[Commlist] New book: Hush by Mack Hagood

We would like to announce a new publication from Duke University Press, 
which we hope will be of interest.

*Hush***

Media and Sonic Self-Control

*Mack Hagood***

*_https://www.combinedacademic.co.uk/hush_**__*

For almost sixty years, media technologies have promised users the 
ability to create sonic safe spaces for themselves—from bedside white 
noise machines to Beats by Dre's “Hear What You Want” ad campaign, in 
which Colin Kaepernick's headphones protect him from taunting crowds. In 
/Hush/, Mack Hagood draws evidence from noise-canceling headphones, 
tinnitus maskers, LPs that play ocean sounds, nature-sound mobile apps, 
and in-ear smart technologies to argue the true purpose of media is not 
information transmission, but rather the control of how we engage our 
environment. These devices, which Hagood calls orphic media, give users 
the freedom to remain unaffected in the changeable and distracting 
spaces of contemporary capitalism and reveal how racial, gendered, 
ableist, and class ideologies shape our desire to block unwanted sounds. 
In a noisy world of haters, trolls, and information overload, guarded 
listening can be a necessity for self-care, but Hagood argues our 
efforts to shield ourselves can also decrease our tolerance for sonic 
and social difference. Challenging our self-defeating attempts to be 
free of one another, he rethinks media theory, sound studies, and the 
very definition of media.

*Mack Hagood*is Robert H. and Nancy J. Blayney Assistant Professor of 
Comparative Media Studies at Miami University in Oxford, Ohio.


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