Audible Metropolis
- Elizabeth Bynum
- School of Arts & Sciences
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Student Arts Innovation Grant
This image was taken by one of Elizabeth Bynum’s research contacts in her home. Telling the story of her research in an audio format allows Elizabeth to linger in the ambiguities and uncertainties she’s encountered in fieldwork. “Based on my field methods training, particularly in Experimental Ethnography, I am committed to the idea that there are multiple ways of knowing and multiple ways of representing information, and audio recording is part of how I approach my research subject.”
Elizabeth Bynum will produce a creative 35-45 minute audio documentary related to her dissertation on citizen and government practices of measuring, evaluating, and controlling sound in Mexico City. The piece will weave together multiple kinds of audio, including recordings made in residents’ homes, recordings of noise complaint investigations, and soundscape recording in the two neighborhoods where her research is centered, Juárez and the Centro Histórico. Part audio documentary and part sound composition, the final product will combine narration and non-narrative segments of environmental sound, demonstrating the potential of creative multimodal social science research to generate new questions and ideas. The final piece, tentatively entitled “Audible Metropolis,” will be shared on a Jekyll static site to promote accessibility and ensure the project’s longevity. Bynum will also facilitate two one-day workshops at Penn where graduate students will be invited to share and workshop sound-based research projects. Workshops will be publicized by the Center for Experimental Ethnography, and hosted in Music Department spaces, with support from Music faculty and staff.