We are witnessing a climate-oriented transformation of what music is and how it comes to be. Recomposed shows how musicians around the world are using the cultural power of music to link climate awareness to climate action.Award-winning author and academic Kyle Devine profiles EarthPercent, founded by Brian Eno and others to help funnel money from the music business to climate causes. Devine enrolls in a course led by ClimateEQ, which teaches carbon literacy for the music ...

The hidden material histories of music.Music is seen as the most immaterial of the arts, and recorded music as a progress of dematerialization—an evolution from physical discs to invisible digits. In Decomposed, Kyle Devine offers another perspective. He shows that recorded music has always been a significant exploiter of both natural and human resources, and that its reliance on these resources is more problematic today than ever before. Devine uncovers t...

Our day-to-day musical enjoyment seems so simple, so easy, so automatic. Songs instantly emanate from our computers and phones, at any time of day. The tools for playing and making music, such as records and guitars, wait for us in stores, ready for purchase and use. And when we no longer need them, we can leave them at the curb, where they disappear effortlessly and without a trace. These casual engagements often conceal the complex infrastructures that make our musical cultures possible....

Stereo is everywhere. The whole culture and industry of music and sound became organized around the principle of stereophony during the twentieth century. But nothing about this-not the invention or acceptance or ubiquity of stereo-was inevitable. Nor did the aesthetic conventions, technological objects, and listening practices required to make sense of stereo emerge fully formed, out of the blue.This groundbreaking book uncovers the vast amount of work that has been required to ma...

The Routledge Reader on the Sociology of Music offers the first collection of source readings and new essays on the latest thinking in the sociology of music. Interest in music sociology has increased dramatically over the past decade, yet there is no anthology of essential and introductory readings. The volume includes a comprehensive survey of the field’s history, current state and future research directions. It offers six source readings, thirteen popular contemporary essays, a...

We're living on the wrong clock. Now is our moment to rethink.In this provocative follow-up to How to Do Nothing, Jenny Odell challenges our cultural obsession with productivity. Drawing on philosophy, ecology and art, Saving Time argues that time is not money – it’s life itself.Odell explores how the ‘clock of capitalism’ dictates our days and disconnects us from natural rhythms, proposing instead a more humane, ecological understanding of time ro...

NOMINATED FOR THE FT & McKINSEY BUSINESS BOOK OF THE YEAR AWARDS 2020'A path-breaking, thought-provoking and in-depth study of how new technology will transform the world of work' Gordon Brown'Compelling... Should be required reading for any presidential candidate' New York TimesNew technologies have always provoked panic about workers being replaced by machines. In the past, such fears have been m...

"Theway Brockman interlaces essays about research on the frontiers of science withones on artistic vision, education, psychology and economics is sure to buzzany brain." — Chicago Sun-Times , on This Will Change EverythingLaunchinga hard-hitting new series from Edge.org and Harper Perennial, editor JohnBrockman delivers this cutting-edge master class covering everything you needto know about Culture. With original contributions by the world'slea...

How do you make your way in a fast-changing world? Why do we have less and less time? Why are some people unfaithful? Who governs the world?This book is about change - from the small and seemingly insignificant transitions in our day-to-day lives, to the big and almost incomprehensible shifts in human history. Because if we want to make change happen ourselves, we have to understand it first. Distilling expert wisdom and complex theories, the authors of the bestselling The Deci...

"A splendid new book. . . . Takes on—and mostly demolishes—the conventional narrative about the acceleration of life in a digital world." ― ObserverMost of us complain that there aren't enough hours in the day and too many e-mails in our thumb-accessible inboxes. This widespread perception that life is faster than it used to be is now ingrained in our culture, and smartphones and the Internet are continually being blamed. But isn't the sol...

Global warming has reached terrifying heights of severity, human consumption has caused the extinction of countless species and neoliberalism has led to a destructive divide in wealth and a polarization of mainstream politics.The climate crisis demands action. Your planet needs you!Can we shop our way out of a crisis? Will technology save the day? What does it mean to be a citizen and not a consumer? Are the real solutions inside of us?Who Cares Wins provid...

Discusses in nontechnical language ten central questions about technology that illuminate what technology is and why it matters.Technology matters, writes David Nye, because it is inseparable from being human. We have used tools for more than 100,000 years, and their central purpose has not always been to provide necessities. People excel at using old tools to solve new problems and at inventing new tools for more elegant solutions to old tasks. Perhaps this is bec...