Media Review Assignment

This short paper will critically examine, analyze and assess the acoustic context of a chosen cultural work. This could be a gallery exhibition of visual art, a popular (or not so popular) TV show, a night out at the cinema, or a public art installation. Pay particular attention to the spatial context of where your visual experience is taking place, and consider how the sound of this space is influencing or inflecting your overall media experience. The idea is to have you pay attention to, and critically consider, the sonic conditions that are often rendered as secondary to the visual aspects of cultural experience. What are the dynamics of noise, silence and music at play in the visual cultural experience you’ve chosen to examine? What sort of listening practices are encouraged? Since Western culture, and Western cultural activity, is so heavily biased towards visual media and forms of engagement, the idea behind this assignment is to have you pay attention to the aspects of aural experience that are typically forgotten, ignored or go unconsidered.