Humans are accustomed to hearing sounds from everywhere at any time. The sources of these sounds are not always discernible to the eye.

A developed auditory sense has allowed humans to gather information from their surroundings. Hearing acts as a kind of early-warning system, enabling humans to identify the general direction of a sound and react to it before the need for visual confirmation.

Our causal mode of listening has helped humans evade predators and navigate through hostile environments. Language introduces semantic modes of listening that has supported mankind’s growing need to understand and cooperate with one another in an increasingly complex and socialised world.

In the course of everyday life these habitual listening modes - the causal and semantic - are often activated and combined simultaneously. Chion writes: “We hear at once what someone says and how they say it“.