2.1 Aims and Fields of Application

From the outset, the World Soundscape Project (WSP) proposed a ‘global’ approach to the problem of noise pollution, in contrast to the growing specialisation of traditional disciplines dealing for instance with acoustics and acoustical engineering. The WSP inscribed itself in the wave of ecological movements that grew through the 1960s and 70s, in response to contemporary environmental problems related to important technological innovations. For Schafer, “it is a fact that the human organism is becoming more and more separated from its natural environment as each new convenience, tool, and technological system enters the human community” (1977b, p. 82). The flow of new devices and tools introduced through the Industrial and Electric Revolutions created an “overpopulation of sounds” (1977c, p. 71), which not only contribute to noise pollution but also encourage a behaviour of avoidance and habituation; citizens do not know how to listen to their environment. The WSP therefore proposed a new discipline, acoustic ecology, which would deal with these particular environmental issues and provide a common ground to unite all disciplines dealing with sound and the sound environment.

For the WSP, the growing problem of noise pollution can only be solved by taking a ‘positive’ approach, opposed to the negative process used in noise abatement: “Only a total appreciation of the acoustic environment can give us the resources for improving the orchestration of the world soundscape” (Schafer, 1977c, p. 4). By defining the soundscape as a “great macro-cultural composition, of which man and nature are the composer/performers” (1977b, p. 82), the WSP establishes its second main conceptual reference: the musicality of the soundscape, and the consequent compositional and listening role (as well as responsibility) of humans. These two paradigms, ecology and musicality, will be reflected in the main epistemological approach of the WSP, as well as the concepts and definitions proposed through their work.

The specific aims of the WSP were defined as early as 1970, when Schafer completes a grant proposal submitted to the UNESCO (Torigoe, 1982). In this document, five objectives are clearly established:
(1) To undertake an intensive interdisciplinary study of contrasting acoustic environments and their effects on man.
(2) To suggest ways of changing and improving acoustic environments.
(3) To educate students and field workers in acoustic ecology.
(4) To educate the general public in acoustic ecology.
(5) To prepare reports as guides to future studies. [emphasis mine] (quoted in Torigoe, 1982, p. 15)

The interdisciplinary nature of the proposed model constitutes not only an answer to the traditional isolation of academic and professional disciplines, but also a step towards the integration of science and arts in the everyday environment; for Schafer, the “revolution will consist of a unification of those disciplines concerned with the science of sound and those concerned with the art of sound” (1977c, p. 205). Together, these will create what the WSP coined acoustic ecology and acoustic design.

The role of education in the re-establishment of a positive soundscape is also brought forward in the proposal to UNESCO. Schafer’s strong interest in music education will resonate in the general orientation of the WSP activities and the nature of their publications. Ear cleaning exercises and soundwalks (Schafer, 1977b, 1977c) become ways to re-connect with the soundscape and initiate acoustic design. For Schafer, “if such an aural culture could be achieved, the problem of noise pollution would disappear” (1977c, p. 181). For the WSP, the issue of soundscape design and assessment must not simply be left to specialised professionals; it must be integrated into everyday practices and knowledge.

With Acoustic Communication (2001), Truax wants to establish a general model to discuss sound from an interdisciplinary and communicational perspective. In 1984 (the publication year of the first edition of his book), Truax had been supervising the acoustic research profile at the School of Communication of Simon Fraser University since 1975, when Schafer left the direction of the WSP (Torigoe, 1982). While a lot of the material used in Acoustic Communication comes from the work of the WSP, the new approach taken by Truax and the central discussion of electroacoustic sounds and processes (especially in the second edition) provides a new theoretical ground, an established communicational approach to sound and acoustic as well as electroacoustic systems.

The model aims not at understanding acoustic phenomena in particular situations or through specifically defined paradigms (as with acoustical engineering, musicology, noise studies…), but rather “attempts to understand the interlocking behavior of sound, the listener, and the environment as a system of relationships, not as isolated entities” [emphasis his] (Truax, 2001, p. xviii). The three main components defined by the model (listener, sound and environment) reflect the communicational framework in which the analysis is set up. Such an approach is required, according to Truax, since previous models cannot be merged due to their objective-subjective dichotomy (1998).

Before outlining the different concepts developed through the model of acoustic communication, Truax highlights some of the problems or limitations of traditional approaches to sound. Similarly to the WSP, he does not condemn objective models; nor does he reject the contrasting subjective account offered by the WSP itself. In fact, to expose the limitations of various models serves as a point of departure in the quest for an interdisciplinary and systemic approach to the sound environment—a communicational model that links these various paradigms together.

