Archaeoacoustics, the study of sound in the past, is increasingly attracting attention. Although some work, particularly in musical archaeology, had been conducted previously, the field received a significant boost when the term itself was coined by Scarre and Lawson in their 2006 volume of that name, which brought together two major distinct strands: archaeomusicology and the acoustics of archaeological spaces. Since 2006, the number of publications has steadily been growing, yet the field remains in its infancy. This is partly due to the complexity inherent in the analysis of sound, which requires multidisciplinary collaboration across various disciplines. This complexity is reflected in the approaches followed and the contributors from diverse academic fields, including not only archaeology but also anthropology, architecture, classics, history, art history, and sound engineering.
The aim is to provide an overview of a selection of the different topics covered by the field of archaeoacoustics. Contributors aspire to advancing the field through innovative approaches, including those stemming from psychology, a field not commonly associated with archaeology. Additionally, the book seeks to expand the field by developing a number of new ideas based on novel case studies. It presents some of the results derived from major research projects, such as the ERC funded Artsoundscapes and the Soundspace projects led by DíazAndreu and Knighton, respectively. The book will cover a wide range of topics, including a synthetic history of research provided in the introduction, theories about the origins of music in early humans, experimental archaeomusicology, approaches from the fields of neuroacoustics and psychoacoustics, experimental studies of portable and fixed lithophones and other musical instruments, explorations of soundscapes, representations of sound in early medieval frescoes, late medieval urbanscapes, and postmedieval proxemics. Case studies are located in America, Asia, and Europe.
Edited by:
Margarita DíazAndreu,
Neemias Santos da Rosa
Imprint: Casemate Publishers
Country of Publication: United States
Dimensions:
Height: 240mm,
Width: 170mm,
ISBN: 9798888571774
Pages: 256
Publication Date: 15 November 2024
Audience:
Professional and scholarly
,
Undergraduate
Format: Paperback
Publisher's Status: Forthcoming
1. Exploring ancient sounds and places: an introduction to the field of archaeoacoustics Margarita D├¡azAndreu and Neemias Santos da Rosa 2. The role of listening in the prehistorical emergence of speech and song: a precursor to becoming human? Bernd Brabec 3. Archoustemology and the Aurignacian: ancient ways of knowing through sound Simon Wyatt 4. The sounds are audible: fabricating ancient instruments what more can we learn? Neil Rusch 5. Methodological approaches to understand the cognitive effects of music in ritualistic contexts: implications for studying ancient ritual activities Raquel AparicioTerr├®s and Carles Escera 6. Methods for psychoacoustic and emotional evaluation of archaeological soundscapes with auralization Samantha L├│pezMochales and Carles Escera 7. Ethnohistorical sources in archaeoacoustics research: a case study from SouthCentral California AnaMar├¡a Alarc├│nJim├®nez, Raquel Jim├®nez Pasalodos and Margarita D├¡azAndreu 8. Early rock music: methodology to identify and analyze portable lithophones. an example from Great Sand Dunes National Park and Preserve in the San Luis Valley, Colorado, US Marilyn Armagast Martorano 9. Preliminary insights into the archaeoacoustics of cupmarked sounding rocks in the north area of the Gredos mountain chain, Spain Raquel Jim├®nez Pasalodos, Mart├¡n AlmagroGorbea and Jes├║s Caballero Arribas 10. The rock art soundscapes of the Karakol valley (Republic of Altai, Russia): an archaeoacoustic study of a unique landscape Margarita D├¡azAndreu, Raquel Jim├®nez Pasalodos, Neemias Santos da Rosa, Daniel Ben├¡tezArag├│n and Lidia AlvarezMorales 11. Sound imagery in medieval Serbian frescoes Zorana ─Éor─æevi─ç 12. Acoustic space then and now: listening to history Tess Knighton 13. Estimation of speech intelligibility in the past: learning from Benjamin FranklinÔÇÖs experiment Braxton Boren
Neemias Santos da Rosa is a Marie Sklodowska-Curie Postdoctoral Fellow at the University of Bordeaux. He holds a PhD from the Universitat Roviri i Virgili and specialises in experimental archaeology applied to the study of prehistoric art especially the technological, social, acoustic and symbolic aspects of rock art production, with a particular focus on the Iberian Peninsula. Margarita D�az-Andreu is an ICREA Research Professor based at the University of Barcelona (Spain). She holds a PhD from the Complutense University of Madrid. She specialises in prehistoric archaeology, focusing on the rock art and archaeoacoustics of Western Europe. Additionally, she is deeply involved in heritage studies and the history of archaeology, particularly emphasising the history of women in professional archaeology and the politics of identity in archaeology, including social engagement, nationalism and colonialism, ethnicity, and gender.
