This course addresses a set of contemporary issues concerning music-making in human culture. In it we will read texts by leading writers and researchers about concepts and issues such as 'world music', intercultural experience through music, and music and ecology, among others. Each week we will listen to 'case study' examples of music that illustrate those issues . LISTENING will be treated as an integral method of learning, as we identify elements in the music itself (including lyrics in the case of songs) as evidence of musicians' engagement with the issues.
Students will acquire the following knowledge in this course.
- The various historical and current applications of the term 'world music'
- The basic terms in which intercultural experience through music can be analysed and discussed
- Possible intersections between ecology and musicology
- The interrelations among music and politics, in particular in song
- How music 'creates' place and identity, in particular in Japan
intercultural experience, world music, ecology, globalisation, identity
Specialist skills | ✔ Intercultural skills | ✔ Communication skills | ✔ Critical thinking skills | Practical and/or problem-solving skills |
(1) Students must read the assigned writings and listen to assigned music extracts in advance of each class and prepare their own set of comments and questions.
(2)A short discussion will be held at the start of each session about overall impressions of what students have heard and read, and the questions or points of argument they have prepared.
(3) A final paper on the material of the session 8 individual presentations must be submitted within a week after that session.
Course schedule | Required learning | |
---|---|---|
Class 1 | Explanation of syllabus. Discussion of musical interests and experiences. What is "World Music"? | Bohlman 2002 |
Class 2 | Intercultural experience through music 1 Case study: wadaiko | de Ferranti 2006:"Japan beating: the re-making of taiko drum music in contemporary Australia." |
Class 3 | Intercultural experience through music 2 Case study: Australian Aboriginal music | Neuenfeldt 1997: The Didjeridu: From Arnhem Land to Internet |
Class 4 | Eco-musicology | J.F. Titon 2013: "The Nature of Ecomusicology" |
Class 5 | Music and place(s) – transforming spaces and feeling the local through music | Readings on music and motion, and 1 or more case studies (for example music in the various spaces of a Tokyo shopping mall, hill country blues, fiddlers in Northern Ireland, Tsugaru folk song ) |
Class 6 | What are songs for? The components of songs, songs of protest, prohibited songs; secret songs, etc. | Frith 1989 "Why do songs have words?" Unsongs https://www.noahpreminger.com/buy/noah-preminger-mediations-on-freedom |
Class 7 | What is “Japanese music"? Case studies: biwa; shakuhachi | de Ferranti 2017: "The place of biwa" Keister 2004 : "The shakuhachi as spiritual tool" |
Class 8 | Individual presentations | Demonstrate understanding of some of the issues and the methods of music research that have been studied. Prepare a revised written version of the presentation for submission within a week. |
readings and listenings on OCWi and WWW
Additional sources will be referred to as necessary.
Preparation of assigned readings and listenings:30%
Class participation: 30%
Final presentation and paper: 40%
Neither prior experience of the discipline of Musicology nor advanced knowledge of music theory are required. (If you are uncertain about this aspect, please ask the instructor by email before the class begins.) What IS required is an ability to listen deeply, a genuine love of music and an earnest desire to understand why human beings cannot live without it, as well as how we can think, talk and write about music coherently. Ability to read and discuss academic texts in English is also needed.
Ideally students would take this course in sequence in 2017, following Graduate Lecture in Culture and Arts S1A.