The earliest references to eavesdropping are found in law books. According to William Blackstone's Commentaries on the Laws of England (1769), ‘eavesdroppers, or such as listen under walls or windows, or the eaves of a house, to hearken after discourse, and thereupon to frame slanderous and mischievous tales, are a common nuisance and presentable at the court-leet’. Today, however, eavesdropping is not only legal, it's ubiquitous – unavoidable. What was once a minor public-order offence has become one of the key political and legal problems of our time, as the Snowden revelations made clear. ‘Eavesdropping’ addresses the capture and control of our sonic world by state and corporate interests, alongside strategies of resistance. For editors James Parker (Melbourne Law School) and Joel Stern (Liquid Architecture), eavesdropping isn't necessarily malicious. We cannot help but hear too much, more than we mean to. Eavesdropping is a condition of social life. And the question is not whether to eavesdrop, therefore, but how.

Published by City Gallery Wellington in association with Liquid Architecture and Melbourne Law School, on the occasion of the exhibition Eavesdropping, curated by James Parker and Joel Stern, at City Gallery Wellington, 17 August - 17 November 2019. The show was first presented at Ian Potter Museum of Art, University of Melbourne, 24 July - 28 October 2018. Eavesdropping is an ongoing collaboration between Liquid Architecture and Melbourne Law School. 

Foreword / Norie Neumark
Eavesdropping / James Parker and Joel Stern
Saydnaya (The Missing 19db) / Lawrence Abu Hamdan
Listening to Answering Machines / Susan Schuppli
Learning from YouTube / Sean Dockray
Hearing, Loss / Joel Spring
Cosmic Static / Fayen d'Evie and Jen Bervin with Bryan Phillips and Andy Slater
Muted Situation 5: Muted Chorus / Samson Young
how are you today / Manus Recording Project Collective
Contributors
List of Works
Colophon
Acknowledgements.