Native Spaces : A geography of sonic emplacement

Native Spaces is a location-based audio public art platform created through collaboration between the authors and the Massachusett Tribe at Ponkapoag. Aligned with Natchee Blu Barnd’s concept of creative ‘geographic strategies to unsettle settler colonialism’, the project is distinct due to its approach to using sound and emphasis on collaboration, albeit through differentiated roles and responsibilities, between settler and Indigenous participants. The project’s compositional choices challenge colonial sonic imaginaries while striving for public accessibility, sourcing field recordings from Massachusett territory to resist space abstraction and homogenization while incorporating more-than-human voices alongside human ones to destabilize dominant acoustic hierarchies. Moreover, the project’s relational, co-creation methodology emphasized capacity-building within the Massachusett Tribe while honoring sovereignty. Finally, the work extends beyond representation to nurture relationships between tribal members, local governments, and diverse publics, offering cultural geographers an example of a publicly accessible approach to sound (as a medium for creative documentary) that centers Indigenous voices while acknowledging the reality that contemporary spaces are shared by communities positioned by many different legacies.