From the call to prayer to the silences of the museum (original) (raw)
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Soundmarks in Place : the Case of the Divided City Centre of Nicosia
2014
In this paper, the distinctive sounds of Nicosia are detected and a basis is set for examining whether the soundmarks of the divided centre of the citytend to empower the sense of place of the inhabitants. Firstly, the concept of the soundmark, as defined by Acoustic Ecology,is connected to the complex dimensions of place. Then, the methodology is analysed and explained, and the experience of a soundwalker is sited, delineating the soundscape of the city centre, leading the discussion to the religious soundmarks. Finally, a basis for a further discussion is set, regarding both the methodology needed to be applied and the religious soundmarks in place themselves.
Call for Participation - Mapping Sounds and Cities Workshop (3-5 October 2017, Vilnius)
The workshop introduces participants to a range of ideas about sounds as a tool for investigating and reappraising urban spaces. Sounds form an intimate connection to the spaces around us: our ears are always open to stimuli from outside, but much of the work of listening is done in ignoring aural stimuli. At the same time, sounds or sound barriers create borders, or sounds can be used to assert collectivities of particular sorts (as in the role of music in urban festivals), or to create atmospheres in which groups are expected to share particular feelings (as in shopping centres), or sounds can be used to assert individual opposition to or withdrawal from one's environment (e.g. through listening to headphones). In a time of de-industrialisation and digitalisation, the questions of soundscapes become complex: through the internet we have access to sounds and music from the world over, but at the same time quiet becomes a commodity to be purchased (for instance, in quiet zones on trains), and conflicts over sounds (especially around nightclubs or between neighbours) are a common feature of today's cities, while musicians and music clubs seek for ways to develop in the context of cities' evolving entertainment economies. During the workshop we propose to explore these issues on the case of the district around the " Stotis " (Station) in Vilnius. This district, close to the Old Town but long considered problematic, is one in which sounds of public transport are juxtaposed with those of recently appearing bars and clubs. The appearance of art and artists in this district has also been diagnosed as leading to its gentrification. The district thus forms an interesting case on which to explore the role of sounds in urban change.
The polyphonies which weave the city
2017
How many kinds of experiences shape the city? Voices, sound sources, moving and dynamic objects weave the city, being a part of it and determining its content. But how to apprehend this fabric in research activities? Poetically, we can say that sonic space is woven by multiple voices. They do not regard only to speech. Even though language reveals a diversity of cultures, such voices also come from our daily activities, from music, traffic, and sound devices. As Thibaud (2017, p. 226) once argued, “we are thus immersed in a world of sound of which we take part and which everyone contributes to, producing through their daily activities and actions”. Sound also plays a significant role in the way we act upon the cities and how we perceive it. The sound itself covers and reveals, at the same time, everyday experiences. Sonic space produces a polyphony which may or may not be masked, may or may not be noticed. It covers a number of relations when listening becomes a habitual act. If we ...
2020
The paper studies sound as a component of urban space. It investigates the composition of urban soundscape as perceived by the area's users and attempts to verify soundscape as an activator of collective memory. In this respect, it attempts to clarify the way people perceive the interaction between sound and space by analysing the features that shape the sonic image of the city, namely the boundaries and the areas formed, the materiality of structures, the activities and the time in which they unfold. Furthermore, it discusses how sound affects the way people relate to their environment, through the procedures of sonic stimulation and appraisal. As a practical implementation, the paper analyses the soundscape of the Exarcheia region in Athens, while employing a multidisciplinary methodology. The impact of the urban fabric to the soundscape is revealed and maps are drawn, outlining the soundscape's general structure, its 24-hour rotations and the long-term changes recorded over the last 50 years. Statistical analysis confirms earlier findings relating to the importance of subjective criteria and expectation in soundscape appraisal and people's preference for certain sounds. Mapping the sonic environment allows elements of the city's identity, to emerge and unveils indications of previous spatial policies and social transformations.
The Soundscape of Istanbul : Exploring the Public Awareness of Urban Sounds
The Soundscape of Istanbul project aims to explore urban sounds of Istanbul since they form a significant part of intangible cultural heritage (ICH) and to protect them by creating an archive for sounds of Istanbul's urban culture. We conducted primary source research followed by an online survey and interviews in order to specify culturally significant urban sounds and to define the archive content. Besides gathering data for archive content, we obtained a pattern demonstrating the level of awareness of urban and cultural sounds of Istanbul from the viewpoint of residents and foreigners. This paper discusses the pattern drawn from the results of the online survey that shows which sounds are primarily recognized and which ones less so, and put forward possible reasons for this outcome. This paper is intended to lay the groundwork for further research on which culturally significant urban sounds need more attention and how to increase awareness of the most important sounds for a sustainable urban culture.
