Слышимое прошлое

Логос. 2026. Т. 36. № 1. С. 195–246.

Стерн Д.

Translator: Д. В. Параничев, С. С. Кондрин, Жиганов М. Д.

Why did sound reproduction technologies emerge at the end of the 19th century, and not at another time, given that some practices, ideas, and concepts of sound reproduction existed even before the advent of machines? What made them possible, sought-after, and significant, and why did they acquire these particular forms and functions? As long as sound was conceptualized in terms of idealized entities such as “voice” or “music,” it remained a mere presumption. But in the modern era, sound and hearing shifted their modes: sounds were objectified, transformed, reproduced, commercialized, and industrialized. Although vision was a privileged sense in European philosophical discourse during the Enlightenment, it would be a mistake to think that it constituted the social blueprint of modernity. It would be more accurate to say that modern modes of listening anticipated modern modes of seeing. Objectifying operations on sound were not a simple effect—this objectification of hearing and sound and their construction as limited and coherent objects was a precondition for the creation of reproduction technologies. Thus, the audible past becomes audible to the extent that it is prepared to become a project for the consistent historical consideration of each of the conditions of its unfolding and development over time.

Keywords: модерн, Просвещение, modernity, Enlightenment, сенсориум, sensorium, Auditory experience, perceptual revolution, aurality, audiovisual litanies, audile techniques, audible past, слуховой опыт, перцептивная революция, ауральность, аудиовизуальные литании, аудильные техники, слышимое прошлое