NOISE AND SILENCE AS THE EXPERIENCE OF WAR: A PHENOMENOLOGICAL ANALYSIS IN THE CONTEXT OF HUSSERL, MERLEAU-PONTY, AND HEIDEGGER

Abstract

This article explores the phenomenon of the auditory experience of war through the lens of phenomenological concepts developed by Edmund Husserl, Maurice Merleau-Ponty, and Martin Heidegger. This perspective enables a deeper understanding of the experience of sound and silence during wartime.

According to Husserl’s theoretical framework, the noise of war can be interpreted as a destabilization of the familiar lifeworld, disrupting the horizons of experience and hindering adequate perception. Silence, in turn, can be viewed as a necessary condition for restoring this horizon and returning to authentic being. Merleau-Ponty emphasizes the embodied dimension of perceiving the sounds of war, where sounds are not merely external signals but are deeply integrated into human bodily experience. Noise thus becomes an expression of war’s physical impact, and its influence on individual perception can be described as a blending of the "bodily" and the "spiritual." Heidegger, for his part, considers noise as part of inauthentic existence, characteristic of the wartime experience within the social crowd, where the individual loses their uniqueness and becomes part of the mass. From his perspective, silence is a path to authentic existence, enabling reflection on one's own being and the awareness of the finitude of human existence, especially in the context of war. In this sense, silence becomes a means of knowledge, not merely the absence of sound.

A significant aspect of the analysis is the idea of the auditory experience of war as a way to capture the existential experiences of individuals. The sounds of war, like silence, are not merely objectively existing phenomena, but ones that profoundly affect a person’s subjective reality. The auditory experience of war is an essential component in this process, helping not only to record events but also to comprehend their impact on psychological states, cultural perceptions, and moral orientations. The nature of war and its sonic dimensions contribute to the formation of new forms of collective memory, where sound and silence serve as tools for reconstructing social identities. This experience is crucial for a future understanding of the consequences of war, as it fosters a deeper awareness of not only what war does to a person, but also how it can transform culture, traditions, and social structures as a whole.

Studying the auditory experience of war through the prism of phenomenological concepts provides a better understanding of how war shapes individual and collective being through sonic and silent experiences. Accordingly, attention to the phenomenology of sound and silence opens new avenues for interpreting war as a complex, multidimensional phenomenon that transforms not only physical reality but also spiritual and social contexts.