

‘[w]hat does it mean for a being to be immersed entirely in listening,

formed by or in listening’,                                                                                                    7.

‘predestined for or determined by a single sense’?                                                                8.

It means that my life is

‘animated through sound’,                                                                                                    9.

‘ears on’,                                                                                                                               10.

a ‘search for resonances and reverberations’.                                                                          11.

I listen.

‘I am in sound’,                                                                                                                    12.

‘entwined with the heard… constituted in this bond’.                                                         13.  

Mine is

an ‘auditory culture’.                                                                                                              14

‘[T]he simple chant of a cricket can awaken whole fairy-swarms of tender and delicate fancies’,           15

 yet ‘sound is as material as stones’.                                                                                       16.

‘[R]ound noises, pointed noises . . . I could write a treatise on noises’,                                17.

 they ‘have “insides” and “underneaths”’,                                                                              18.

‘can be “female”, “move” and have affects of “their own”,                                                  19.

can “speak” like a bird’.                                                                                                         20.

I inhabit

‘an ontology which exists only in audition’.                                                                          21.

‘[S]ounds seem to form an autonomous realm’.                                                                    22.

 They have ‘the capacity to initiate actions by themselves’.                                                   23.

 ‘[S]onic beings…interact with each other in a suspended realm,

 according to rules of their own’.                                                                                           24.

This

‘enchanted listening’!                                                                                                             25.

A ‘path to augmented social realities’                                                                                    26.

‘[A] method of exploration…

What I hear is discovered, not received, and this discovery is generative, a fantasy’,          27.

‘bringing into being a parallel world,

as if there was another world that could be entered simply by listening’.                              28.  

Yet,

‘how can we listen as a moth listens, as a stone listens, a building listens, darkness listens?...

[T]hese ideas that preoccupy me can be hard to explain or understand.

This is something I have to pursue through my lifetime’.                                                     29.

References

1. Lee, Laurie. [1959] 2002. Cider with Rosie. London: Vintage, p 98.

2. Nancy, Jean-Luc. 2007. Listening (trans. C. Mandell). New York: Fordham University Press, p 12.

3. Sterne, Jonathan. 2003. The Audible Past: cultural origins of sound production. Durham and London: Duke University Press, p 96.

4. ibid.

5. Gell, Alfred. 1995. “The Language of the Forest: landscape and phonological iconism in Umeda.” In The Anthropology of Landscape: perspectives on place and space, edited by Eric Hirsch and Michael O’Hanlon, 232-245. Oxford: Oxford University Press, p 237.

6. Schieffelin, Edward. [1976] 2005. The Sorrow of the Lonely and the Burning of the Dancers. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, p 94.

7. Nancy, Jean-Luc. 2007. Listening (trans. C. Mandell). New York: Fordham University Press, p 4.

8. Pinch, Trevor, and Karin Bijsterveld. 2012. “New Keys to the World of Sound.” In The Oxford Handbook of Sound Studies, edited by Trevor Pinch and Karin Bijsterveld, 3-35. Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, p 29.

9. Constance Classen. 1993. Worlds of Sense: Exploring the Senses in History and Across Cultures. New York: Routledge, p 121.

10. Lachmund, Jens. 1999. “Making Sense of Sound: auscultation and lung sound codification in nineteenth-century French and German Medicine.” Science, Technology, and Human Values 24(4): 419–50, p 40.

11. Cunha, Manuela Carneiro da. 1998. “Pontos de Vista sobre a Floresta Amazônica: Xamanismo e Tradução” [Points of View about the Amazon Rainforest: Shamanism and Translation]. Mana 4(1): 7–22, p 16. Cited in de Menezes Bastos, Rafael José. 2013. “Apùap World Hearing Revisited: Talking with ‘Animals’, ‘Spirits’ and other Beings, and Listening to the Apparently Inaudible”. Ethnomusicology Forum 22(3): 287-305, p 297.

12. Voegelin, Salomé. 2010. Listening to Noise and Silence: towards a philosophy of sound art. New York and London: Continuum, p 5.

13.  ibid, p 4.

14. Gell, Alfred. 1995. “The Language of the Forest: landscape and phonological iconism in Umeda.” In The Anthropology of Landscape: perspectives on place and space, edited by Eric Hirsch and Michael O’Hanlon, 232-245. Oxford: Oxford University Press, p 236.

15. Hearn, Lafcadio. 1914. Exotics and Retrospectives. Boston: Little, Brown and Company, p 80.

16. de Menezes Bastos, Rafael José. 2013. “Apùap World Hearing Revisited: Talking with ‘Animals’, ‘Spirits’ and other Beings, and Listening to the Apparently Inaudible”. Ethnomusicology Forum 22(3): 287-305, p 292.

17. Vigée-Lebrun, Elisabeth. 1984. Souvenirs. Volume 1, p 186. Cited in Garrioch, David. 2003. “Sounds of the city: the soundscape of early modern European towns”. Urban History 30: 5-25, p 10.

18. Feld, Steven. 1984. “Sound Structure as Social Structure”. Ethnomusicology 28(3): 383-409, p 396.

19. Stoichita, Victor A. and Bernd Brabec de Mori. 2017. “Postures of listening.” Terrain [Online]. http://terrain.revues.org/16418, n.p.

20. ibid.

21. ibid.

22. ibid.

23. ibid.

24. ibid.

25. ibid.

26. ibid.

27. Voegelin, Salomé. 2010. Listening to Noise and Silence: towards a philosophy of sound art. New York and London: Continuum, p 4.

28. Toop, David. 2019. ‎ Flutter Echo: living within sound. London: Ecstatic Peace Library, p 158.

29. ibid, p 189.

