Expérience sonore des usagers dans l'espace public urbain: l'exemple du boulevard Saint-Laurent à Montréal
Since Pierre Schaeffer has first explored the concept of "sound object," research on the sound phenomenon has considerably evolved, allowing us to grasp all of its complexity. This research further explores the world of sound by examining the everyday experience of the city main commercial streets using as fieldwork, Saint-Laurent Street in Montreal. Through a comprehensive approach, we examine people’s own interpretation of their sound experience of this historical commercial street. Every day, citizens wander and make their way in public spaces by apprehending their environment through their senses. Besides the visual aspect, senses are quite often ignored by designers of urban space. This often results in a relatively poor urban design in terms of sensorial experience. The theories and methods resulting from the environmental sounds field see the scope of their investigation expanded by anthropology of the senses. The richness of this approach allows us to better understand the multiple dimensions that shape the sound. The field of references privileged here also draws on artistic practices. Those offer us a form of field of experimentation that abounds with qualitative material. The analysis of these last ones brings to the foreground dimensions useful for the understanding of the sonic experience. This experiment was conducted using various methods to collect a maximum of qualitative material. Then, observation, qualified listening walks and commented walks1, in-depth interviews were led. This research allowed to a better understanding of the existing dialogue between the sound, the space and the user disclosing the various dimensions of the sonic experience of the commercial main street and in particular those was surrounding the culture of the senses.
design urbain son perception culture urban design experience sound perception public space culture polysensorialiy memory