Ethnography / Listening / Recording. Sound Environments of the Malawian North and Beyond

Abstract

Anthropological writings barely comment on practices of listening and recording that are in fact essential for ethnographic fieldwork. They constitute the foundations of encountering the local environments approached by ethnographers. This research practice recontextualizes recorded sound in the new settings of academic or commercial repositories. Two case studies from fieldwork in Northern Malawi elucidate ways in which reflective listening and the uti-lization of technology constitute knowledge generative processes. The example of the recordings entitled “Bicycling through Chibavi” concerns questions of distance and engagement during fieldwork. The case of an experimental recording of vimbuza music constitutes a methodological project of a “situationist event”. The project demonstrates how the subjects of the research performatively navigate between local sound environments.