Collective listening across distance

Abstract

Shortwave Collective draws from a feminist perspective to learn about sound technology together with others as equal non-experts, bypassing the often hierarchical culture and gendered learning experienced in amateur radio and tech clubs. As an international collective, we spend time together in each other’s company remotely and in hybrid forms – making, testing and sharing DIY open wave-receivers, antennas and other pieces of radio-related technologies, often by reusing various components from found and everyday objects and materials. Our distributed group practice reveals different modes of listening to the electromagnetic transmissions embedded within a soundscape. These draw attention to the position of each listener within a wider constellation of bodies, positionalities, skills, acoustic environments and technologies. We’ve discovered that material innovation, time of day, group dynamics, location, reception and other factors contribute to the outcomes. These are unique to the time and place of each listening and each soundscape. As a group, we combine these individual and topical experiences into a collective network of listenings, which are expressed through performances, installations, recorded works and compositions, as well as in educational activities such as workshops, presentations and commissions. Our collaboratively written text ‘Collective listening across distance’ shares the praxis and thinking behind our collective’s listening methodology and demonstrates its unique ability to create a constellation of fragile, uncertain pluralities.