Critical review #10: Meintjes 1990: "Paul Simon's Graceland"

In her 1990 article entitled "Paul Simon's Graceland, South Africa, and the Mediation of Musical Meaning," Louise Meintjes discusses and examines the political dynamics involved in the creation of Simon's album. She begins by examining the idea of collaboration, and trying to define it in her own terms while examining what it means to different groups of people. Collaboration, according to Meintjes, happened in "Graceland" at many levels, from composition of songs to the languages used in the album and the politics involved in the associated world tour. She separates these types of "musical collaboration" from her other category, which she calls "social collaboration." Social collaboration primarily involves the listener and the way that he/she experiences the music; Meintjes looks at the music from both a white and black South African perspective.

Meintjes does a great job of laying out some of the intrinsic issues in Paul Simon's album, but in my opinion doesn't further the research beyond articles we have already read. Personally, I would be interested in hearing first-hand accounts of people who were each of her categories to see how they felt about the album - will these accounts back up her assertions?

Discussion question: How can we look at "Graceland" as an ethnography in itself?

Challenge question cycle: answer to Hannah's question

Hannah's question: In Shelemay’s article “Ethnomusicologist, Ethnographic Method, and the Transmission of Tradition,” she discusses the ethnomusicologist's role in the transmission of tradition. How does an ethnomusicologist’s role in this differ depending on the situation and type of fieldwork they are doing? Does it make a difference if they are doing fieldwork “at home?”

We've looked at this question in a variety of contexts in this class so far, and the answers have sometimes been different depending on the specific case study. I'd like to synthesize these answers somewhat while trying to develop a more generalized theory of the ethics behind an ethnomusicologist's role in the transmission of tradition.

As we've discussed in depth, the word "tradition" itself is a difficult and hard-to-define term. At what point does a type of music become "traditional?" In some fields the word tradition seems to be applied as soon as something has happened more than once, such as in my own fieldwork. In other groups, such as the traditional Baroque music groups that exist, "traditional" means that they are playing works with the specific instrument types that existed at that time period, trying to reproduce the original sound as exactly as possible.

So how can tradition be "transmitted" in these different areas? What is the role of an ethnographer in this process? I see their role as differing when they're working "in the field" versus "at home." In a place foreign to them, an ethnographer has the freedom to work as an independent researcher, initially starting out without overt connections to the community. In this more old-school role, he/she has the ability to work with less fear of offending the musical community, and begins the process with fewer pre-conceived notions. Though these benefits to fieldwork exist, there are also downfalls; several of our readings have pointed out the difficulties that arise when a community is less accepting to outsiders and may hold information back or attempt to paint themselves in a different light. The ethnographer's role, here, is to transmit as much knowledge about the community to the rest of the world; they have fewer social and moral obligations to the community. However, I am a fan of Shelemay's interactions with the  community she was studying; eventually, she was able to impart knowledge to them about their own musical tradition.

At home, the ethnomusicologist may have a greater ability to tease out information about complex emotions and relationships, as he/she already has a basic knowledge of the group being studied. However, this basic knowledge can be a burden as well; in some cases this "knowledge" is more of a set of stereotypes than anything else. As a researcher who is also a part of the community he/she is studying, the ethnographer in this context has much more responsibility to give back to the community, be it through transmission of their tradition or another form of social service. 

So, how are these values of the ethnomusicologist "at home" versus "in the field" changing? As we have seen from Kiri's own work as well as other readings, it is becoming harder to distinguish the two areas, which seemed so juxtaposed in the 1950s and '60s. Is a researcher looking at YouTube videos made in Singapore from the comfort of her own home "at home" or "in the field?" Does fieldwork even require participation any more? Ethnomusicology seems to be at a liminal stage in development right now, and it will be interesting to see how the field develops as we move more and more into an "internet age."

