Sounding Sustainable; or, The Challenge of Sustainability

Abstract

This critique of sustainability is intended to improve cultural sustainability advocacy in ecomusicology, sound studies, and music. The idea of sustainability is expanded in four ways: first, by acknowledging the challenge of sustainability, getting past basic meanings of “endure,” and using sustainability more robustly in its meanings of “change”; second, by arguing for the foundational role of nature / environmental studies; third, by understanding sustainability as a lens rather than a goal, noun, or verb; and fourth, by arguing for aesthetics as an important addition to three-part sustainability theories. Through the lens of a change-oriented, environment-based sustainability, music and sound studies scholars can demonstrate how listeners and musicians value sounds and therefore cultural actions that exist in ethically charged contexts.