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March 27-28, 2026, University of Houston
KEYNOTE SPEAKER
Alejandro L. Madrid, Harvard University
VISITING ARTIST
Maria Chávez
Resounding Spaces invites interdisciplinary engagement with musical and sonic practices that shape, and are shaped by, the material, political, and affective textures of global urban contexts. We are seeking probing reflections on the ways in which music and sound participate in producing, contesting, and reimagining urban life around the world; as well as explorations of sonic and musical practices that reveal, disrupt, or reconfigure urban dynamics. We encourage diverse methodological approaches, including critical theory, ethnography, archival work, community-engaged research, and creative or practice-based inquiry. Resounding Spaces aims to foster interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary dialogue, emphasizing the generative potential of music and sound in understanding and reshaping urban society.
Questions related to the interconnectedness of music, sound, noise, and our global urban experience are becoming increasingly important for understanding our sociopolitical experience. As of 2024, 58% of the world’s population – some 4.4 billion people – live in urban areas, a figure projected by the United Nations to reach 68% by mid-century. This dramatic global shift signals a future increasingly shaped by urban life: dynamic, coeval, and interrelated. Amid this transformation, urban areas have become central to conversations about the Anthropocene, postmodernity, and socio-environmental crises, manifested through gentrification, migration, economic disparity, inequality, public safety, and climate vulnerability.
We welcome proposals for 20-minute individual papers and for organized panels (3–4 papers) from music studies and across the wider arts, humanities, and social sciences, including (but not limited to): musicology, music theory, ethnomusicology, sound studies, urban studies, anthropology, cultural geography, history, performance studies, dance, film/tv/media studies, linguistics, theater, sociology, architecture, visual arts, and climate studies. Selected proceedings from the conference may appear in an edited volume.
Please submit your abstract or panel proposal of 250-300 words to the Resounding Spaces Conference Submission Form by November 1, 2025. See the Resounding Spaces Conference website for more information, including topics of interest.
CONFERENCE CO-ORGANIZERS
Damjan Rakonjac (Assistant Professor of Musicology)
Ji Yeon Lee (Associate Professor of Music Theory)
Juan Fernando Velasquez (Assistant Professor of Ethnomusicology)
Kathryn Caton (Lecturer of Musicology)
