Generating Ontologies of Historical Sound Recordings. Interculturality, Inter-collectivity, and Transmutation as Method

Abstract

The article focuses on historical sound recordings and how they are perceived by several actors, showing the limits of interculturality when dealing only with human/human interactions. Inter-collectivity is suggested as a concept that includes human/non man relations taking these ontologies as certain and as a serious basis for an analysis. In the second part, problems of translation in inter-collective interactions are discussed, leading to the method of “transmutation”. The concept refers to Roman Jakobson’s (1959) idea of an intersemiotic translation, defined as “an interpretation of verbal signs by means of signs of nonverbal sign system”. Furthermore, it demonstrates how transmutation is a general practice in Pemón shaman and ipukenak (wise person) interactions with spirits. Therefore, the ritual song genre murúa (Pemón) is chosen as an example. Finally, the present study shows how transmutation in indigenous translation practices can be applied as a method to analyse historical recordings. I argue that sound as sound itself and the material that contains it have to be understood as a new ontological unit that is continuously generated. The process of that generation is defined by several entities (e.g. thoughts, practices, relations) and their semiotic systems.