For Hybrid Audio Diffusion System (HADS)
Inward Voices, Outward Struggles explores gender-based violence in Mexico through a hybrid audio system (HADS). This system merges intimate binaural experiences through open-back headphones (egocentric, head-fixed sound fields) with shared speaker systems using Ambisonics (allocentric, room-fixed sound fields), creating an augmented immersive 3D audio experience.
The open-back headphones help represent the private, often hidden struggles of women. The speakers, in contrast, symbolize the public sphere that frequently overshadows or even denies these violences. By using open-back headphones that allow sound from the speakers to bleed through, I aim to depict the struggle between systemic violence and the private experiences of women that misogynistic structures try to silence.
Building on the feminist idea that “the private is political,” my project explores the schizophrenic dissonance of gendered bodies in Mexico assailed by constant violence amid a society that simultaneously denies their harrowing experience. To deepen this exploration, I use the individuality of headphones to create multiple versions of the piece. While the speaker array delivers the same audio to all listeners, the headphone audio varies, allowing a single performance to present different versions of the work. I therefore seek to use immersive audio and hybrid systems to inspire critical reflection through the contrast between individual bodily experiences and communal cacophony.
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“[...] al cuerpo de Liliana. A la vida de Liliana. A la muerte de Liliana. ¿Cuántas veces al día murmura la palabra justicia? Uno nunca está más inerme que cuando no tiene lenguaje. ¿Quién, en ese verano de 1990, iba a poder decir, con la frente en alto, con la fuerza que da la convicción de lo correcto y de lo cierto, y la culpa no era de ella, ni dónde estaba ni cómo vestía? ¿Quién en un mundo donde no existía la palabra feminicidio, las palabras terrorismo de pareja, podía decir lo que ahora digo sin la menor duda: la única diferencia entre mi hermana y yo es que yo nunca me topé con un asesino?
La única diferencia entre ella y tú.”
— El invencible verano de Liliana, Cristina Rivera Garza
“[...]To Liliana’s body. To Liliana’s life. To Liliana’s death. How many times a day does one murmur the word justice? One is never more defenseless than when one has no language. Who, in that summer of 1990, could have said, with their head held high, with the strength that comes from the conviction of what is right and true, it wasn’t her fault, nor where she was, nor how she dressed? Who, in a world where the word femicide didn’t exist, where the words partner terrorism didn’t exist, could say what I now say without the slightest doubt: the only difference between my sister and me is that I never crossed paths with a murderer?”
The only difference between her and you.”
— Liliana’s Invincible Summer, Cristina Rivera Garza
A Loana y a Lliana.