The quiet cultural cost of speaking and listening less

Lives beyond our own circles

Much of the collection is available online through Trove. Its recordings include Indigenous Australians describing the distant past, as well as personal memories reaching back to the 19th century. Across thousands of voices, I’ve heard people from different generations, places and social groups tell their stories in their own words.

The archive also holds forgotten Australian accents, vanished words and accounts of jobs that no longer exist. Some people make me laugh until I cry. Others describe major social upheavals, from the 1891 Queensland shearers’ strike to arguments over conscription during the First World War. I’m deeply moved by Indigenous Australians who recount becoming part of the “stolen generations.”

Listening is more than hearing

The value of these recordings is not just that they preserve information. Hearing people with different lives and perspectives can support mental and physical well-being, help people share knowledge, broaden understanding and prompt new ideas. Listening is also closely tied to empathy.

For me, that is the central point. Listening lets us enter another person’s experience without demanding instant satisfaction or artificial agreement. It teaches patience, makes differences easier to value and leaves room for disagreement without unnecessarily breaking relationships.

That matters as social circles narrow around distance, remote work and time spent online. An archive can bring an unfamiliar voice within reach, but it cannot replace the exchange itself. My concern is that if we speak and listen to one another less, empathy will not simply fade as an abstract virtue; we will have fewer chances to learn how people unlike us live.

Across centuries, backgrounds and very different circumstances, people still recognise love and loss, change and hardship, joy and resilience. The old voices remain capable of reaching us. The harder question is whether we will keep making space to hear them.