How do sound-making practices and noise control debates reveal the underlying mechanisms of governance and collective living in a major metropolitan center? Leonardo Cardoso, an anthropologist specializing in sound studies, utilizes ethnographic research conducted in São Paulo to argue that sound is not merely a cultural phenomenon but a critical site for analyzing state power. By examining how noise is regulated and contested, the author demonstrates that sound serves as a primary entry point for understanding the complexities of urban administration and social order.

Scholars in urban anthropology and sound studies recognize this work as a significant contribution to the study of sensory politics in the Global South. Readers frequently note the academic density of the prose, which provides a rigorous framework for understanding the intersection of sound and state power.