Engaging under-represented groups in soundscape evaluation through creative, embodied listening practices

Soundscape studies has been dominated by responses from hearing and neuro normative, middle class and English-speaking communities, often ignoring how noise can illuminate urban power structures and more readily affect underrepresented city communities. A re-evaluation of current methods is required to engage with a more diverse and representative response. This presentation will discuss findings from co-produced research practice that engages in participatory soundscape evaluation with a range of underrepresented groups including neurodiverse, non-English speaking, and refugee communities. The research uses two accessible and innovative visual methods across specially chosen community focus groups: graphic scoring (the abstracted visual representation of sounds taking from musicological practices) and emotional body mapping, (using a body outline as a template, to investigate 'embodied listening') alongside a guided listening practice inspired by Deep Listening. These methods move beyond the lack of common public lexicon around sound and the absence of defined Western listening practices to create new, perspectives, deepening the exploration of the direct impact of environmental sound and building a more inclusive, representative, and equitable 'Acoustemology of Community'.