DEEP ASPECTS IN WESTERN ACOUSTIC CULTURE ACCORDING TO MURRAY SCHAFER (Kategorie glebokie w zachodniej kulturze akustycznej w ujeciu R. Murraya Schaeffera. Zarys badan porównawczych.)

R. Murray Schafer's teaching and research activities are the primary sources of soundscape studies and the acoustic ecology movement. In his interdisciplinary writings Schafer utilises, among other approaches, a social perspective, using numerous cultural comparisons of soundscapes and acoustic societies partaking in those environments. In the main part of my article I suggest that in these comparisons, as well as in other parts of his writings, Schafer discovers in Western culture 'deep' aspects (approaching an anthropological universalism) which liken it to traditional cultures of other parts of the world and historically distant or pre-historical times. This thesis is illustrated by six examples from Schafer's writings: 1. The relating of cosmogenic myths of other cultures to Western everyday life; 2. The continued existence of 'sacred noise' through its transmutation into specific noises of contemporary civilisation; 3. The widespread existence of certain categories of acoustic signals on the globe (such as centrifugal/centripetal); 4. The universal existence of sound sentiments and phobias; 5. The similarity of sources and inspirations of music in different cultures (inspiration by the soundscape); and 6. The recent trend in the West toward the acoustic space model of communication found in other cultures (as evidenced by Marshall McLuhan).