Dissonant Sounds is a global, interdisciplinary look at sound and conviviality in the contexts of global capitalism, nationalism, and racism.

Culturally focused but with regard to the materialities of sound, Dissonant Sounds evaluates speech, everyday life, media, computation and music. It does not simply map these phenomena but looks at them as convivial formations in the contexts of global capitalism, nationalism and racism.

With contributors based-in and discussing areas across the globe including South America, North America, the Caribbean, West Africa, Europe, South Asia, East Asia, and the Middle East and from fields including anthropology, sociology, geography, history, ethnomusicology and sound studies, the collection presents a diverse range of spaces and voices. It assesses the ways in which forms of ordinary cultural interactions convey and exceed the dominant racial politics of the moment.

Michael Bull is Professor of Sound Studies at the University of Sussex, UK. He is co-founder and editor of the journal Senses and Society, founding editor of Sound Studies: An Interdisciplinary Journal, and series editor for the book series The Study of Sound (Bloomsbury). He is author of Sirens (Bloomsbury 2020) and co-editor (with Marcel Cobussen) of The Bloomsbury Handbook of Sonic Methodologies (Bloomsbury 2020). He is also co-editor of The Auditory Culture Reader (Bloomsbury 2003, 2016) and editor of The Routledge Companion to Sound Studies (2018).

Malcolm James is Senior Lecturer in Media and Cultural Studies at the University of Sussex, UK. He is author of Sonic Intimacy (Bloomsbury 2020), Urban Multiculture: Youth, Politics and Cultural Transformation (2015), and co-editor of Regeneration Songs: Sounds of Investment and Loss in East London (2018).