Week Six: The Control of. a Whisper

This week was the final week of our Whisper Project, where our group continued to explore how silence, authority, and communication interact within performance. On Monday, we briefly tested one final idea, showing lip movements as a digital livestream. But, after some discussion, we decided that our research and intentions were more excited in the performative nature of our “speaking choir” and it was also more rooted in our research. Our project had always been about the human experience of control, gesture, and collective behavior, something that felt more powerful to express through live interaction rather than through screens.

This week’s focus was on more research and user testing. We spoke to many people, asking what gestures they associate with being told to be quiet, to whisper, or to adjust their volume. We were interested in the physical language of authority figures and how a simple raised finger, hand wave, or look can immediately signal control. Because our “choir” was structured around managing people’s volume through nonverbal cues, these insights helped us understand how deeply ingrained and universally understood such gestures are.

Our performance took place later in the week and went surprisingly well, as I was feeling a bit uncertain about this concept. We had seven groups of two people, and our conductor established authority and direction from the beginning. Even though volunteers were not told beforehand that they would be responding to gestures, during the performance, they instinctively followed along. This understanding reinforced our central idea: that power and universal gestures can get people to adjust noise volume.

The feedback we received was not so much suggesting changes to what we had done; our tutors and peers focused on where the project could go next, what contexts it could exist in, and how it might evolve. Their comments made me think about the larger extent of our work. I began wondering how this performance would be placed in a different environment, such as a theater. Would an audience still understand the gestures without the explanation that we gave? Would the sense of control be amplified or lost in a larger space? These questions have stayed with me, reminding me that our project isn’t just about whispering about how people read and respond to authority in silence.