A sound path: the Campo Grande (RJ) soundscape and guidelines to urban design. urbanism education

Abstract

The trajectory of students shows what we should and how we can teach. This work is the result of an academic journey involved with sound forms; in scientific initiation participating in the research “Soundscape, memory and culture”, in extension activities and with the final project “Listening in Campo Grande – prospects for urban planning and urban projects from the analysis of the soundscape”. Research on sounds as cultural representations present in our landscapes is not common in Architecture and Urbanism schools, but sometimes they are present in other courses – music, communication and engineering. Urban sound issues are relevant and cannot be treated as a pollution problem, but as relevant cultural manifestations. That work unveils the urban landscapes of the Campo Grande neighborhood from the cultural landscape that is beaten, spoken, shouted and sung and seeks to understand, through the sounds, the appropriation of the suburban public space and it’s silenced problems, making a parallel between the form and sound, as well as proposing answers to such questions. A correlation was theoretically established between Norberg-Shulz's concept of “character” and Schafer's “sound events''. And, in practice, the soundscape was explored through hearing-guided drifts.