Making operative concepts from Murray Schafer’s soundscapes typology: A qualitative and comparative analysis of noise pollution in Bangkok, Thailand and Los Angeles, California

Abstract

Employing components of Murray Schafer’s soundscape typology from his inimitable 1977 work, The Soundscape: Our Sonic Environment and the Tuning of the World, my exploratory study qualitatively and comparatively explores the sonic landscape and noise pollution ‘texture’ of Bangkok, Thailand and Los Angeles, California. By employing Schafer’s soundscape concepts to explain how people subjectively accommodate and generate the noises and sounds of cities, I hope to move beyond the conventional quantitative measurements of sound through decibels. The study argues that urban sociology’s blind spot is that qualitative examinations of the sonic environment have not been undertaken. By making operative Schafer’s soundscape concepts I make the preliminary argument that a qualitative understanding of urban noise reveals social structure insofar as cultural accommodations of noise, urban configurations of a city and degrees of development of a city are concerned.