Anthropology of Sound

Books at UVic Libraries on the anthropology of sound (a select list).

Updated September 19, 2025
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Collaborative intimacies in music and dance : anthropologies of sound and movement
Chrysagis, Evangelos
Ebook
Across spatial, bodily, and ethical domains, music and dance both emerge from and give rise to intimate collaboration. This theoretically rich collection takes an ethnographic approach to understanding the collective dimension of sound and movement in everyday life, drawing on genres and...
The sonic persona : an anthropology of sound
Schulze, Holger
Paper Book
In The Sonic Persona, Holger Schulze undertakes a critical study of some of the most influential studies in sound since the 19th century in the natural sciences, the engineering sciences, and in media theory, confronting them with contemporary artistic practices, with experimental critique...
The auditory culture reader
Bull, Michael
Paper Book
Sight and sound are equally crucial to our understanding of the world, yet the visual has dominated discussions of cultural experience. The very way we relate to, and think about, our everyday world has been influenced by this emphasis on sight over sound. Providing a definitive overview of an...
Towards an anthropology of ambient sound
Guillebaud, Christine
Ebook
This volume approaches the issue of ambient sound through the ethnographic exploration of different cultural contexts including Italy, India, Egypt, France, Ethiopia, Scotland, Spain, Portugal, and Japan. It examines social, religious, and aesthetic conceptions of sound environments, what types...
Noise : a human history of sound and listening
Hendy, David
Paper Book
What if history had a sound track? What would it tell us about ourselves? Based on a thirty-part BBC Radio series and podcast, Noise explores the human dramas that have revolved around sound at various points in the last 100,000 years, allowing us to think in fresh ways about the meaning of our...
The taste of ethnographic things the senses in anthropology
Stoller, Paul.
Ebook
An ingeniously constructed springboard for a criticism of anthropology.--
City of Noise Sound and Nineteenth-Century Paris
Boutin, Aimee
Ebook
Beloved as the city of light, Paris in the nineteenth century sparked the acclaim of poets and the odium of the bourgeois with its distinctive sounds. Street vendors bellowed songs known as the Cris de Paris that had been associated with their trades since the Middle Ages; musicians...
Worship sound spaces : architecture, acoustics and anthropology
Guillebaud, Christine
Ebook
Worship Sound Spaces unites specialists from architecture, acoustic engineering and the social sciences to encourage closer analysis of the sound environments within places of worship. Gathering a wide range of case studies set in Europe, Asia, North America, the Middle East and Africa, the book...
Sound, Symbol, Sociality The Aesthetic Experience of Extreme Metal Music
Unger, Matthew.
Ebook
Based on ethnographic research within the extreme metal community, Unger offers a thought-provoking look at how symbols of authenticity and defilement fashion social experience in surprising ways. Exploring the many themes and ciphers that comprise this musical community, this book interprets...
Drones, Tones, and Timbres : Sounding Place among Nomads of the Inner Asian Mountain-Steppes
Pegg, Carole
Ebook
An indispensable study of the music of Altai-Sayan peoples Based on more than twenty years of collaborative research, Carole Pegg's long-awaited participatory ethnography explores how Indigenous nomadic peoples of Russia's southern Siberian republics (Altai, Khakassia, Tyva)...
The sonic boom : how sound transforms the way we think, feel, and buy
Beckerman, Joel
Ebook
"Music defines us. Joel Beckerman knows. Let him tell you all about it." --Anthony Bourdain "Equal parts sociological study and business advice, using unique everyday examples--for instance, how the fate of the Chili's fajita empire rested on the sound of the sizzling platter, and...
Ethnicity, identity, and music : the musical construction of place
Stokes, Martin.
Paper Book
- Directly relevant to the needs of teachers and researchers in music, musicology, ethnomusicology and social anthropology.This book examines the significance of music in the construction of identities and ethnicities, and suggests ways to understand music as social practice. The authors focus on...

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