A Quotation Poem in the Anthropology of Sound (with in-text references)

Here,

‘the blank pages like listening ears’ 1(Lee [1959] 2002, 98),

‘stretched towards the register of the sonorous’ (Nancy 2007, 12).

Me,

‘an audile… a person in whom auditory knowing is privileged over knowing through sight’ (Sterne 2003: 96),

‘a person in whom “auditory images” are predominant over tactile and visual stimuli’ (ibid).

There is ‘a premium on hearing as the main sensory modality’ (Gell 1995: 237).

‘[D]ay begins with the sound of the first birds singing, not the appearance of the sun.

Evening is characterised by the singing of the cicadas, not the fading light’ (Scheiffelin [1976] 2005: 94).

So,

‘[w]hat does it mean for a being to be immersed entirely in listening,

formed by or in listening…’ (Nancy 2007: 4),

‘predestined for or determined by a single sense’? (Pinch and Bijsterveld 2012: 29).

It means that my life is

‘animated through sound’ (Classen 1993: 121),

‘ears on’ (Lachmund 1999: 40),

a ‘search for resonances and reverberations’ (Cunha 1998: 16, cited in de Menezes Bastos 2013: 297).

I listen.

‘I am in sound’ (Voegelin 2010: 5),

[E]ntwined with the heard… constituted in this bond’ (ibid: 4).

Mine is

an ‘auditory culture’ (Gell 1995: 236).

‘[T]he simple chant of a cricket can awaken whole fairy-swarms of tender and delicate fancies’ (Hearn 1914: 80),

 yet at the same time ‘sound is as material as stones’ (de Menezes Bastos 2013: 292).

 ‘[R]ound noises, pointed noises . . . I could write a treatise on noises’ (Vigée-Lebrun 198: 186, cited in Garrioch 2003: 10),

they ‘have “insides” and “underneaths”’ (Feld 1984: 396),

‘can be “female”, “move” and have affects of “their own”…

can “speak” like a bird’ (Stoichita and Brabec de Mori 2017: n.p.).

I inhabit

‘an ontology which exists only in audition’ (ibid).

‘[S]ounds seem to form an autonomous realm’

with ‘the capacity to initiate actions by themselves’ (ibid),

‘sonic beings…interact with each other in a suspended realm, according to rules of their own’ (ibid).

This

‘[E]nchanted listening… a path to augmented social realities’ (ibid),

 ‘a method of exploration…

What I hear is discovered, not received, and this discovery is generative, a fantasy’ (Voegelin 2010: 4),

 ‘bringing into being a parallel world, as if there was another world that could be entered simply by listening’ (Toop 2019: 158).

Yet,

‘how can we listen as a moth listens, as a stone listens, a building listens, darkness listens?

 [T]hese ideas that preoccupy me can be hard to explain or understand.

 This is something I have to pursue through my lifetime’ (ibid: 189).

References

Constance Classen. 1993. Worlds of Sense: Exploring the Senses in History and Across Cultures. New York: Routledge.

Cunha, Manuela Carneiro da. 1998. “Pontos de Vista sobre a Floresta Amazônica: Xamanismo e Tradução” [Points of View about the Amazon Rainforest: Shamanism and Translation]. Mana 4(1): 7–22.

de Menezes Bastos, Rafael José. 2013. “Apùap World Hearing Revisited:nTalking with ‘Animals’, ‘Spirits’ and other Beings, and Listening to the Apparently Inaudible”. Ethnomusicology Forum 22(3): 287-305, DOI: 10.1080/17411912.2013.845364

Feld, Steven. 1984. “Sound Structure as Social Structure”. Ethnomusicology 28(3): 383-409. https://doi.org/10.2307/851232

Garrioch, David. 2003. “Sounds of the city: the soundscape of early modern European towns”. Urban History 30: 5-25. doi:10.1017/S0963926803001019

Gell, Alfred. 1995. “The Language of the Forest: landscape and phonological iconism in Umeda.” In The Anthropology of Landscape: perspectives on place and space, edited by Eric Hirsch and Michael O’Hanlon, 232-245. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Hearn, Lafcadio. 1914. Exotics and Retrospectives. Boston: Little, Brown and Company.

Idhe, Don. 2007. Listening and Voice: phenomenologies of sound. Albany: State University of New York Press.

Lachmund, Jens. 1999. “Making Sense of Sound: auscultation and lung sound codification in nineteenth-century French and German Medicine.” Science, Technology, and Human Values 24(4): 419–50.

Lee, Laurie. [1959] 2002. Cider with Rosie. London: Vintage.

Nancy, Jean-Luc. 2007. Listening (trans. C. Mandell). New York: Fordham University Press.

Pinch, Trevor, and Karin Bijsterveld. 2012. “New Keys to the World of Sound.” In The Oxford Handbook of Sound Studies, edited by Trevor Pinch and Karin Bijsterveld, 3-35. Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press.

Schieffelin, Edward. [1976] 2005. The Sorrow of the Lonely and the Burning of the Dancers. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.

Sterne, Jonathan. 2003. The Audible Past: cultural origins of sound production. Durham and London: Duke University Press.

Stoichita, Victor A. and Bernd Brabec de Mori. 2017. “Postures of listening.” Terrain [Online]. http://terrain.revues.org/16418

Toop, David. 2019. ‎ Flutter Echo: living within sound. London: Ecstatic Peace Library.

Vigée-Lebrun, Elisabeth. 1984. Souvenirs. Volume 1: 186.

Voegelin, Salomé. 2010. Listening to Noise and Silence: towards a philosophy of sound art. New York and London: Continuum.