Cemeteries are active urban resonant places,or are they not?

Abstract

A cemetery is usually an integral part of the urban environment, constituting a landmark, where a city buries its deceased, while providing places of remembrance and memory. Therefore, it establishes wide, usually car-free areas, where trees and small animals dominate the environmental space among the graves, within its urban plan. These seemingly empty areas, also host sparse human activity by mourners, visitors, death professionals or cleaners; it is their resonances, along with an ambient city soundscape from the background, that a listener experiences when visiting. Considering listening as multisensory experience, imaginary sounds often seem to integrate in this soundscape. What can sounds of the cemetery reveal? And which sound qualities define the relation between actual and imaginary sounds? By employing sound ethnography, including observation, recordings, listening tests and interviews, the article traces the qualities of Limassol's urban cemeteries through their everyday sound, from an experiential perspective.