Can Noise Be Mapped? Exploring Hyderabad Through the Sounds We Ignore

In Hyderabad, the soundscape is more than just background noise; it's an archive of everyday life. From the urgent honk of buses weaving through Jubilee Hills to the rhythmic call to prayer echoing at dusk in the Old City, the city speaks in tones we’ve come to normalise, ignore, or sometimes even cherish. Yet within these layers of white noise, ice cream cart bells, street arguments, pigeons cooing, devotional chants, lie clues about identity, belonging, exclusion, and power. This article explores how sound maps not just geography but also emotion, memory, and social dynamics, through conversations with a diverse group of residents, vendors, students, and workers. What do the sounds we take for granted say about us, and what happens when we pause to truly listen?

The Layers of a City: Everyday Sounds That Shape Hyderabad

The sonic tapestry of Hyderabad is rich and layered, woven with childhood echoes, religious rituals, mechanical roars, and quiet moments of reflection. For many, it’s the white noise of traffic, murmurs of neighbours, and pigeons fluttering by the balcony that become the invisible backdrop to daily life. “There used to be loud sounds of namaz at exactly 5 every evening, mixed with the traffic from the highway and the ice cream wallah’s ghadi, which was my personal favourite,” recalls Hashmi, a corporate worker who lived in the city for a few months. For others, the rhythm of street life offers a more vibrant score. A vegetable seller shared, “Children shouting and playing on the street, that’s the most common sound in my neighbourhood. That and the way people talk, words like mamu, chicha, idar ich udar ich, it’s all part of the sound of this place.”

Hyderabad’s auditory map isn’t limited to movement and speech. It includes silences too, intentional or forced. A student from Hitech City offered a conflicted reflection: “I miss the rustic nature of my locality, but I also feel tech is indispensable. Everyone’s glued to their phones now. It’s more disconnected, and I think that’s made the city quieter in an odd way.” Meanwhile, the mechanical sounds, the truck horns, GHMC garbage vans, and the blaring traffic signals serve as jarring reminders of urban life. “The sharp burst of a truck horn could mean danger,” noted a young intern. “It’s the only sound that cuts through the white noise.”

These mundane, even ignored sounds collectively map a city in motion, not through its architecture or planning, but through its emotional register. They tell us where life gathers, where tensions rise, and where comfort resides.

Sound as Identity and Avoidance: What We Embrace, What We Escape

In a city as textured as Hyderabad, certain sounds serve as anchors of identity, auditory emblems that instantly evoke a sense of place. “I’m not a Muslim, but every time I hear namaz in the evening, I think of Hyderabad,” Hashmi reflected. “That, and when people speak in that Hyderabadi Hindi slang, it’s unmistakable.” For others, it’s the collective hum of street life that captures the city’s essence. The vegetable seller pointed to the distinctive local lingo; “mamu, chicha, idar ich udar ich” as the very sound of her surroundings. Even more abstractly, an intern described Hyderabad’s identity as embedded in white noise, a blend of honks, conversations, and distant market calls that “isn’t any single sound but the sum of all the little ones.”

Yet, not all sounds are welcome. For some, noise creates tension and avoidance, especially when it overlaps with religious or political discord. “I try to avoid areas where religious stuff goes on,” Hashmi admitted. “Noise is just one of the reasons; it’s also about the other things that come with it.” Others avoid high-traffic areas or intersections where the stress of constant honking becomes overwhelming. The intern added, “Home is the place I retreat to. It’s where I can finally escape the relentless city sounds.” These choices, what we gravitate towards and what we flee, speak volumes about how soundscapes influence urban navigation and emotional comfort.

Gendered Frequencies: How Noise Is Felt Differently

While the city’s soundscape may seem democratic, its impact is often filtered through the lens of gender. Public noise, especially in crowded or chaotic zones, doesn’t feel the same to everyone. A vegetable seller noted, “Men are ready to respond and help or defend, while women are usually scared and want to get out of there.” Her observation speaks volumes about how women’s encounters with public sound, especially aggressive or intrusive noise, often signal discomfort or threat. Sound, in this sense, becomes more than just background; it’s an emotional terrain navigated differently based on gender.

Hashmi offered a revealing glimpse into how these differences emerge even within families. “My mom listens to music at full volume in the morning; my dad hates it. My grandmom gets involved in every neighbourhood quarrel, while my granddad stays calm.” This domestic soundscape reflects how noise is also tied to agency, who gets to make noise, who is expected to tolerate it, and who retreats from it. And when asked about danger, the intern referenced the blaring horn of a truck as a sound of imminent risk, but stopped short of linking it to gender, perhaps unaware of how safety itself is differently constructed across identities. In a city like Hyderabad, noise is not just heard; it is absorbed, resisted, and responded to differently, depending on where one stands in the social hierarchy.

The Sound of Staying

When asked what sound they’d miss most if they ever left Hyderabad, almost everyone paused, not because they didn’t know, but because what they’d miss wasn’t always a single noise, but a feeling stitched into many. “The noise by the vehicles mixed with pigeon sounds from my house balcony, while I’m feeding them, it’s that whole mix I’ll miss,” said Hashmi, capturing how even the chaotic can feel intimate when tied to routine. For the intern, it was the “white noise” itself, “not any single sound but the sum of all the little ones that make up life here.” In a world where cities are often defined by skylines and roads, Hyderabad’s true map might just be drawn in sound: in the ritualistic, the annoying, the soothing, and the unspoken. To leave a city like this, then, is to carry not just its memories, but its noise in your head, long after the traffic fades.