In this speculative scenario, the UK has started to use speech analysis as a key assessment for gaining access to the country. In addition, electrical network frequency analysis is used in law, forensics and other aspects of culture to mark or conceptualise time, because of its ability to timestamp recordings. People have become hyper-aware of its hum.
English is still the fundamental language but people have reacted to this situation by forming their own speech communities, creating sonic borders and allowing them distinct ways of life. Populations have diversified their language not in terms of words but in terms of sound, due to the tone (on and around 50Hz = F-sharp) of the pervasive electrical hum.
Presented as eight audio clips that can be listened to by inputting a headphone jack into a laser cut map, they can be listened to independently but also provide a linear or chronological narrative. Starting at the Dover border, in scene 1 the hum is loudest and most potent, gradually getting quieter through the scenes and having less influence, finally ending in scene 8 where there is no hum.
Abbas-Nazari worked with a speech therapist and amateur singers to help develop and define the vocal parts through improvisation and role-play. Abbas-Nazari herself takes on the role of an outlaw speech therapist, within the narrative, through her teaching people how to perform their vocal parts, giving them the ability to code-switch to move across borders.