Papers by Alexandra Supper
Science as Culture, 2016
Dissertation defenses are ambiguous affairs, which mark both the end of a long process of doctora... more Dissertation defenses are ambiguous affairs, which mark both the end of a long process of doctoral education and the inauguration of a doctoral candidate into a body of experts. At Maastricht University (and other Dutch universities), the decision to award a doctoral degree is made on the basis of the written dissertation well before the defense, which makes the ambiguous status of the event between examination and celebration especially evident. Nevertheless, participants attach importance to the event because it impacts the reputation of individual researchers, as well as that of research groups and of the host-university itself. Taking a Goffmanian perspective on the event as a performance, it becomes clear that the ambiguity in the definition between celebration and assessment is contained within the script that details how the performance should be conducted. In this script, participants' role is unclear, providing them the means to act in accordance with their own definition of the event. The ambiguous definition of the event is performed at an individual level but also in team performances, in which participants correct each other when someone's behavior appears too celebratory. Amidst this ambiguity between celebration and assessment, the university reinforces its own authority to award doctoral degrees, acting as a gate-keeping institution to the academic world.
In: Handbuch Sound. Geschichte, Begriffe, Ansätze. Hg. v. Daniel Morat und Hansjakob Ziemer. Stut... more In: Handbuch Sound. Geschichte, Begriffe, Ansätze. Hg. v. Daniel Morat und Hansjakob Ziemer. Stuttgart: Metzler 2018: 75–79.
Lo-fi music is commonly associated with a recording aesthetic marked by an avoidance of state-of-... more Lo-fi music is commonly associated with a recording aesthetic marked by an avoidance of state-of-the-art technologies and an inclusion of technical flaws, such as tape hiss and static. However, I argue that lo-fi music is not defined merely by the presence of such imperfections, but by a discourse which deliberately draws attention to them. Album liner notes play an important role in this discourse, as they can function as curatorial practices, through which lo-fi artists give an appropriate frame of reference to their recordings. By highlighting the ‘honest’ character of the recordings, the intimate recording spaces, the materiality of the equipment and its ambiguous character as machine/instrument/performer, they invite listeners to adopt a genre-adequate mode of listening. Rather than listening past hiss and other recording artefacts as undesirable qualities, listeners are asked to listen for these qualities as an essential element of not just the recordings, but the music itself.
Article published in Sound Studies: An Interdisciplinary Journal, vol 2:1
Sonification, the tran... more Article published in Sound Studies: An Interdisciplinary Journal, vol 2:1
Sonification, the transformation of data into sound, is often argued to challenge the “visual culture” of science. Based on an analysis of rhetorical discourses as well as bodily practices within the sonification community, I show that the relationship between sonification and visual culture is in fact more complex and ambivalent: in publications and interviews, sonification researchers blame visual practices for the marginalisation of sound, but also look up to visualisation as a role model. I argue that this delicate balancing act can be regarded as an expression of what historian of science Thomas Kuhn has referred to as the “essential tension” of science between convention and iconoclasm; here: between questioning a scientific status quo (equated with a “visual bias”) and conforming to it. Turning towards the sonic and embodied skills involved in doing sonification work, I show that the different sensory modalities, which seem so neatly bounded in discourses about sonification, are intimately intertwined in practice.
Eine Kulturgeschichte der Sonifikation, 2012
In this post for the Centre for Imaginative Ethnography, Anna Harris, Thomas Fuller, Alexandra Su... more In this post for the Centre for Imaginative Ethnography, Anna Harris, Thomas Fuller, Alexandra Supper, Joeri Bruyninckx and Melissa van Drie document and reflect upon a ‘sonic dinner’ we hosted in early 2015. Each of the participants, most of us sound scholars, translated a particular sonic memory, story or observation into an edible and audible dish. These dishes evoked places which we have inhabited and relate to in different ways: countries we grew up in but no longer live in; cities we’ve made our homes in recent times; sites we’ve visited as tourists; or locations where we’ve spent time as ethnographers. In the process of ‘transducing’ these place memories into a dish, we addressed recipes in different ways: by meticulously following written instructions or intuitively following auditory cues; by learning instructions from family members in a step-by-step process over the years or reconstructing dishes from different written sources. All of these dishes used sound as a starting point but led to multisensory experiences and performances on the night that, with this contribution, we will translate into yet another format: a multivocal, multisensory and multimedia menu of stories.
