I dove into the world of sound studies with no previous experience, or to be honest, no interest in digging deeper into how sound affects the world around us. Throughout my semester studying it though, I have come to truly appreciate sound and its effects, actions, and consequences. Through studying the sound in music, I gained a greater appreciation for music in general and the artists that create it. With the help of some philosophy, I reached my own definition about who can have voice. Finally, from immersing myself in the soundscape of Davidson, I discovered what sounds adds to this campus. I am now reflecting on everything I have learned to try and determine the impact my new focus on sound has on how I live my life. Hearing is a sense that people can take for granted but the world is constantly filled with sounds yearning to be listened to. Every sound has something it can tell me. My projects weren’t eye opening, but rather ear opening. I am amazed how much of the world has passed me by because I never had the awareness to simply listen. From this class though, I now know how. I now have the appreciation and tools to finally be able to comprehend what these sounds mean.
Thinking about voice in relation to sound taught me how to critically listen. Although I had thought about “voice” before, I never understood or cared about the widespread impact of this idea on those with speech difficulty or other disabilities. When I read Aristotle’s essay on voice and sound, his ideas didn’t seem right to me. I began to think about whether there is more to voice than the physical sound exiting the human mouth as Aristotle would define it, and after reading Cavarero’s essay “Multiple Voices,” I concluded there is (Aristotle 670). She wrote “the voice is the equivalent of what the unique person has that is most hidden and most genuine” (Cavarero 522). Voice reaches beyond the actual sound because it is most closely related to expression. This definition is far more inclusive than Aristotle’s.
“[Speech-impaired people] can [express themselves] through art, writing, sign language, and even through technology today, which in a way has given them the ability to verbally express themselves. If the true definition of voice was that it needed to be a sound generated from the resonance inside a human being, many non-verbal people’s souls and imaginations would never have been revealed.
This idea is from my first writing project and explains the reasoning behind people having a voice without the ability to speak. With this came another realization that definitions of sound, or even extensions beyond that, evolve along with the evolution of society. Aristotle described his definition of voice at a time before any technology existed that enabled speech-impaired people to speak. Of course, there were other ways to express themselves through writing or art, but it would have seemed impossible to them that those who were speech-impaired could express themselves using sound. Now, however, with the evolution of technology, they have the ability to do this. One of the more powerful articles I read was “Helping my Non-verbal Son Find his Voice.” The child described by his mother cannot speak, but rather uses a computer program that speaks for him (Sumner). This made me think. Why does he not deserve a voice? I came to the conclusion that he does. He expresses himself with this machine and although it is not the actual sound coming from within his body, the ideas and thoughts are his own. This writing project was an educative process for me. Thinking about voice in a deeper way gave me new perspectives on issues like that and I witnessed how changes in technology can influence definitions as basic as those for voice and sound. Sound has such a large impact on society and the meaning as a whole can be fluid. Because of this, my awareness for sound and the changes in its impact on society grew and I began to listen more to the soundscape around me.
After exploring the relationship between sound and voice in humans, I had a whole new view about the importance of the world of sounds around us. With the second writing project, this reared its head in music. I determined that the actual sound of songs can have meaning beyond what the lyrics are saying. Coming to this conclusion took the same strategic listening as the first writing project. Part of my listening focused on cover songs. Taylor Swift’s cover of “September” by Earth, Wind, and Fire was an interesting example that really made me rethink musical production as a whole. The lyrics were the same, yet somehow, the differences in genre and instruments changed the meaning of Taylor Swift’s version.
“The change in sound of Swift’s cover shows how sound can augment the meaning of a song and the resulting reaction also showed that genre, being sorted by sound, inherently affects the meaning of a song.”
This conclusion took a lot of critical listening skills to come to. I have always believed music has the ability to create certain feelings in a listener, but studying Swift’s cover gave me a brand new perspective on the tools used by artists to convey meaning. There is so much more work that is involved in making music than I originally believed and this project reinforced to me that most of us never realize the amount of meaning sound can carry. Like the first writing project, my eyes were opened to what sound can impact in our daily lives. I can now appreciate music as an art more than I could before because of my new awareness. My renewed ability to listen and understand sounds was pushed further and this project showed me how I could use this skill to live a more fulfilling and understanding life.
My final writing project put all of these ideas together. I turned my focus from music and voice to the Davidson community as a whole. While studying music was more specific, I began to explore the everyday sounds that fill my soundscape. Even these sounds began to have some sort of meaning to me. My project focused on Vail Commons, the only dining hall at Davidson. While sitting in the dining hall, the noise, keynotes, and soundmarks as defined by Schafer gave me an insight into Davidson students and the use of the space itself.
“In addition to helping show the culture of Davidson, the sound also reveals what the space is used for. The loud volume during lunch and dinner means students are not doing work while they eat, but rather as a vessel to finally take a break from their hard work.”
My focused listening in the scoundscape showed me different things about the Davidson student body. Overall though, it taught me to be more aware of the everyday sounds around me. Similar to sightseeing, listening to an environment can reveal so much about a particular space. People, including me before this project, do not seem to put any emphasis or importance on sounds, but then they miss out on so much a place has to offer. I could have come to some of these conclusions about Vail Commons without the close listening but the sounds I heard reinforced my pre-existing beliefs. It also proved that these sounds do in fact have meaning and this idea can be expanded to help me in future situations to try and understand a certain space or the culture surrounding it.
Throughout the semester and with each subsequent writing project, my understanding of the world around me has expanded. The soundscape has always been there, but I never had the awareness to listen. I can now interpret spaces around me and I honestly see more beauty in the world and I see how each sound interacts together to paint a picture as much as any visual image could. Hearing is a sense most people take for granted. I always thought it was mostly used as a means for communication between individuals, but it can also be a means of communication with the non-human world. I am going to take this new appreciation and apply it to my everyday life. Whether that is seeing the artistic expression in a song, or immersing myself in nature with the constant chirping of the birds and the wind rattling the leaves, I have a lot more to explore in life now. There is a new story to appreciate in my life now; one written by the ever expanding catalog of sounds that are trying to author their own meaning.
References
“Taylor Swift – September Cover (Earth, Wind & Fire).” YouTube, 14 Apr. 2018, www.youtube.com/watch?v=KnDnphYTb0Q. Accessed 24 Mar. 2019.
Schafer, R. Murray. “The Soundscape.” The Sound Studies Reader, edited by Jonathan Sterne, 2012, pp. 95-103.
Aristotle. “Aristotle on Voice.” 1984. The Complete Works of Aristotle, Princeton University Press, 1984.
Sumner, Jamie. “Helping My Nonverbal Son Find His Voice.” Ties, www.nytimes.com/2018/07/06/well/helping-my-nonverbal-son-find-his-voice.html. Accessed 11 Feb. 2019. Originally published in The New York Times, 6 July 2018.
“Earth, Wind & Fire – September (Official Music Video).” YouTube, 11 Jan. 2013, www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gs069dndIYk. Accessed 24 Mar. 2019.
