CS640K-Sound, Aurality, and Power: An Introduction to Sound Studies

There are so many topics that appear in the Preamble and Introduction sections of Henriques' book that can be and has been analyzed in the world of academia. As a former cultural dancer with a minor in Cultural Studies, I'm choosing to share my thoughts with you all on the influence and elements of slavery and African culture found in Dancehall culture. Even though there are elements of African culture found within the religions of Jamaica namely Rastafari, Obeah, and especially Pocomania, because of my background, I'd like to look into music and dance specifically. Henriques mentions our African heritage multiple times in his Preamble while not actually getting into the meat of the matter (which is fine, that is not what the book is about). Growing up I did a lot of folk and contemporary dance in our annual islandwide cultural competitions, widely known as JCDC. We did folk dances that involved the Kumina dance move as well as Bruk Ins. Now that I am older, it amazes me ho...

The Centrality of sound in the creation of modern American Architecture. Thompson researches and speaks about the importance of sound. According to Thompson, sound is a fundamental feature in the construction of modern American architecture. Thompson, in her research, looks at the period between 1900-1932.  This year is interesting for several reasons. It saw the Great war (1914-1918) and the boom of the the1920s that flowed the war years and eventually cumulated in the great depression (1929-1930). The 1920s were years of vigorous economic activity in America. From the construction of the modern sub-urbs due to the explosion in car ownership to the rapid availability of electricity and entertainment such as cinemas all saw explosive growth n the 1920s. This is why Thompson refers to this period as the Machine age.  According to Thompson, during the machine age, more and more sound was produced through technological mediation. The sound that was created as a result of cars, tr...

A few weeks ago we had been talking about the Sound, Affect, and Politics reading by Stirling. Affect, as noted by Stirling, has specific importance placed on bodies and refers to the processes that humans have the least amount of control over, such as hormone release, breathing, sweating, etc.—which points towards corporeal states, sensing, and auras (Stirling, 2018, p. 54). I’m equating this to what I refer to in everyday language as ‘the vibes’. But, I was particularly interested in this with reference to concerts and live music in terms of the social experience, which is kind of what Stirling got into within this chapter (although she is interested in how this can reproduce existing socio-political power). Large-scale, mass-produced concerts (think the Rogers or Air Canada centre) allow for an affective experience that is only experienced by you—it is completely a solo experience. Not only does the mass-produced air of the concert seem impersonal, but you are also separated from ea...

One of the first albums (if not the first album) I remember listening to in full was Big Audio Dynamite II's The Globe . While I could go into what this album meant to me in great depth, I want to focus on a moment on the hit track Rush .  Listen to this part at 1:58  (or the whole song it's a pretty fun tune). Although it's not too complicated, a young Lucas hadn't really listened to much music from his own personal headphones before. Previously, most of what I had listened to music from came from the car, the dad's boombox, and whatever music in the public space I heard. I had also heard this track a million times before, it's a favorite of my mom. But the stereo element here blew me away because I had no idea one could do this with music. A cool sample used in a plunderphonic like way to focus on the rhythm and melody separately was amazing. I would listen to this section over and over. For me, it was what Krukowski (2017) explains as 'imagined space'...

  Silence, and its relationship to power.  The power silence holds is fascinating. Scholars such as Rath believe that democrats and dictators alike have attempted to use silence to maintain control and prolong their rule throughout history. Whereas dictatorships are often associated with silencing their population, democracies have been grossly guilty of the act.  Silence is enforced through tools that can ensure the unity of the process. One such tool until recently had been the mass press. In his book Unfreedom of the press, Mark Levin noted that the development of the mass press as an instrument of Mass Communication in its self inhibited the ability of a large number of the population to express its opinion. If we were to couple that with the intense concentration of media ownership worldwide, then we have an apparatus in place that silences a majority of the population.  For example, in 1790, then US president Adam passed the sedition law, which made it illegal ...

 I have a love for ambient music and I feel a lot of the time people undervalue the sounds they provide. There is something disappointing to me about all the 'study relaxation' playlists on YouTube that take away the context from albums that artists put out. To show this I'd like to focus on one of the Ambient Music greats, Brian Eno. A personal favorite of mine and one of the most influential musicians of the last 50 years (seriously look at everything he produced on his Wikipedia page it is insane), Eno's ambient work shows how your personal experience shapes the world. I'm going to focus on two of Eno's albums to show some of the aesthetical work they do. Firstly, Brian Eno's classic Ambient 1: Music for Airports. If you have yet to have ever listened to this album I beg you to put this on right now. Probably the best introduction to the genre as well as being a beautiful listen, Brian Eno created this masterpiece after being stuck in an airport for hours...

    During covid the ability to go to a live concert, sporting event and any large gathering in general was taken away from individuals. It generated a societal withdraw from the live event and forced individuals to experience sound of events through technological devices. Wether that's be listening to new music through smartphones, watching baseball games on television or attending "Zoom" concerts. It created a technological world which attempted to mimic the live event. Through the question was, did it succeed in doing so? I would argue that it didn't.     Recently for the first time last Friday I attended a Blue Jays game and even though it wasn't at full capacity as an avid sports fan it brought me into a realm of sound which i dearly missed. This past week our class read the "The Walkman Effect" by Hosokawa, it focused primarily o the sound experience one gets from listening to music through headphones. One of the main quotes from the reading...