Paesaggi sensoriali delle miniere. Suoni, voci e memorie alla fine della vita estrattiva nella Sardegna sud-occidentale

Felice Tiragallo

2024-01-01

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Abstract

For the anthropologist, mining work seems to be characterized by a specific set of spatial, material, bodily and sensory relationships. Current debates in anthropology emphasize the importance of a direct approach to this range of features of experience, in correlation with the need to understand how they are related to social meanings. This article uses this approach to investigate how sensory experiences of mining are shared by miners as communities of practice. At the same time, the historical decline of mining is inexorably limiting mining landscapes and cultures to the heritage of the past. In European mining districts, such as that of southwestern Sardinia (Italy), a rich heritage of memories of an abandoned mining world coexists with a series of advanced, state-subsidized mining facilities that are ceasing to operate. In this context, a particular form of life seems to appear that links miners, witnesses of a recent mining past, with local communities still involved in mining. The existence of a rich auditory sensitivity in the underground, recorded by the research project is closely related to the way former miners “voice” and “hear” what they say. The sensory landscapes of mine life are linked to the subjective voices that express their history and memory. Drawing on ethnographic research, I will discuss the relationship between the performative aspects of oral memory and the acoustic and visual dimensions of modern mining work.