Tag: Sonic South

Mémwa Nwa

Mémwa Nwa

Denise Frazier and Sultana Isham

Mémwa Nwa (Black Memory) traces how themes of love and memory in AfroCreole music by modern Louisiana composers and musicians rearticulate and reaffirm the socio-political and historical condition and context in which they were created. This generated a practice of performative resistance to the forgotten memory of AfroCreole sonic contributions in the nineteenth century.

Speech Melody

Speech Melody

Julia Brock and Jennifer Sutton
Right there in the front yard?

Right there in the front yard?

James Jabar

Poem from the Sonic South Issue.

Soundscapes Are Not Monolithic

Soundscapes Are Not Monolithic

Kristofer Graham, Jessica Peacock, Christina Spears, and Keisha Worthey

Like Black culture, soundscapes are not a monolith. In these personal essays, Black educators in North Carolina reflect on the intersections of their own identities and how they create and make meaning of soundscapes in their educational practice.

Hearing Waycross

Hearing Waycross

Abigail Greenbaum, illustrations by Phil Blank

In this piece, a longtime Gram Parsons fan grows suspicious of the myths that surround the singer's life and music. A visit to Waycross, Georgia; interviews with people connected to Parsons's South Georgia childhood; and investigations of the area's musical, industrial, and socioeconomic histories reveal whose stories are heard and whose are silenced by such myths. The piece explores how one might hear the oppressive structures that echo in the music, such as the exploitation of Black laborers, the anti-Black violence of the region, the deforestation of South Georgia's longleaf grassland, and the impact of that ecological harm on Black and white family farmers.

Reclaiming the Beat

Reclaiming the Beat

Antron D. Mahoney
Located and Dispersed

Located and Dispersed

Monica Moses Haller

This essay considers the specific qualities of underwater sound as a means of learning, for artwork, and for speculative listening. When certain sound waves move through water, for example, they move faster than through air.

“We’re Not Just Shooting the Breeze”

“We’re Not Just Shooting the Breeze”

Matt Sakakeeny, photographs by Abdul Aziz

This is a coming-of-age story of kids who play in southern marching bands and the teachers who mentor them. In the South, "show-style" bands are Black excellence personified.

Windy Gap Road

Windy Gap Road

Joanna Welborn

This photo essay explores deafness, sound, language, and land through the author's personal story of five generations of deafness in her family. Due to their geographic isolation in the mountains of western North Carolina in the 1800s, her family members developed their own sign language to communicate between hearing and Deaf family members.

In Mind and Place

In Mind and Place

Kristin Gee Hickman

This article analyzes the covert racism concealed in the phrase "Ole Miss," a longstanding nickname for the University of Mississippi.

Sounding the South / Souf

Sounding the South / Souf

Regina N. Bradley, illustrations by Jade Orlando

Introduction to the Sonic South Issue, guest edited by Regina N. Bradley.

Front Porch: Sonic South

Front Porch: Sonic South

Tom Rankin