Listening

Sound has been a growing area of research and interest to cultural geographers, taking cues from non-representational and affect theories to question the primacy of the visual that has previously dominated much creative and experimental geographical research. Over the past decade, many geographers have led the way in multi- and transdisciplinary inquiries into listening, advancing methods that span creative and geographical practices. In this chapter we explore how creative approaches to ‘listening’ through sonic, ambient, resonance, and atmospheric qualities of spatial and mobile phenomena have advanced cultural geographies, and particularly, have continued to bridge creative practice and field-based inquiries. We draw on a series of creative experiments from fieldwork around two Australian places, the city of Brisbane-Meanjin and the regional town of Bundaberg, discussing the potentials of sonic methods and suggesting future trajectories for listening in geographic research.