"As the western sun poured into the small room like a flame, the shrilling of the cicadas would strike the ear with new urgency. And so August, he saw, was half over."
So wrote Nagai Kafu in 1909, in The River Sumida.
The man heard a sound. It made him see an image.
We call this "soundseeing". That is the premise for our project. The start of our journey.
Hearing is believing
Asakusa is one of the places in Tokyo where history has left its deepest marks (map is centered on the Sensouji buddhist temple). This is the result of an
ongoing process across the feudal centuries that
started when the city bore the
name of Edo, and continued through the modern era and on into the
present.
Our university has entered a collaboration with
distinguished overseas Japanologists, to spread the
word in an organized way about the cultural and
historical resources of Asakusa.
The project combines work in the fields of the
humanities and technology to create economic
growth. Audio is a central tool in this effort. We
are currently preparing to bring rich audio
presentations of the Old Town of Tokyo to the
comfort of your living room.