Published in: Information and Culture, vol.50:4, pp. 441-464.
In recent years, sonification—the ... more Published in: Information and Culture, vol.50:4, pp. 441-464.
In recent years, sonification—the auditory display of data—has received increasing media attention and been presented as a solution to the challenges posed by large, complex datasets. By analyzing the development of the sonification research community, this article shows that specific historical configurations have led the community to concentrate on technical solutions for the design of sonification technology rather than on analyzing and interpreting sonified data. Consequently, sonification still struggles for scientific acceptance and does not offer any ready-made solutions to the problems posed by complex data; indeed, it echoes, rather than solves, these problems.
At the International Conference on Auditory Display (ICAD), an interdisciplinary conference dedic... more At the International Conference on Auditory Display (ICAD), an interdisciplinary conference dedicated to sonification and the use of non-speech sound to represent information, presenters make use of a variety of bodily skills and representations that appeal to the senses of their audience. In many established disciplines, the conventions that guide the use of these skills and representations are taken for granted; but within ICAD, they are often explicitly negotiated. The practice of ‘data karaoke', in which researchers mimic the sound of a sonification with their own voice, is particularly instructive for understanding these negotiations, and the ICAD community more generally. Data karaoke fulfils five functions: embodiment, highlighting, illustration, authorisation and integration. To make sense of data karaoke, we have to understand the institutional and intellectual environment in which this peculiar practice has emerged; but conversely, an understanding of data karaoke can help us throw new light on epistemological debates about the hierarchy of the senses: data karaoke is a multisensory skill engaging the whole body of the sonification researcher, and thus calls into question the dominant epistemological discourse within the ICAD community, in which the different sensory modalities are framed as competitors. The ICAD case shows that studying conferences as sites where bodies interact, and presentations as performances involving the bodies and senses of scientists, helps us to understand not only the conference cultures, but also the ideals about scientific scholarship and academic authority held by scientific communities.
In the past two decades, the sonification of scientific data – an auditory equivalent of data vis... more In the past two decades, the sonification of scientific data – an auditory equivalent of data visualization in which data are turned into sounds – has become increasingly widespread, particularly as an artistic practice and as a means of popularizing science. Sonification is thus part of the recent trend, discussed in public understanding of science literature, towards increased emphasis on ‘interactivity’ and ‘crossovers’ between science and art as a response to the perceived crisis in the relationship between the sciences and their publics. However, sonification can also be understood as the latest iteration in a long tradition of theorizing the relations between nature, science and human experience. This article analyses the recent public fascination with sonification and argues that sonification grips public imaginations through the promise of sublime experiences. I show how the ‘auditory sublime’ is constructed through varying combinations of technological, musical and rhetorical strategies. Rather than maintain a singular conception of the auditory sublime, practitioners draw on many scientific and artistic repertoires. However, sound is often situated as an immersive and emotional medium in contrast to the supposedly more detached sense of vision. The public sonification discourse leaves intact this dichotomy, reinforcing the idea that sound has no place in specialist science.
Alexandra Supper & Karin Bijsterveld
in: Interdisciplinary Science Reviews, 40:2 (June 2015), pp.... more Alexandra Supper & Karin Bijsterveld
in: Interdisciplinary Science Reviews, 40:2 (June 2015), pp. 124-144
This article investigates the role of listening in the knowledge making practices of Western scientists, engineers, and physicians from the 1920s onwards. It does so by offering a two-dimensional typology of the modes of listening that they employ. Distinguishing between two dimensions allows us to make sense both of the purpose and of the ways in which scientists, engineers, and physicians have listened to their objects of study; and it also allows us to appreciate the importance of shifting between modes of listening. At the same time, we argue, understanding the role of sound in knowledge making cannot be limited to the study of listening alone; rather, we have to pay attention to how listening is embedded in broader sonic skills — including the handling of tools for the making, recording, storing, and retrieving of sounds.
This paper presents a social science perspective on the field of sonification research. Adoptin... more This paper presents a social science perspective on the field of sonification research. Adopting a perspective informed by constructivist science and technology studies (STS), the paper begins by arguing why sonification is an interesting case study to reconsider the role of sensory representation in scientific practice, and in particular the creation of credibility in science. It then focuses on a debate in which the meaning of objectivity is negotiated within the sonification community, showing that different notions of objectivity and scientific quality co-exist within the community, which are linked to different research questions being asked with the sonifications, different users that are envisaged for the sonifications, and different disciplinary backgrounds of the sonification researchers.
