Courses
GDCV1896 Soundscape Studies and Hong Kong Culture (IGE) (3 units)
- Medium of Instruction:
- English
Soundscape Studies investigate the relation of an acoustic environment and the behavioural characteristics of humans living within it. They explore how people create, interpret and interact with sounds in everyday-life. Doing so soundscape studies link up artists, cultural studies researchers and anthropologists. This course aims at introducing this cross-disciplinary practice to students as a new trajectory to understand and reflect upon Hong Kong culture—through listening to its acoustic communities.
In this course, students will learn about the origins of soundscape studies, their theory and practices and in what ways they influence musicians, media artists and culture researchers. Also, they will ‘unlearn’ relying on sight as their primary sense, and ‘relearn’ the ability of listening. To achieve this, the major focus of the course is on students conducting site-specific fieldwork to explore the idea of acoustic communities and their specific soundmarks. This will familiarize students with ethnographic research approaches, and will help them to develop their own critical position on cultural and social issues.
The practices exercised throughout this course can subsequently be applied in various fields of studies including anthropology, sociology, communication and creative arts.
http://ge.hkbu.edu.hk/course/IGE-1896/