The Bloomsbury Handbook of Sound in Museums is the first collection to offer a state-of-the-art survey of the sonic practices in museums.

Museums are increasingly embracing a multisensory approach, shifting from silence to engaging sonic experiences. Used in multifarious ways, sound now plays a pivotal role in museums practices, though resources outlining its debates, key concepts, and research methodologies are scarce. This book represents the area in all its fulness thereby examining the interplay of sound, humans, space, and technology in museum exhibitions. The collection theorizes the field as it showcases practical case studies and provides discussions and interviews. It explores the ontologies of sound, maps museum practices centered on sound, delves into the narrative potential unlocked by sound exhibitions, examines the different museum spatialities, and scrutinizes how sound technology acts as a conduit in these environments.

Alcina Cortez is a museum curator and researcher at NOVA University Lisbon, Portugal. She is author of O Som como Meio de Comunicação nas Exposições em Museus (2023) and several articles for the journals Curator, Sound Studies and Popular Music.

Eric de Visscher is a curator and researcher, presently working for the French Ministry of Culture in Paris. He has previously been Artistic Director of IRCAM/Centre Pompidou, Director of the Musée de la musique (Philharmonie de Paris) and Andrew W. Mellon Visiting Professor at the Victoria and Albert Museum, UK. He was a guest editor of a special issue of Curator: The Museum Journal.

Gabriele Rossi Rognoni is Curator and Chair in Music and Material Culture at the Royal College of Music, UK. He was previoulsy President of the International Committee of Music Museums of ICOM (The International Council of Museums) and Board member of the Galpin Society, of the Benton Fletcher Collection of Keyboard Instruments (Fenton House, National Trust).

Holger Schulze is Professor in Musicology at the University of Copenhagen, Denmark. He is founding editor of the book series Sound Studies. His recent publications include The Bloomsbury Handbook of the Anthropology of Sound (2021), The Bloomsbury Handbook of Sound Art (2020, co-editor), Sonic Fiction (Bloomsbury 2020), Sound Works (Bloomsbury 2019), The Sonic Persona (Bloomsbury 2018), and Sound as Popular Culture (2016, co-editor).