Review: The Oxford Handbook of Sound Studies, edited by Trevor Pinch, Karin Bijsterveld; The Sound Studies Reader, edited by Jonathan Sterne

Abstract

The Oxford Handbook of Sound Studies , edited by Trevor Pinch and Karin Bijsterveld. Oxford Handbooks. Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 2012. xii, 593 pp. The Sound Studies Reader , edited by Jonathan Sterne. Abingdon, UK, and New York: Routledge, 2012. x, 566 pp. The Oxford Handbook of Sound Studies (OHSS) and The Sound Studies Reader (SSR) are rowdy in the best sense of the word—vibrant, intense, materially diverse. To read multiple selections from either book in a single sitting yields a dizzying experience akin to plunging one's head into a roaring whirlpool. These volumes invite us to journey into cities, enter laboratories, streak across microchips, zoom in on atoms, tread into gardens, and dive into watery depths in search of soundworlds that boom and bloom. Across sixty-nine chapters in all—twenty-four in OHSS and forty-five in SSR—authors lend their ears to a jumble of mediums, spaces, topics, agents, data, devices, cultures, historical moments, and possible futures. Together, the resonant texts mirror and reflexively critique two of sound studies' leading concerns: first, that we live in noisy times (acoustically, discursively); and second, that the very challenges of writing about sound may offer vital clues into sound's definitions, properties, and epistemologies. The respective introductions to OHSS and SSR lay out sound studies' agenda in admirably broad terms. Trevor Pinch and Karin Bijsterveld identify sound studies as “a flourishing interdisciplinary area with several overlapping disciplines and a range of methods that touch upon the fields of acoustic ecology, sound design, urban studies, cultural geography, media and communication studies, cultural studies, the history and anthropology of the senses, the history and sociology of music, and literary studies” (OHSS, p. 10).1 Jonathan Sterne similarly notes that “people who do sound studies … are not strictly speaking -osophers, -ologists, or -ographers” (SSR, p. 3). Later, he continues: “As a field, sound studies should not close in upon itself to protect sound as an object from the encroachment of other fields or to claim it as privileged disciplinary property. Instead, it should seek out points of connection and reflection” (SSR, …