Sound communities

Abstract

What makes communities ‘sound’? One key feature noted in this article is resilience, though a more extensive list of features of sound communities is also addressed. The term ‘sound communities’ is intentionally polysemous and perhaps especially for this reason demands an intensely interdisciplinary approach to its definition for use within ethnomusicology. The keyword ‘sound communities’ builds on the work of ethnomusicologist Jeff Todd Titon (2015) and puts the discussion in a much wider context of studies of community, communities of practice and performance, ‘sound praxis’ (Araujo, 2009), applied ethnomusicologies and peacebuilding. Case studies presented in this article are largely based on applied ethnomusicology approaches.