This thesis investigates the two journals 'Science, Technology, & Human Values' and 'Social Studi... more This thesis investigates the two journals 'Science, Technology, & Human Values' and 'Social Studies of Science' as sites where the disciplinary, thematic and political boundaries of the emerging academic field of STS (Science and Technology Studies or Science, Technology & Society) are constructed, contested and negotiated. The thesis first outlines the theoretical background and introduces the history of the two journals. Subsequently, it sets out to explore how, over 26 years, the boundaries of the STS field were negotiated in these journals, and how the authors and editors have positioned themselves in the emerging field. On the basis of an analysis of articles and editorial material published in the two journals, it traces the debates about the research objects of STS, its disciplinary status and relationship with adjoining academic fields and disciplines, and about the (past, present and desired) normative, social and political agenda of STS scholarship.
Talks by Alexandra Supper
“You’re not listening to me!” When talking about someone’s listening skills, we often employ a no... more “You’re not listening to me!” When talking about someone’s listening skills, we often employ a normative argument, in which listening well is considered as something of an interpersonal courtesy, if not a civic duty. Similarly, when scholars in the social sciences and humanities write about listening practices, moralistic overtones are quite common. For instance, Adorno’s classification of different types of musical behaviour makes no secret of distinguishing between better and worse kinds of listening; a guter Zuhörer is more respectable than a Ressentiment-Hörer.
Over the course of the last several decades, a variety of such taxonomies of types or modes of listening have been offered by scholars in different disciplines. Some of them have followed a similarly normative path, while others have focused more detachedly on the cognitive dimensions of how people listen (e.g. dimensionally, associationally, or informationally) or the reasons for listening (e.g. for monitory, exploratory or diagnostic purposes).
We want to provide a historical discussion of such efforts to categorise listening modes; not a history of listening, but a history of thinking about listening. In doing so, we explicitly connect works dedicated to the theme of musical listening with those discussing listening skills in domains such as science or everyday life. The different taxonomies spring forth from different historical contexts, and they clarify different aspects of the nature of listening. We seek to understand them in their historical contexts: not merely as passive documentations of styles of thinking about listening, but as active interventions into particular societal and/or academic contexts.
This paper presents a social science perspective on the field of sonification research. Adopting ... more This paper presents a social science perspective on the field of sonification research. Adopting a perspective informed by constructivist science and technology studies (STS), the paper begins by arguing why sonification is an interesting case study to reconsider the role of sensory representation in scientific practice, and in particular the creation of credibility in science. It then focuses on a debate in which the meaning of objectivity is negotiated within the sonification community, showing that different notions of objectivity and scientific quality co-exist within the community, which are linked to different research questions being asked with the sonifications, different users that are envisaged for the sonifications, and different disciplinary backgrounds of the sonification researchers.
I will defend my PhD thesis, entitled "Lobbying for the Ear: The Public Fascination with and Acad... more I will defend my PhD thesis, entitled "Lobbying for the Ear: The Public Fascination with and Academic Legitimacy of the Sonification of Scientific Data".
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Papers by Alexandra Supper
Sonification, the transformation of data into sound, is often argued to challenge the “visual culture” of science. Based on an analysis of rhetorical discourses as well as bodily practices within the sonification community, I show that the relationship between sonification and visual culture is in fact more complex and ambivalent: in publications and interviews, sonification researchers blame visual practices for the marginalisation of sound, but also look up to visualisation as a role model. I argue that this delicate balancing act can be regarded as an expression of what historian of science Thomas Kuhn has referred to as the “essential tension” of science between convention and iconoclasm; here: between questioning a scientific status quo (equated with a “visual bias”) and conforming to it. Turning towards the sonic and embodied skills involved in doing sonification work, I show that the different sensory modalities, which seem so neatly bounded in discourses about sonification, are intimately intertwined in practice.
