MOVEMENT, MEMORY & THE SENSES IN SOUNDSCAPE STUDIES by Jennifer Schine

This paper will explore how the practice of soundwalking can be a tool for memory retrieval. I ask: How are memories created and remembered in the mind and felt within the body? What happens to our perception of self, home, and knowing as we move through spaces and places of significance? I aim to explore the subject of memory and movement within the context of soundscape studies; these notions require an understanding of how we “hear” the past and re?evoke our acoustic memories as we move and act through our environment. Traditional methods for recalling the past involve mainly visual cues and focus on materiality (Bäckman, Small, Wahlin & Larsson 2000) —we look to photographs and hold personal objects, etc.—while remaining visual?centered and localized. I suggest that it is the physical act of moving our body through meaningful environments that unifies the senses, places and knowing and that brings together the local past into the present experience (Casey 1987). My main focus is to understand the ways in which people—both as individuals and as groups—remember and construct the past. This paper explores how the production of memory and act of remembering are evoked during the process of memory walks (or soundwalks) as a way of understanding and engaging with the world.