Phonozoic

Publications and Research


Select Publications

A red dot indicates an item that you can read (or hear) in full by following the link provided.

Some Recent Presentations

  • "Inventing the Sound Recording: The Evolution of a New Medium, 1877-1892," National Museum of American History Tuesday Colloquium, December 6, 2011.
  • "Phonogram Images on Paper, 1250-1950," Association for Recorded Sound Collections annual conference, Los Angeles, California, May 2011. [Abstract]
  • "He Was the Edison Phonograph: Len Spencer, an Old New Media Pioneer," Society for Cinema and Media Studies conference, New Orleans, Louisiana, March 13, 2011.
  • "New Directions in Phonautographic History," Association for Recorded Sound Collections conference in Washington DC, May 29, 2009. Both the "script" and audio may be accessed here.
  • "The Quest for the World's Oldest Recorded Sounds," Audio Engineering Society Chicago section meeting, Nov. 20, 2008.
  • "From Echo To Tinfoil: The Early Phonograph in Light of Its Prehistory," Association for Recorded Sound Collections conference in Palo Alto, California, March 28, 2008. Audio of the entire conference, including my presentation, is available here.
   

Patrick Feaster
photo: Ronda L. Sewald

Research Interests

The social and cultural history and prehistory of the phonograph, telephone, and other sound media, with a focus on reconfigurations of speech and performance and the methodical use of sound recordings themselves as texts for analysis.

Select Manuscripts / Works in Progress

  • "Edison's Phonographic Voice and the Aural Culture of Imitation"
  • "'Rise and Obey the Command': Performative Fidelity and the Exercise of Phonographic Power"
  • "'A Compass of Extraordinary Range': The Forgotten Origins of Phonomanipulation"
  • "'My Mother Was a Phonograph': The Deixis of Emergent Sound Media"
  • "'Fixing Sounds': On the Nature and Antiquity of the Phonogram"
  • "The Physiology of Audition and the Emergence of Modern Sound Media"

Dissertation

My dissertation, which I defended in April 2007, is entitled "The Following Record": Making Sense of Phonographic Performance, 1877-1908.  You can order a hard copy from ProQuest if you like; at over 700 pages, you'd probably come out ahead in terms of sheer raw materials!


See also a collection of media reports describing projects and publications with which I've been involved.

 
 

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Original content copyright © 2009, Patrick Feaster.