Two objective models are first described and discussed in relation with contemporary issues. The energy transfer model, which describes “acoustic behaviour as a series of energy transfers from source to receiver” (Truax, 2001, p. 5), has been widely used not only in acoustics and noise studies, but also in psychoacoustics and even in certain social and cultural models such as the transmission view of communication (Carey, 1998) and the message transmission theory (Leiss, 1991), in which energy is replaced by a message. Such disciplines deal with sound issues by describing the linear process of transfer, and the way in which the signal/sound can be altered:

The linear model from source to receiver translates into a prioritised list of traditional strategies, starting with reduction at the source, proceeding to attenuation via the transmission path, and ending with isolation of the receiver. In other words, the imperative is to change the sound and its environment, not the listener (Truax, 1998, The Acoustic Environment Model section, ¶6)

With the advent of electronic means of audio transmission, processing and storage, came a second paradigm—signal processing. The “black box” (Truax, 2001, p. 9) model represents electroacoustic systems in terms of “ ‘fidelity’ between the input and output signals” (ibid.), thereby focusing on technological components of a particular system and their influence on the transmission of an audio signal. These two models not only restrict the analysis of the sound environment to particular processes and behaviours, but also make such an analysis a very specialised practice.

For Truax, the approach of the WSP clearly stands in opposition with the objective models just described: “the soundscape model deliberately places the listener at its centre and hence it may be termed a subjective model” (1998, The Soundscape Model section, ¶1). As we have seen, the WSP advocated a return to a perceptual appreciation of the sound environment, one in which the notion of context and the capacity to act on one’s environment become central issues. However, the drastic shift taken by the WSP and its difficulty to cope with the growing presence of technological systems (see section 2.3 below) raises questions concerning its capacity to deal with complex, urban situations in which for instance too much subjectivity may present tremendous methodological, or even legislative problems. This is why, Truax argues, it is necessary “to move beyond [these] polarised approaches” (1998, The Acoustic Community Model section, ¶1), through the use of a communicational model “which understands acoustic communication as a system within which information is created and exchanged” [emphasis mine] (ibid.).

The approach broadly defined here as originating from CRESSON in France can be divided into two main components, for the sake of our research interests. On the one hand, there is the description and applications of the concept of sound effect (l’effet sonore), an interdisciplinary tool at the core of CRESSON’s work. The second component is represented by the methodological work of Pascal Amphoux, who in 1991 studied the sonic identity of three Swiss cities.

Jean-François Augoyard proposed the concept of sound effect to fulfil the need for an intermediary tool for sound analysis (Augoyard & Torgue, 1995). According to Augoyard, the two predominant concepts to deal with the sound environment, the sound object of Pierre Schaeffer and the soundscape of R. Murray Schafer, are either too specific or too general, and therefore fail to account for the complex mechanisms involved in an analysis of the perceived environment. The sound effect describes a particular sound perception as a result of specific physical conditions (nature of the sound source, acoustics, morphology of the environment, etc.), social and cultural contexts and a subjective perceptive mechanism. Instead of defining specific objects of analysis, it provides an understanding of a group of phenomena, their nature and status (Augoyard & Torgue, 1995, p. 10; my translation).

Sound effects fulfil five main functions, through which they connect various disciplines and fields of research. Firstly, they complement objective acoustic measurement, working “as detailed descriptive tools for forecasting and assessing specific sonic values” (Hellström, 2003, p. 104). Secondly, they offer interdisciplinary tools to deal with complex sound situations. Thirdly, they provide additional supports to representative tools, such as maps and graphs (Augoyard & Torgue, 1995). Fourthly, sound effects are designed as tools of urban and architectural intervention and conception. Finally, they are considered by French researchers as pedagogical supports serving general, non-expert listening situations, by providing terms which describe complex mechanisms embedded in our daily lives (ibid.).

Pascal Amphoux, a researcher associated both with CRESSON and IREC (Research Institute on the Built Environment, Lausanne, Switzerland), has developed an extensive methodology aimed at describing and analysing the sonic quality and sonic identity of urban spaces. This approach was designed and tested through a comparative study of three European cities, and which led to the publication of À l’Écoute de la Ville (1991) (Listening to the City) and L’Identité Sonore des Villes Européennes (1993a, 1993b) (The Sonic Identity of European Cities), a set of methodological guidelines from which specific tools will be extracted to be used in our present synthesis.

This particular methodology emphasises positive aspects of the sound environment and tries to describe general criteria that can be used to qualify its features. It does so in a way to fulfil three specific objectives. First, it tries to “understand and break ideological blocks of urban authorities” (Amphoux, 1991, p. 9; my translation), through the integration of notions of acoustic comfort in urban planning practices. Secondly, Amphoux wants to design simple but efficient tools to describe the sound environment (ibid.), in a way to make possible a shift in the traditional visual conception of architecture and urban planning. Finally, the methodology is proposed as an analytical approach that accounts for local cultural features, which often are ignored by legislation but yet remain central to one’s perception and interaction with the sound environment. These three objectives correspond to the three dimensions of the approach: acoustic, topological, and socio-cultural (ibid.).