Introducing the Upcoming Special Series “Queer Politics & Positionalities in Sonic Art”

Abstract

Essay| March 01 2023 Introducing the Upcoming Special Series “Queer Politics & Positionalities in Sonic Art” Charles Eppley Charles Eppley Charles Eppley (they/he) is an assistant teaching professor of Interdisciplinary Art & Performance (IAP) at Arizona State University. They teach and research the intersections of sound, disability, and techno-material culture from an interdisciplinary art history and media studies perspective. They are currently working on a book on the politics of listening in postwar art, focusing on the sound artist Max Neuhaus (1939–2009). They previously held faculty positions in media studies and art history at the University of California at Riverside and Oberlin College, as well as research posts at the MIT Media Lab, Experiments in Art & Technology (E.A.T.) at Nokia Bell Labs, and the Max Planck Institute for the History of Science. Charles currently serves as a co-editor and research coordinator for the Mellon and Ford foundation–funded Proclaiming Disability Arts initiative at the Center for Disability Studies at New York University. They are also a member of the artist collectives Remote Access and Cybernetics Library, where they help to design participatory public programs on disability and digital culture. Search for other works by this author on: This Site PubMed Google Scholar Resonance (2023) 4 (1): 6–12. https://doi.org/10.1525/res.2023.4.1.6 Views Icon Views Article contents Figures & tables Video Audio Supplementary Data Peer Review Share Icon Share Facebook Twitter LinkedIn MailTo Tools Icon Tools Get Permissions Cite Icon Cite Search Site Citation Charles Eppley; Introducing the Upcoming Special Series “Queer Politics & Positionalities in Sonic Art”. Resonance 1 March 2023; 4 (1): 6–12. doi: https://doi.org/10.1525/res.2023.4.1.6 Download citation file: Ris (Zotero) Reference Manager EasyBib Bookends Mendeley Papers EndNote RefWorks BibTex toolbar search Search Dropdown Menu toolbar search search input Search input auto suggest filter your search All ContentResonance Search What is queer listening? Can sound be queer? Both questions are illogical. Being queer does not completely define how a person hears sound and interprets the worlds that it creates. Sound is also a mechanical force that produces physical vibrations in the ears and renders psychoacoustic phenomena in the minds of listeners. Sound cannot be queer because it is not a person, and as such it has neither sexuality nor gender. But are we satisfied by these answers? Do they really account for the complex ways that queerness resonates through sound across the social constructs of gender and sexuality? Perhaps there is more to say, and more for which to listen. The upcoming special series of Resonance, “Queer Politics & Positionalities in Sonic Art,” opens discursive space for critical reflection and creative expression on this essay’s opening questions. We don’t intend or desire to answer them definitively. Nor do... You do not currently have access to this content.