Phonographic Encounters

This cross-disciplinary volume illuminates the history of early phonography from a transnational perspective, recovering the myriad sites, knowledge practices, identities and discourses which dynamically shaped early recording cultures. With case studies from China, Australia, the United States, Latin America, Russia, Sweden, Germany, Spain, Portugal, France, and Italy, Phonographic Encounters explores moments of interaction and encounter, as well as tensions, between local and global understandings of recording technologies.

Drawing on an array of archival sources often previously unavailable in English, it moves beyond western-centric narratives of early phonography and beyond the strict confines of the recording industry. Contributions from media history, musicology, popular music studies, cultural studies, area studies and the history of science and technology make this book a key and innovative resource for understanding early phonography against the backdrop of colonial and global power relations.

Author Biography

Elodie A. Roy is a media and material culture theorist. She is the author of Media, Materiality and Memory: Grounding the Groove (Routledge).

Eva Moreda Rodríguez is Senior Lecturer in Musicology at the University of Glasgow and the author of two books on music and politics in Francoist Spain. Her research into early recordings in Spain has received funding from the AHRC and the British Academy.