The Sounds of Melting Mountains: A Sound Cartography of Mining in Minas Gerais, Brazil

• Published in: Pulse (Budapest) Vol. 9; no. 1; pp. 1 - 21
• Main Author: Pessoa, Frederico
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Central European University 01.12.2022; Central European University, Budapest
• Subjects: Environmental interactions; mining; Music; neo-extractivism; Political Ecology; Sociology of Art; Sociology of Culture; sound cartography; soundscape; Mining; neoextractivism; sound cartography; soundscape
• ISSN: 2416-111X
• DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.10547283

This essay addresses the sounds of Brazilian mining, focusing on the State of Minas Gerais, where two recent catastrophes occurred as a result of the collapse of mining tailings dams: Mariana and Brumadinho. The purpose of this article is to develop a sound cartography that articulates different dimensions of the exploratory processes of extractivism, an economic model that has become central in Brazil since colonial times, and which establishes a relationship with the Earth as an inexhaustible supplier of natural resources. Mining structures complex relationships that range from endless perforations of the Earth and the opening of monstrous craters that ravage entire ecosystems to capital flows that enrich the stock market, but keep the population's basic needs unmet. The path followed in this text crosses multiple aspects that make up the sounds of mining and that are symbols of the predatory action that humans have continually exerted on their surroundings. The human species has forgotten that it is ontologically a constitutive part of the environment and that its actions result in ever-increasing changes in the fine fabric that connects beings and forms the biosphere. Mining is one of these actions and a symbol of a way of life that has led us to the critical moment we are in.