Since ancient times, the city has been perceived as a peculiar living environment, distinguished from the surrounding territories by a series of quite specific dynamics, phenomena, and characters. Going beyond the gaze, then, also means trying to grasp that fabric of relationships, affects, perceptions – at times intangible, but also very tangible – that each generation has experienced as typical of its own time. More specifically, the macro-session includes (but is not limited to) the following themes: Sound and the city: soundscapes, the places for music, voices and noises in the city Times and rhythms of city life: perception of change, places of memory, sense of the present and the horizon of the future Urban detectability: signs, boundaries, landmarks and orientation in the city Places and practices of dwelling: settlement geographies, domestic spaces, neighborhood practices The city and generations: topographies and histories of intergenerational exchange, trends, and conflicts Sentimental geographies: the city and emotions, family relationships, the affectivity of places The construction of city identity: rhetorics of belonging, forms and practices of citizenship, mechanisms of inclusion/exclusion, the spaces of politics and the places of urban sociability DEADLINE FEBRUARY 15, 2023
Between the Music of the City and the Urban Noise
ARTE IMAGEN Y SONIDO
Starting from the overvaluation of visual culture in the modes of representation of society, this article draws a time line that goes from the marginalization of sounds promoted by disciplines such as geography, architecture and urban planning, until reaching to the acoustic definition of the landscape. In this way we demonstrate how the landscape is reincorporated in the agenda of these disciplines, not only as something visible, but as a cultural construction of our sensory activity, which is also made of sounds. This explains the anthropocentric nature of the soundscape, using the concepts of “sonorous image” and “sonorous identity” to reveal how sound attributes character to space and humanizes it, that can be seen from a global or local point of view. This in order to conclude how the patrimonial identity of sound is capable of characterizing specific urban contexts, its space, its habits and customs, while the ordinary identity contains a trait of "detachment" that ...
Music Culture and Urban Life. Build and Inhabit the City from the Sound
UNESCO City of Music - Kirsheir International Music Symposium. Ed. Fenomen (Turkey), pp. 485-496, 2022
The experience of art always comes with a utopian tension. The source of this tension is the binary dimension of artistic work: while reflecting on the world, it also speaks to us about non-actualized possibilities. In the case of music, its degree of abstraction, multiple textualities, and the indefinite nature of sound itself, favor the construction of a thought based on what reality could be, and not so much about what it is. Listening to music allows us to open and access possible worlds in everyday life. From a critical perspective which begins with the assessment of existing societies in general as unsustainable community models, this text explores the functions and creative possibilities of music and acoustic signals in various contexts of the city. To do this, an interpretation of reality as a plurality of worlds and sound cultures is proposed. In this sense, listening emerges as an act of creation and, at the same time, of ethical-political, plural, and participatory commitment, which decisively influences how we build communities and inhabit our space-time reality. Thus, the ways of listening and inhabiting combine as transformative actions from which to reconfigure the sound as a commonplace and, with it, open new horizons in everyday life.
Despite the fact that urban modernity and modernization in the Balkans has been a celebrated topic among social and cultural historians and historians of architecture and urban planning, the dimension of sound has been almost entirely absent from these discussions. The present paper is based on fresh research aiming to fill this gap. It initiates a comparative inquiry about the sonic environment of three Balkan capital cities (Belgrade, Sofia and Athens) during their transition to the industrial era. It offers a panorama of testimonies on the various dimensions, factors and actors creating and transforming the fin-de-siècle Balkan capitals' soundscape (the role of climate and built environment, the natural and biological keynote sounds, the sounds of street vendors and musicians and the mechanical sounds of trams and motorcars). It finally demonstrates, through the example of the noisiest of the three cities, i.e. Athens, the importance of the "soundscape" as a field of signification and socio-cultural conflict in a transitional period for the Balkan city.
Sounding Thessaloniki; architectural representation of an invisible city
2014
This study constitutes the first attempt to architecturally represent the sounding city of Thessaloniki. The writers approach sonic urban environment as a field that has always interfered with the formation of architectural realities. The creation of a sound framework and the notion of sonic architectural ecologies construct a new approach towards the urban ecologies, concerning especially Thessaloniki. Solids, networks and communities compose an invisible urban fabric with vast amounts of information concerning the reality of a city, beyond the typical urban studies and sterile three-dimensional geometry.