KINGSTON, R.I. – Feb. 27, 2026 – The University of Rhode Island Center for the Humanities will offer the public an opportunity to be immersed in sonic sound and take a trip that asks them to rethink the world through their ears instead of their eyes.

The special free public performance, titled “Ways of Knowing: A Sonic Celebration of the Humanities,” will be held Wednesday, March 11, at 7 p.m. in the Hope Room of the Robert J. Higgins Welcome Center, 45 Upper College Road on the Kingston Campus. Registration for the event, which will also feature a Q&A session with Chris Hoff and Sam Harnett—co-producers of the “Ways of Knowing” podcast series—can be found on the humanities center’s website.

For 70 minutes, attendees will have a unique multi-channel audio experience. Participants will wear eye masks, sit in the dark and hear several sounds, from vibrations of the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco, footsteps of ants, and ancient Latin to recordings of Berlin made in 1930, the first piece of musique concrete, and the theory of how push buttons and Tupperware act as media objects. Afterward, Hoff and Harnett will take questions from attendees. 

Earlier in the day, Hopp and Harnett will also hold a free in-person lecture titled “Media Objects” in the Galanti Lounge of the Robert L. Carothers Library & Learning Commons, 15 Lippitt Road. The 3 p.m. presentation, part of a six-part series produced in collaboration with Cornell University, will discuss how society is surrounded by media beyond phones, the internet and television, and how objects exert pressure on what we think and how we think.

Hoff and Harnett’s “Ways of Knowing”podcast series is produced in partnership with multiple academic institutions such as Johns Hopkins University, the University of Chicago, and the University of Washington. The pair have published academic papers, spent a semester at Cornell University as practitioners-of-residence and performed their octophonic audio compositions at more than 50 universities, theaters, and art spaces. Hoff and Harnett previously worked in public radio, earning two Edward R. Murrow Awards for excellence in sound design.

The March 11 events are also sponsored by the URI College of Arts and Sciences and the Harrington School of Communication and Media.

URI’s Center for the Humanities is designed to foster intellectual exchange and independent inquiry, analysis, and interpretation of the humanities in research, teaching, and learning. For more information about the center, visit the center’s website or contact Evelyn Sterne, professor of history and director of the Center for the Humanities, at 401-874-4074 or sterne@uri.edu.