Sound Professions: Transformations on being a printer

Abstract

The study of the evolution of the printing trade requires an attentive observation of how different printing techniques have shaped the trade since the Nineteenth century. Particular printing techniques determine how printers relate to space, to the machine and to the trade itself. Through ethnographic exercises this article explores how the introduction of digital printing techniques has transformed the printing trade in San Nicolás (a traditional neighborhood in Cali, Colombia). I propose this transformation is best described and understood through an ethnographic analysis of the relations between printers and their machines and through a detailed description of the printing offices soundscape.