In recent years, sonification—the auditory display of data—has received increasing media attention and been presented as a solution to the challenges posed by large, complex datasets. By analyzing the development of the sonification research community, this article shows that specific historical configurations have led the community to concentrate on technical solutions for the design of sonification technology rather than on analyzing and interpreting sonified data. Consequently, sonification still struggles for scientific acceptance and does not offer any ready-made solutions to the problems posed by complex data; indeed, it echoes, rather than solves, these problems.
in: Interdisciplinary Science Reviews, 40:2 (June 2015), pp. 124-144
This article investigates the role of listening in the knowledge making practices of Western scientists, engineers, and physicians from the 1920s onwards. It does so by offering a two-dimensional typology of the modes of listening that they employ. Distinguishing between two dimensions allows us to make sense both of the purpose and of the ways in which scientists, engineers, and physicians have listened to their objects of study; and it also allows us to appreciate the importance of shifting between modes of listening. At the same time, we argue, understanding the role of sound in knowledge making cannot be limited to the study of listening alone; rather, we have to pay attention to how listening is embedded in broader sonic skills — including the handling of tools for the making, recording, storing, and retrieving of sounds.
Talks by Alexandra Supper
Over the course of the last several decades, a variety of such taxonomies of types or modes of listening have been offered by scholars in different disciplines. Some of them have followed a similarly normative path, while others have focused more detachedly on the cognitive dimensions of how people listen (e.g. dimensionally, associationally, or informationally) or the reasons for listening (e.g. for monitory, exploratory or diagnostic purposes).
We want to provide a historical discussion of such efforts to categorise listening modes; not a history of listening, but a history of thinking about listening. In doing so, we explicitly connect works dedicated to the theme of musical listening with those discussing listening skills in domains such as science or everyday life. The different taxonomies spring forth from different historical contexts, and they clarify different aspects of the nature of listening. We seek to understand them in their historical contexts: not merely as passive documentations of styles of thinking about listening, but as active interventions into particular societal and/or academic contexts.
Sonification, the transformation of data into sound, is often argued to challenge the “visual culture” of science. Based on an analysis of rhetorical discourses as well as bodily practices within the sonification community, I show that the relationship between sonification and visual culture is in fact more complex and ambivalent: in publications and interviews, sonification researchers blame visual practices for the marginalisation of sound, but also look up to visualisation as a role model. I argue that this delicate balancing act can be regarded as an expression of what historian of science Thomas Kuhn has referred to as the “essential tension” of science between convention and iconoclasm; here: between questioning a scientific status quo (equated with a “visual bias”) and conforming to it. Turning towards the sonic and embodied skills involved in doing sonification work, I show that the different sensory modalities, which seem so neatly bounded in discourses about sonification, are intimately intertwined in practice.
In recent years, sonification—the auditory display of data—has received increasing media attention and been presented as a solution to the challenges posed by large, complex datasets. By analyzing the development of the sonification research community, this article shows that specific historical configurations have led the community to concentrate on technical solutions for the design of sonification technology rather than on analyzing and interpreting sonified data. Consequently, sonification still struggles for scientific acceptance and does not offer any ready-made solutions to the problems posed by complex data; indeed, it echoes, rather than solves, these problems.
in: Interdisciplinary Science Reviews, 40:2 (June 2015), pp. 124-144
This article investigates the role of listening in the knowledge making practices of Western scientists, engineers, and physicians from the 1920s onwards. It does so by offering a two-dimensional typology of the modes of listening that they employ. Distinguishing between two dimensions allows us to make sense both of the purpose and of the ways in which scientists, engineers, and physicians have listened to their objects of study; and it also allows us to appreciate the importance of shifting between modes of listening. At the same time, we argue, understanding the role of sound in knowledge making cannot be limited to the study of listening alone; rather, we have to pay attention to how listening is embedded in broader sonic skills — including the handling of tools for the making, recording, storing, and retrieving of sounds.
Over the course of the last several decades, a variety of such taxonomies of types or modes of listening have been offered by scholars in different disciplines. Some of them have followed a similarly normative path, while others have focused more detachedly on the cognitive dimensions of how people listen (e.g. dimensionally, associationally, or informationally) or the reasons for listening (e.g. for monitory, exploratory or diagnostic purposes).
We want to provide a historical discussion of such efforts to categorise listening modes; not a history of listening, but a history of thinking about listening. In doing so, we explicitly connect works dedicated to the theme of musical listening with those discussing listening skills in domains such as science or everyday life. The different taxonomies spring forth from different historical contexts, and they clarify different aspects of the nature of listening. We seek to understand them in their historical contexts: not merely as passive documentations of styles of thinking about listening, but as active interventions into particular societal and/or academic contexts.