Soundscapes & Sound Identities, 7th international FKL symposium on soundscape.
Symposium, concerts, Installations and videos at CASTELLO DI BESENO, Besenello (TN), ITALY | 22-24 May 2015
There exists doubtlessly an acoustic identity of places, even in those which, due to the increasing uniformity of the contemporary world, end up being “non-places”; acoustic identity may appear standardized, but is nevertheless present.
The term “acoustic climate” is often used in environmental physics in defining the parameters and quantitative data which characterize an acoustic environment, obviously this term inevitably hints at an idea of identity linked to its measurable aspects.
Bioacoustics and ecology deal with, among other things, the way the acoustic environment, the specific sonic utterances and hearing characteristics of living species represent the identity of a given species, and the way they co-exist and live together.Human and social sciences (anthropology, history, sociology, ethnomusicology) on their side examine the various practices of acoustic communication that may characterize a given territory, a social group, a historical period, or even a future perspective, and here comes into play the way human being relates to other individuals and the environment, the way in which he represents his/her identity through the sounds he/she produces or listens to.
And also the sonic forms through which an individual and a collective represent themselves and which are dealt with by music and art, together with architecture and electro-acoustic engineering, inevitably imply a multi-faceted discussion of identity.
I there exists an acoustic identity it exists for somebody who perceives it as such. Speaking of identity thus means speaking of the listener and not only of what produces the sound or affects its diffusion (see the aural dimension of architecture and the ensuing sound effects). The concept of identity, and in particular of sonic identity, may be looked at as a vital dimension in the problems of co-existence and conflict between different human groups, between living beings of different species, between living beings and the natural environment, thus as a problem or a form of ecology.
What are for us the aspects that give a context an acoustic identity, or when are we able to speak of it? Are there sounds, practices, contexts particularly apt to express such an identity, and why?
The variety of the sonic forms of identity result in that which only in a macroscopic, or better, macro-acoustic sense may be thought of as an identity of a soundscape.
The international FKL symposium intends to offer an occasion for discussing these issues, for stimulating a reflection and dialogue within the acoustic community in the attempt to define, or to share as much as possible the basis on which we build our ideas, and confer qualities of identity to the sonic contexts in which we live or which are around us.
