Or­din­ary Or­al­it­ies: Every­day Voices in His­tory

Histories of voice are often written as accounts of greatness: great statesmen, notable rebels, grands discours, and famous exceptional speakers and singers populate our shelves. This focus on the great and exceptional has not only led to disproportionate attention to a small subset of historical actors (powerful, white, western men and the occasional token woman), but also obscures the broad range of vocal practices that have informed, co-created and given meaning to human lives and interactions in the past. The volume aims toward geographical and chronological breadth, from any region of the globe, from roughly the seventeenth to the twentieth century. Contributors to this volume seek out spaces and moments that have been documented idiosyncratically or with difficulty, and where the voice and its sounds can be of particular salience.