Critical review #9: Miller - "Travelling Home" intro, chapter 1

In the introduction to her book on Sacred Harp singing, Miller begins by describing the background of this tradition, which seems to have begun in New England around the time of the Revolutionary War, but later found a home in the Appalachians and further south in the 19th century "singing school" movement. Sacred Harp has sometimes been known as a sort of "white spiritual," and this term persists as the genre is still very white-dominated; Miller explores some of the origins of this boundary as well as why it remains intact today, especially in areas that like to see themselves as post-racial. With the advent of recording technology and radio, as well as a "diaspora" of Sacred Harp singers out of the south, the tradition has continued with some changes. One current struggle exists around the idea of "authority" and who constitues a "traditional" singer - are only the singers who grow up in the southern Sacred Harp tradition the "authoritarians?"

Discussion question: We see here how a tradition can become more flexible over time. How can a tradition become less flexible in certain ways?

Challenge questions

1. In some of the ethnographies we have read, the researcher plays a part in the transmission of tradition within the community, as Kay Shelemay did. In others, the ethnomusicologist does no such thing and feels very little connection to the community after conducting research. What is the role of an ethnomusicologist, and what does she/he owe to the community being studied? What does the community owe to him/her? Do these roles differ if the ethnographer is "at home" or "away?"

2. We have looked at various examples of use of the internet in ethnographic research, including Miller's idea of A2A transmission via YouTube and Eric Whitacre's "virtual choir." How has the advent of the internet changed the practice of ethnomusicology? How has it made some parts of research more difficult?

Critical Review #8: Kaminsky, "Gender and Sexuality in the Polska"

David Kaminsky's article on gender and sexuality within the Swedish polska dance tradition was extremely interesting, especially as we have not yet looked at dance from an ethnomusicological perspective. Kaminsky begins the article by describing an interaction he had with another male dancer; this ethnography is clearly "from within," as Kaminsky has extensive experience within this tradition himself. Kaminsky provides a quick introduction to polska itself, then describes the intricacies of the "narrative" within the dance; it seems that polska takes an interesting role where it isn't a narrative dance, but yet represents a narrative.

Clearly, as in most types of folk dance, the partner dancing traditionally has male and female (leader and follower) roles. Kaminsky describes these typical roles as "Guinevere and Lancelot" – chivalry (kavaljer) is encouraged from the male. However, new styles of teaching polska teach masculine and feminine roles to both genders; Kaminsky notes that there has been a movement in the past 10 years towards many more male-male pairings in dance, where there had only previously been female-female pairings.

So how do these male-male pairings relate to the use of polska as a flirtation and "coupling" dance? It seems that the instance that Kaminsky describes in the opening of the paper was an anomaly; most flirtation routines involve the use of extreme gender roles. Kaminsky closes the paper by talking about when mixed-gender couples decide to "flip" gender roles, and the difficulties involved in this switch. His interview with Cissi Strombeck was interesting, as she seemed not to agree with his assertions, yet he did not directly address this point.

Discussion question: Is it important to have people within a musical tradition proofread papers such as these? What happens if they don't agree with the author's assertions?

Critical review 7: Back 2002, White power music and the internet

In his 2002 article entitled "Wagner and power chords: skinheadism, white power music, and the Internet," Les Back begins by providing the reader with a very detailed description of the origins and history of the White Power movement. Before reading this article, I knew very little about the movement, as it's not extremely prevalent in the area I live in (or so I thought...two men mentioned from the "Aryan Singles" dating site in this article live very close to my hometown). I do remember reading this article a few months ago, and being shocked at the life that this man had previously led.

After this introduction to the racial supremacy movement, Back begins to discuss how the internet functions as a means of recruitment and communication for people within this movement, and especially how their music has been disseminated through the web. Most simply, the internet has allowed different "pockets" of white supremacists to contact each other and unify their goals. Interestingly, the types of music associated with these White Power groups have diversified in recent years; the movement is still associated most closely with punk/metal bands, but some in the group have discussed the need for music that can appeal to a wider audience.

Discussion question: In what ways have these White Power groups used the internet to further their goals? Are there ways in which the internet has held them back?

Sir Whiskey Richards: interview clips

Here are a few sounds clips from later portions of the interview from my previous post.

The first one comes from a question I asked about how people stay involved in Arrr after they graduate from Brown:

In the second clip, Whiskey discusses how Arrr started and early impressions people had of the group: