From Bentham to Guadet: ‘Auditory Visibility’ in Nineteenth-Century Theories on Government Offices

Abstract

Architectural historiography is seldom concerned with the antithetical notions of ‘noise’ and ‘silence’. In this case study, I tentatively explore the theme in the context of nineteenth-century administrative buildings. More particularly, I investigate the normative views of British and French authors concerning acoustic perception in one subtype of ‘bureaucratic’ architecture: the ministerial office building. Drawing examples from the work of, among others, ‘panopticon’ theorist Jeremy Bentham and the architect Julien Guadet, I point at the centrality of ‘sound control’ or ‘sound management’ in architectural discourses on office buildings. In the specific domain of ministerial offices, moreover, these discourses were rife with ideological views on the nature and the functioning of government itself.