Paper Short Abstract:

This talk considers the imagination and experience of silence in rural areas of the European High North. It seeks to understand silence not as the absence of sound or of logocentrist production of words or voice, but rather a resource existing across multiple, diverse social and nature-based forms, carrying with it multiple significations.

Paper Abstract:

This talk considers the presence of silence as it is imagined and experienced across rural landscapes in the European High North. This research understands silence not as the absence of sound or of logocentric words, but rather a resource that exists across multiple, diverse social and nature-based forms, carrying with it multiple significations. Through an investigation of how the material and symbolic infrastructures of silence give it meaning as it is produced, consumed and experienced in various Arctic communities, I aim to deconstruct the expectations of silence through its wider social and cultural processes, to show silence to be a fundamental aspect of everyday life and to cultivate it as a utilizable immaterial resource. Using mixed methods from across several disciplines (anthropology, geography, environmental humanities, soundscape ecology), I will also think through the various forms of observation and documentation that can be used to encapsulate the significance of silence, and consider how to implement nuanced understandings of the significance and role of silence in everyday life, across pasts, futures and presents.