When the looms stop, the baby cries
Jenny Hall · 2022
Early theories in sound studies have been based on Western-centric assumptions regarding ‘noise’, the passivity of participants, and the private as a place of retreat from the public. However, an examination of the two main kimono-making industries in Kyoto, Nishijin orimono (weaving) and Kyō-yūzen (paste-resist dyeing), provides an alternative understanding of urban sonic environments that challenge such entrenched assumptions. This chapter focuses on the ways in which technological change, especially mechanisation and digitisation, has altered the sonic environment of the kimono-making industry to highlight these debates and demonstrates that weavers and dyers continually negotiate and contest their sonic environments.