Listening to the Street: Urban Sounds in Hamburg-Altona between the „Right to the City“ and the „Creativity Dispositif“

Research output: Journal contributionsJournal articlesResearchpeer-review

Authors

  • Lisa Gaupp
  • Nikolas Bielefeldt
  • Rufus Giesel
  • Kathleen Göttsche
  • Zoe Hasse
  • Simon Laumeyer
  • Leona Lenßen
  • Julia Mai
  • Anna Rüpcke
  • Louis Rummler
  • Joanna Dill
This study examines the complex relationship between music and cities. More specifically, it explores how, when and why distinct urban atmospheres and unique urban spaces are created through music, specific sounds or creative social practices such as busking. As Andreas Reckwitz has shown, it has become a social regime in accordance to the creativity dispositif to act creatively and to strive for originality and uniqueness. Busking and other creative expressions in public sphere seem to satisfy this demand, but at the same time, they also tend to symbolise practices of resistance against neo-liberal discourses. According to Reckwitz, this social aestheticisation can be observed especially in cities, for example, in neo-liberal discourses such as city marketing. To examine this ambivalent if not contradictory divide, this empirical study focuses on STAMP, an international street arts festival in Hamburg, Germany, and especially, on related music practices. It considers macrostructures, such as city policies, organisational and spatial politics of gentrification and micro-practices of creativity expressed in symbolic interactions or practices of participation, following specific sociocultural conventions. Using a mixed method research design including ethnography, surveys, qualitative interviews and soundscape analysis, this study explores the many different facets of urban sounds in the streets of Hamburg-Altona from different sociological perspectives. By considering not only different perspectives, such as those of the organisers of the festival, the city, local residents, audiences or musicians as well as cultural policies but also the sound of the festival, this study aims to answer the question whether such urban musical practices are at odds with or contribute to what Reckwitz refers to as “creativity dispositif” and related processes of gentrification or whether they can be related to what Henri Lefebvre has described as the “right to the city”.
Original languageEnglish
JournalAVANT: Trends in Interdisciplinary Studies
Volume11
Issue number3
Pages (from-to)1-24
Number of pages24
ISSN2082-7598
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 22.12.2020

Bibliographical note

Funding Information:
Lisa Gaupp is interim professor for cultural sociology at Leuphana University of Lüneburg. She studied cultural studies (Kulturwissenschaften) and intercultural & international studies at the Universities of Lüneburg and Barcelona and holds a PhD in ethnomusicology from Hanover University of Music, Drama and Media. Her scholarly work - which has been supported by numerous grants and was awarded with several prizes - focuses on music, performance arts, migration, inequality, global interrelations, urban spaces, politics, diversity and decolonizations. Lisa has lived in the USA, Haiti, Guatemala and Spain and was executive manager of the 2009 Hannover International Violin Competition (Stiftung Niedersachsen).

Publisher Copyright:
© 2020, AVANT. All rights reserved

Documents

DOI