This lecture was on Media Affordances, which basically mean’s what is unique about the specific medium, which this week was sound, it’s importance within our world and it’s differences from our other senses. One thing I haven’t thought about is that sound as a sense is one that we have a lot of difficulty turning off – your eye’s points outwards but the ear draws inwards.  Essentially soaking up information.

I also have a deep frustration with the whole listening v.s. hearing concept, as a very observant person who is constantly thinking I can instantly tell if someone is actually listening to me and unfortunately most people nowadays are so overstimulated by a million different things in their environment they don’t or can’t listen – so put down your phone when we’re having a coffee because I can tell when you’re just nodding along and mumbling yeses while your eye’s are glued to the screen, that you’re not really listening to me. I am guilty of this as well because I’m alway’s in my head, overthinking things or just daydreaming that I can miss whole sections of conversations, but for the past few months I’ve been working on maintaining eye contact and listening to people more closely.

Sound is intricately connected to our way of life that it can evoke emotions and memories, like the sound of my dad’s voice the last time I ever saw him elicits a sense of sadness within me, the distinct sound of my mum’s Toyota Corolla driving down the driveway, then up the hill of my street that would prompt me to know that I can now stop faking sick and run to turn on the morning cartoons and eat as many Anzac biscuits out of the tin without it being to noticeable, the sound of the guitar riff in Typhoon’s ‘Hunger and Thirst’ which makes me feel the weight of all the missed opportunities and mistake’s I’ve made. These are all significant memories and emotions in my life and they have come from sound and I wouldn’t have them if I couldn’t have the ability to hear. I used to say how I would rather be deaf than blind but now after truly thinking about how much we take sound for granted and it’s importance, I’m not so sure I would make that choice and I’m blessed that I don’t have to.