Budhaditya Chattopadhyay – författare

This book is the first ever systematic attempt to study film sound in the Indian subcontinent by artistic research. The book aims to fill the scholarly void on the issues of sound and listening in the Global Souths’ cultures. It develops a comprehensive understanding of the unique sound world of Indian film and audiovisual media through the examination of historical developments of sound from early optical recordings to contemporary digital audio technologies. The book is enriched with a practice-based methodology informed by the author’s own practice and based on extensive conversations with leading sound practitioners in the Indian subcontinent. The book locates an emerging social and spatial awareness in Indian film and media production aided by a creative practice of sound, occurring alongside the traditionally transcendental, oral, and pluriversal approach to listening. By tracing this confluence of tradition and modernity, the book makes valuable contributions to the fields of film history, sound, and media studies.

The Auditory Setting introduces and investigates how narrative and a sense of place are constructed in film and media arts through the reproduction and mediation of site-specific environmental sounds, or ‘ambience’. Although this sonic backdrop acts as the acoustically mediated space where a story or event can take place, there has been little academic study of sound’s undervalued role in cinematic setting and production. Drawing on theories of narrative, diegesis, mimesis and presence, and following a varied number of relevant audio-visual works, this book is a ground-breaking exploration of human agency in mediating environmental sounds and the nature of the sonic experience in the Anthropocene.

Analyses the sonic environment mediated and crafted within the film and audiovisual media artsDefines the generally underexplored but well-used terms ambient sound" and "ambience" terms that denote an often unnoticed but significant element in the organization of sound in film and media productionsTraces the use of ambient sound in film and media art production through various technological trajectories leading to the contemporary milieu of digital sound systemsTakes a critical attitude towards the notions of diegetic sound, mimesis, presence, artistic transformations of soundscapes and technological innovationsQuestions the conventional assumptions about sound in film and audiovisual media art (e.g. image-based relationships), and intends to shift the focus on the notion of sculpting a site's presence in the diegetic world of media productions as a vital narrative strategyDraws inputs from prominent media artists and practitioners and their works across the globe as well as from this author's practiceIncludes examples from Indian, European and American films and many artworks from around the worldWatch the author introduce the book in webinar from the Centre for Screen Cultures, University of St AndrewsThe Auditory Setting introduces and investigates how narrative and a sense of place are constructed in film and media arts through the reproduction and mediation of site-specific environmental sounds, or 'ambience'. Although this sonic backdrop acts as the acoustically mediated space where a story or event can take place, there has been little academic study of sound's undervalued role in cinematic setting and production. Drawing on theories of narrative, diegesis, mimesis and presence, and following a varied number of relevant audio-visual works, this book is a ground-breaking exploration of human agency in mediating environmental sounds and the nature of the sonic experience in the Anthropocene."

The first-ever book to systematically and comprehensively investigate the unique sound worlds of the Global South, Sonic Perspectives from the Global Souths outlines the historical and aesthetic developments of sound practices in some of the key regions of South Asia, the Middle East, Latin America, and Africa. It examines the sonic aesthesis and thinking in these regions in the light of a complex and fraught colonial relationship with the West to bring forward the under-engaged and often underrepresented artists and thinkers and sonic epistemologies from the Global South. The book is auto-ethnographic in approach, informed by the author’s own practice and migratory background, and draws insights from long conversations with prominent sound practitioners based in the Global South or part of their diaspora. The book traces a decolonial milieu of sounding and listening and offers embodied perspectives on the unheard reciprocity, resonant relationality, and the aural confluences.

This book develops a comprehensive understanding of the unique sound worlds of key regions in the Global South, through an auto-ethnographic method of self-reflective conversations with prominent sound practitioners from South Asia, Africa, the Middle East and Latin America.

This book develops a comprehensive understanding of the unique sound worlds of key regions in the Global South, through an auto-ethnographic method of self-reflective conversations with prominent sound practitioners from South Asia, Africa, the Middle East and Latin America.  The conversations navigate various trajectories of sound practices, illuminating intricate sonic processes of listening, thinking through sounds, ideating, exposing, and performing with sound. This collection of conversations constitutes the main body of the book, including critical and scholarly commentaries on aural cultures, sound theory and production. The book builds a ground-up approach to nurturing knowledge about aural cultures and sonic aesthetics, moving beyond the Eurocentric focus of contemporary sound studies. Instead of understanding sound practices through consumption and entertainment, they are explored as complex cultural and aesthetic systems, working directly with the practitioners themselves, who largely contribute to the development of the sonic methodologies. Refocusing on the working methods of practitioners, the book reveals a tension between the West’s predominant colonial-consumerist cultures, and the collective desires of practitioners to resist colonial models of listening by expressing themselves in terms of their arts and craft, and their critical faculties.Conversations with:Clarence Barlow, Sandeep Bhagwati, Rajesh K. Mehta, Sharif Sehnaoui, Ximena Alarcón Díaz, Hardi Kurda, Mario de Vega, Luka Mukhavele, Khyam Allami, Cedrik Fermont, Khaled Kaddal, David Velez, Juan Duarte, Youmna Saba, Abdellah M. Hassak, Mariana Marcassa, Amanda Gutiérrez, Syma Tariq, Alma Laprida, Siamak Anvari, Mohamad Safa, Debashis Sinha, Zouheir Atbane, Constanza Bizraelli, Jatin Vidyarthi, Joseph Kamaru, Surabhi Saraf, Isuru Kumarasinghe, Hemant Sreekumar.