Smith, M.D. orcid.org/0000-0002-3782-1465 (2021) Sound hunting in postwar Japan: recording technology, aurality, mobility, and consumerism. Sound Studies, 7 (1). pp. 64-82. ISSN 2055-1940
Abstract
Throughout the 1970s, the hobby of sound hunting boomed in Japan. A magazine and numerous guidebooks urged young people to get out and about recording the soundscape and hunting for “real sound”. The mobility inherent in the technological transformations of the previous decades fed into a media discourse which drew together theories and practices taken from the protests and sub-cultures of the 1960s that celebrated creativity, openness, and individuated lifestyles, whilst challenging notions of authority and expertise. Sound hunting and amateur recording was a mediatised pastime that sought new ways of incorporating technological change, as well as professional experimentation in music and sound recording, into everyday life. Sound as an object – to be understood, controlled, and manipulated – was incorporated into consumer society through a media discourse that emphasised the individualism, mobility, experimentation, and spending at the heart of youth lifestyles in the 1970s. Capturing sound required detailed research, an individual, creative approach and an amateur spirit. The sound hunting boom in Japan highlights the importance of technology, consumerism and the media to sound studies by shedding light on the wider social, cultural and media contexts within which portable sound-recording technology and new practices of listening became increasingly commodified.
Metadata
Item Type: | Article |
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Authors/Creators: |
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Copyright, Publisher and Additional Information: | © 2020 Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group. This is an author-produced version of a paper subsequently published in Sound Studies. Uploaded in accordance with the publisher's self-archiving policy. |
Keywords: | Sound hunting; Japan; soundscape; tape-recorder; media; youth; consumerism; mobility |
Dates: |
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Institution: | The University of Sheffield |
Academic Units: | The University of Sheffield > Faculty of Social Sciences (Sheffield) > School of East Asian Studies (Sheffield) |
Depositing User: | Symplectic Sheffield |
Date Deposited: | 27 Nov 2020 14:01 |
Last Modified: | 10 Jun 2022 23:39 |
Status: | Published |
Publisher: | Taylor & Francis |
Refereed: | Yes |
Identification Number: | 10.1080/20551940.2020.1857620 |
Open Archives Initiative ID (OAI ID): | oai:eprints.whiterose.ac.uk:168484 |