ABSTRACT
This chapter examines the visual as the prioritized sense within western culture, and the debates destabilizing its dominance. As Richard Coyne presents, 'according to various commentators, such as Dewey, Mc Luhan and Ong the visual is the favoured sense of the culture of print and of the Enlightenment.' Contemplation and attention could be correlated to the visual and intellectual, whereas the use and habit could be correlated to the everyday, inconspicuous involvement with buildings and spaces. The chapter looks into a series of sonic experiments to investigate the notion of ambience and the non-visual sensations within space. The purpose of these design-experiments is to look closely into the process of listening and mapping the sound of a place. The sonic ambience is expected to provide different kinds of information, concerning the geometry, size, material, insulation, directions, and any other information that it may possibly carry.
