Multisensory Experience

multisensory_web

In recent years, archaeology has embraced phenomenological techniques and approaches to begin moving towards a lived experience of the past and embracing personalised perspectives. These avenues of archaeological investigation have been particularly popular within digital technologies, where computing methods provide a medium to create highly realistic images, graphics and video.

Recent debate, however, has seen criticism of these methods as being overly ocularcentric. In the eyes of scholars who argue that the senses are inextricably linked with one another and that all sensory experience and perception is socially, culturally and personally specific, these approaches can be problematic in the way they present narratives of the past. Although immersive virtual experiences seek to bring us closer to creating realism in these narratives, discussions of how far this is possible are on-going, focussing on the issues surrounding the cultural and personal subjectivities of archaeologists.

This discussion group aims to bring together the theoretical approaches to a multisensory experience of the past as well as discussing new digital methods which are moving beyond the visual. The two papers selected aim to provide a starting point for discussion about different approaches to the multisensory experience of the past.

Papers to read:

Eve, S. (2012). Augmenting Phenomenology: Using Augmented Reality to Aid Archaeological Phenomenology in the Landscape. Journal of Archaeological Method and Theory, 19(4), 582–600. doi:10.1007/s10816-012-9142-7

Hamilakis, Y. (2014) Archaeology and the senses : human experience, memory, and affect. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Chapter 1, pp. 1-15

Extended Reading:

Wheatley, D. (2014) Connecting landscapes with built environments: visibility analysis, scale and the senses. In Paliou, E., Lieberwirth, U. and Polla, S (eds.) Spatial analysis and social spaces: Interdisciplinary approaches to the interpretation of historic and prehistoric built environments. Topoi. Berlin Studies of the Ancient World, Berlin: De Gruyter.

Hamilakis, Y. (2014) Archaeology and the senses : human experience, memory, and affect. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Chapter 4, pp. 111-28

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Written by

I completed a BA in Archaeology and Anthropology at University of Cambridge in 2007. I then worked in commercial archaeology before beginning a masters in Archaeological Computing at the University of Southampton in 2010. I am now undertaking a PhD with the ACRG focussing on the visualisation and analysis of medieval Cairo, with particular emphasis on simulating movement, visibility and acoustics. My research interests include procedural modelling, visualisation of ancient cities, the visualisation of uncertainty in archaeological reconstructions, medieval and Roman urbanism, the archaeology of early Christianity and Islam.

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