Listening as Witnessing

Witnessing is a new inter- and multi-disciplinary, peer-reviewed journal, launching with a special issue on listening, co-edited by Brandon LaBelle and Anna Papaeti.

“This special issue draws on a selection of papers given at two international symposia organized in the context of ERC MUTE – Soundscapes of Trauma: Music, Sound, and the Ethics of Witnessing (Horizon 2020).¹ The first one, ‘Listening as Witnessing’, took place in Athens (16 to 19 October 2023) and was co-organized by the Institute of Historical Research of the National Hellenic Research Foundation (IHR / NHRF), The Listening Academy, and the Athens School of Fine Arts. The second symposium, ‘Ear Witness: Listening to Violence, Migration, Climate’ was co-organized by the IHR / NHRF and the Geneva University of Art and Design (HEAD – Genève, Haute école d’art et de design, Hes-so). It took place in Geneva (25 to 26 February 2025), a place where international advocacy and activism meet policy-making, aiming at sharing research and reflections, as well as creating the potential for future synergies and intra-sectoral collaborations.

The interdisciplinarity of these encounters reflects the sonic turn that has been taking place in the humanities and social sciences: a paradigm shift that has brought to the fore the social, cultural, and political ramifications of sound and the importance of listening practices in understanding the world. Posing new questions and shedding light onto perspectives previously ignored or silenced, has allowed scholars, researchers, and artists to challenge and transgress the boundaries of national archives and archives of violence. Understanding the multifaceted role of sound in political and historical traumas, as well as its inaudibility and absence in discussions about violence and resistance is to perceive a missing and crucial part of the puzzle that allows us to critically approach and listen to the past and present with different ears.

Inaugurating the journal Witnessing, this issue shares the notion of witnessing as a process that ‘cannot be fully grasped by one discipline single-handedly but requires the methodological tools and practices of many’ (See About). The articles, essays, and audio essays explore – critically and multimodally – listening as a process of witnessing with regard to traumatic, invisible or inaudible sounds, voices, (hi)stories. How is trauma acoustically represented? What does it take to make an absent sound or voice heard? What is the ethical and political positionality of listening as witnessing? And what of the unlistenable, when it becomes difficult to listen further? What kind of response and responsibilities does listening-witnessing call for? Can mutualities and networks of care develop through practices of listening in such contexts? Can listening become the point where different struggles meet? What are the intersections of listening-witnessing and art practices? An encounter of scholars, artists, and researchers, this issue aims at collaborative dialogue. Contributing to new perspectives on listening as witnessing, it hopes to initiate a redistribution of the heard. Published in a politically bleak moment in time, when human rights once taken for granted are consistently undone, far-right ideologies, racism, nationalism, and violence are spiralling out of control against a wide range of Others, while environmental crises, war, and genocide are raging, we wish to open up a dialogue with engaged communities of peers.”

● Editorial

Anna Papaeti and Brandon LaBelle Introduction

● Articles

BRANDON LABELLE Poetics of Listening: From Archives of Silence to Negative Methodology

ANNA PAPAETI Listening to Conflict: Radio Broadcasts across Divided Cyprus

GENE RAY Late Listening: A Planetary Concept

NELLI KAMBOURI Listening in Common: Sound, Migration, Gender, and the Buzzing of Translation

DANA PAPACHRISTOU AND YORGOS SAMANTAS Broadcasting from a Deaf Planet: Deaf and Hearing Encounters through Sound and Radio Art at School

LEANDROS KYRIAKOPOULOS Dangerous Listening: Warfare, Technology, and the Spectrum of Audibility

● SHORT ESSAYS

STEFANOS LEVIDIS Sounding Border Nations: An Aural Contact with the Greek-Albanian Border

EVA MATSIGKOU Disguised as a Recorder: Reflective Practices in Documenting Migrant Women’s Stories