MUSC 280: World Music Notes

Ethnomusicology: 1) study of music in culture

- Culture includes institutions promoted / maintain values
- Culture justified colonialism and violence on indigenous pops.

Unilinear descent: societies naturally evolve through same sequence of stages from primitive to
civilized

Ethnocentrism: evaluating other cultures based on values / customs / beliefs you are assuming
(BAD)

2) study of world’s musics from a comparative and relativistic perspective

3) study music through fieldwork
- study of how people conceive of, produce and consume music by spending time with
them daily
- Ethnography: systematic study and description of a group of people and their cultural
practices from their point of view

4) study of all of the musical manifestations of a society

- no hierarchies of value the good, ordinary, and bad
- do not privilege elite music, pay attention to ALL music of ALL people

Changing Definitions of Ethnomusicology

- Previous definitions of this are flawed as they are premised on a common
understanding of music
- Music is NOT a universal language (ethno..study music as a behavior)

Conceptualize music making as different fileds of artistic practice not a single art
form that has various styles
- Get rid of music as an ontological construct ; resituate music as sound and noise
(generic term)

Soundscape features

Signals – sounds that are consciously listened to (micro, horns) ; have social meaning
Soundmarks – Bell tower, School bell (derived from landmark)
Acoustemology

Acoustics + Epistemology = sound as way of knowing

Study by Steve Feld 1992
Different from soundscapes and acoustic – the experience and agency of listeners and histories
of listening

Listening as embodied experience

Evelyn Glennie: How to listen with your whole body
-listening as habitus (routine, emplaced hearing) ingrained worldview and set of dispositions,
tastes, and habits shared by people with similar backgrounds