The Citizenship Ceremony

Yesterday Carrie and I were sworn in as Canadian citizens. Our ceremony took about two hours. First, all 40-odd immigrants (from 25 countries) had to have their IDs checked, and get one last set of questions as to whether we’d been in trouble with the law or immigration since we submitted our forms. We also signed a form with the oath of citizenship on it, which meant (as with marriage certificates and weddings) that we were probably legal citizens at that point even though we hadn’t yet gone through the ceremony.* Then we were all called back into the room. A clerk explained the ceremony (in both English and French), and then a judge came in and spoke to us, mostly in French. She said all the things you’d expect her to say at a citizenship ceremony — it’s our big day, it’s an accomplishment, it’s a responsibility, we should explore Canada, fulfill our dreams, etc. But a couple things stood out.

Her speech had a section that was especially addressed to women. She talked about equality of opportunity for women as one of the defining aspects of Canada. She spoke about being able to be a woman judge. On one level, to the highly educated crowd I run with, this can sound hokey, or even problematic given the way “women’s rights” has been used as a lever in some Islamophobic talk. But on another level it rang true for me as something that distinguishes Canada. Can you imagine a U.S. citizenship judge instructing immigrants on women’s equal rights? And I have to say there was plenty of male entitlement (and not just male privilege) on display in France and Germany when I visited. Sure, it’s still a patriarchy here too, but the sentiment was meaningful given the occasion, and I can think of lots of occasions where there is a greater presumption of equality here than in other places.

Beyond the rights and responsibilities talk, she actually thanked us for becoming citizens. I’ve never seen or heard of an official of a country expressing gratitude to immigrants before. Maybe that’s common, but I found it notable. Also, amazingly, you actually get a decent free gift (not counting the Maple Leaf pin and flag).

After the speech, we had our names called to come up and collect our citizenship certificates and shake hands with the judge.

Then, we recited the oath of citizenship in both languages, and sang the national anthem, also in both languages. Right beforehand, the clerk spoke and said the second strangest thing I heard yesterday**: that he needs to see us saying the oath in order for us to be citizens, and that if he doesn’t see it, they might cancel our citizenship. Besides being utterly bizarre and probably unenforceable (they weren’t looking up photos as we were reciting the oath), it also suggests that they’re playing on people’s experiences in more authoritarian states. Then again, maybe with iris scanning, this will be our future as well. Or maybe not.

People were very happy, many pictures were taken, and yes, I got butterflies right before my name was called to go get my certificate. Afterwards, we went and had coffee at the Queen Elizabeth, with our friend Darin, who had joined us for the event.

Up next: my citizenship FAQ

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* All the interviews, documentation and medical checks happen for permanent residency. For citizenship, they count the days you’re physically on Canadian soil (very 19th century, but with an online “residence calculator”), and then you take a multiple-choice exam, which is really also a literacy test in French and English, and given the multiple choice works, also a test of a certain type of Western-style bureaucratic reason.

** The strangest thing was a pictographic sign on the inside of the bathroom stall doors instructing people to throw used toilet paper in the toilet, not on the floor. They must have had problems.

Post Publication Cleanup: Old School Word Clouds


I’m in the somewhat laborious process of decommissioning files from two books. I hate sorting through paper. I’m organized inside computers, not outside them. There are tons of things that were important at the time and can now be recycled, including these two pages (which as you can see from the scan-through are already recycled drafts of “What If Interactivity Is the New Passivity?”). I won’t bother you with scans of the manuscript in its various different stages, but the materiality of print is hard to ignore when surveying the masses of paper that were produced before the final book was put into print. Reduced to an incunabulum, my copy of the advance version of the book (ie, bound, uncorrected proofs for reviewers) has been retired to the Museum of Quirky Communication Technologies With a Special Emphasis on the Obsolete, at least until I think of a better home for it. The Sound Studies Reader, though longer, produced less paper in my home and office. If you include the piles of paper produced by all the authors in the preparation and original publication of their essays, it would yield an awesome mountain.

New Text: about 900 pages of it

(also available on wax cylinder, via 128kbps mp3):

I returned home from Europe to find both my new books waiting for me. Although Amazon lists North American release dates in early August (and MP3 comes out on my birthday), the books are starting to reach people.

MP3 is a gorgeous book and I have to thank Amy Ruth Buchanan, my designer, and Liz Springate, my graphic artist (I hired her: I don’t know of any academic presses that provide graphic artists for their authors). Even the hardcover with its orange and black colour combo has a certain special quality.

As I wrote to the authors in The Sound Studies Reader, assembling the reader was a labour of love, but also considerably more difficult than I initially imagined, because of the sheer volume of great work on sound that’s now in print (and the ongoing flow of great work that’s appeared since the ToC was set). In the end, I decided to include more work with the sacrifice that it required some editing and excerpting. Some of my favourite authors and texts — new and old — aren’t even in the book.

I’m grateful to everyone who helped me along in the rather lengthy process of producing both book. The acknowledgements at the beginning of MP3 are a pamphlet in themselves, and you can read them online courtesy of Scribd.

I’ll have more to say about both books in the coming weeks, but it was time to announce since others are starting to get them.

If you want to order either, here are some options:

MP3: The Meaning of a Format at Duke University Press
The Sound Studies Reader at Routledge.

Both companies also have examination copy policies if you’re thinking of course adoption.

Amazon in your country may have a discount (the US does, Canada does not), or you could support your local awesome academic bookstore, if you still have one. For instance, in Pro QM Berlin has a better English-language academic bookstore than any in Montreal. And I’m not just saying that because they have a “sound studies/noise” shelf.

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In addition to cloth, paper, and wax cylinder via mp3, MP3 will be out on iBooks and Kindle sometime in the next few weeks, and I will also be launching an online companion (done in Scalar) later in the summer.

There will be a book launch in Montreal in September.

…and oops, we’re in the summer hiatus

and I’m in Europe for 4 weeks. We just got to Paris, which is lovely (I’d never been). We’re near the Bastille for two days before moving into an apartment. In England, I had a wonderful time at the Supersonix conference, and the highlight was recording a bit of the intro to MP3 onto a ca. 1900 phonograph cylinder as part of Aleks Kolkowski’s Phonographies project.

But things have already been quite slow in this space, and probably will continue to be, apart from occasional announcements, until fall. Though every time I say that, something comes up.