The post-industrial city of Limerick, Ireland, is currently undergoing a state- sponsored programme of urban regeneration following decades of challenges (Hourigan 2011).
This top down Regeneration project appears more focused on new buildings rather
than on social relations. In the absence of a cohesive policy promoting real
diversity, a research cluster at the University of Limerick sought to stimulate
creative collaboration and the
construction
of social networks
amongst Limerick’s citizens through a soundscapes project.
Our paper documents how LimerickSoundscapes adopted a citizen-led, bottom up
approach to social regeneration and integration by adapting traditional sound mapping
practices from acoustic ecology (Schafer 1977; Traux 1978) combined with urban ethnomusicology’s
focus on human subjects (Hemetek and Reyes 2007; Jurkova 2012) and sociological
understandings of the cultural restructuring of
urban spaces (Fainstein and Campbell 2011; LeGates 2011). Volunteer recordists
from a variety of socio-economic and ethnic backgrounds traversed the city capturing
a vast array of sounds from their urban environment. The project’s real focus, however,
is on the on-going, collaborative process which sees the activation of creative
and critically engaged citizens (Carter 2012; Nell et al 2012) who share a vested interest in (re)presenting
their city through everyday, lived (sonic) experiences (De Certeau 1984).