Walking into the future: Soundwalks and the affective politics of climate imagination

In the face of accelerating climate disruption, imagination is increasingly recognised as a vital but underdeveloped dimension of transformative change. This article explores immersive soundwalks—location-based audio narratives experienced through walking—as techniques of experiential climate futuring and affective engagement. Drawing on qualitative analysis of 62 reflection texts written by university students after participating in two speculative climate soundwalks in southern Sweden (Farewell Falsterbo and Memories from the Transition), we examine how sound, storytelling, movement, and place-based listening shape imaginative and emotional responses to climate futures. The analysis shows how participants experienced speculative futures not as abstract scenarios, but as emotionally and spatially situated environments encountered through movement, sound, and narrative. Participants reflected on climate transition through feelings of fear, nostalgia, ethical discomfort, and cautious hope, while also experiencing shifts in temporal perspective and their relation to possible futures. We argue that immersive soundwalks offer a distinct yet underexplored technique of futuring that complements dominant visual and technocratic forms of climate communication. By grounding speculative futures in embodied and place-based experiences, soundwalks can contribute to more affective, participatory, and imaginative forms of climate engagement.