Emily Ann Thompson

A vibrant history of acoustical technology and aural culture in early-twentieth-century America. In this history of aural culture in early-twentieth-century America, Emily Thompson charts dramatic transformations in what people heard and how they listened. What they heard was a new kind of sound that was the product of modern technology. They listened as newly critical consumers of aural commodities. By examining the technologies that produced this sound, as well as the culture that enthusiastically consumed it, Thompson recovers a lost dimension of the Machine Age and deepens our understanding of the experience of change that characterized the era. Reverberation equations, sound meters, microphones, and acoustical tiles were deployed in places as varied as Boston's Symphony Hall, New York's office skyscrapers, and the soundstages of Hollywood. The control provided by these technologies, however, was applied in ways that denied the particularity of place, and the diverse spaces of modern America began to sound alike as a universal new sound predominated. Although this sound--clear, direct, efficient, and nonreverberant--had little to say about the physical spaces in which it was produced, it speaks volumes about the culture that created it. By listening to it, Thompson constructs a compelling new account of the experience of modernity in America.

Architectural Acoustics and the Culture of Listening in America, 1900-1933

The Soundscape of Modernity

In this history of aural culture in early-twentieth-century America, Emily Thompson charts dramatic transformations in what people heard and how they listened. What they heard was a new kind of sound that was the product of modern technology. They listened as newly critical consumers of aural commodities. By examining the technologies that produced this sound, as well as the culture that enthusiastically consumed it, Thompson recovers a lost dimension of the Machine Age and deepens our understanding of the experience of change that characterized the era. Reverberation equations, sound meters, microphones, and acoustical tiles were deployed in places as varied as Boston's Symphony Hall, New York's office skyscrapers, and the soundstages of Hollywood. The control provided by these technologies, however, was applied in ways that denied the particularity of place, and the diverse spaces of modern America began to sound alike as a universal new sound predominated. Although this sound--clear, direct, efficient, and nonreverberant--had little to say about the physical spaces in which it was produced, it speaks volumes about the culture that created it. By listening to it, Thompson constructs a compelling new account of the experience of modernity in America.

Soundscape of Modernity

Shimon Edelman

Peter Galison

Joseph Pellegrino University Professor Peter Galison

Table of Contents The Architecture of Science by Galison, Peter L. (Editor); Edelman, Shimon (Editor); Thompson, Emily (Editor) Terms of Use Acknowledgments Notes on Contributors 1 Buildings and the Subject of Science Peter Galison 1 Of Secrecy and Openness: Science and Architecture in Early Modern Europe 2 Masculine Prerogatives: Gender, Space, and Knowledge in the Early Modern Museum Paula Findlen 3 Alchemical Symbolism and Concealment: The Chemical House of Libavius William R. Newman 4 Openness and Empiricism: Values and Meaning in Early Architectural Writings and in Seventeenth-Century Experimental Philosophy Pamela O. Long II Displaying and Concealing Technics in the Nineteenth Century 5 Architecture for Steam M. Norton Wise 6 Illuminating the Opacity of Achromatic Lens Production: Joseph von Fraunhofer's Use of Monastic Architecture and Space as a Laboratory Myles W. Jackson 7 The Spaces of Cultural Representation, circa 1887 and 1969: Reflections on Museum Arrangement and Anthropological Theory in the Boasian and Evolutionary Traditions George W. Stocking Jr. 8 Bricks and Bones: Architecture and Science in Victorian Britian Sophie Forgan III Modern Space 9 "Spatial Mechanics": Scientific Metaphors in Architecture Adrian Forty 10 Diagramming the New World, or Hannes Meyer's "Scientization" of Architecture K. Michael Hays 11 Listening to/for Modernity: Architectural Acoustics and the Development of Modern Spaces in America Emily Thompson 12 Of Beds and Benches: Building the Modern American Hospital Allan M. Brandt and David C. Sloane IV Is Architecture Science? 13 Architecture, Science, and Technology Antoine Picon 14 Architecture as Science: Analogy or Disjunction? Alberto Perez-Gomez 15 The Mutual Limits of Architecture and Science Kenneth Frampton 16 The Hounding of the Snark Denise Scott Brown V Princeton After Modernism: the Lewis Thomas Laboratory for Molecular Biology 17 Thoughts on the Architecture of the Scientific Workplace: Community, Change, and Continuity Robert Venturi 18 The Design Process for the Human Workplace James Collins Jr. 19 Life in the Lewis Thomas Laboratory Arnold J. Levine 20 Two Faces on Science: Building Identities for Molecular Biology and Biotechnology Thomas F. Gieryn VI Centers, Cities, and Colliders 21 Architecture at Fermilab Robert R. Wilson 22 The Architecture of Science: From D'Arcy Thompson to the SSC Moshe Safdie 23 Factory, Laboratory, Studio: Dispersing Sites of Production Peter Galison and Caroline A. Jones Index Descriptive content provided by Syndetics"! a Bowker service.

Emily Ann Thompson

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