Soundscapes From The Americas: Ethnomusicological Essays On The Power, Poetics, And Ontology Of Performance (soas Musicology Series)
by Donna A. Buchanan /
2014 / English / PDF
1.5 MB Download
Dedicated to the late Gerard Behague (1937-2005), whose pioneering
work in Latin American music, popular culture, and performance
studies contributed extensively to ethnomusicological discourse in
the 1970s-1990s, this anthology offers comparative perspectives on
the evolving legacy of performance ethnography in socio-musical
analysis. President of the Society for Ethnomusicology from
1979-81, editor of its journal, Ethnomusicology, from 1974-78, and
founder and editor of the trilingual Latin American Music Review
from 1980 until his death, Behague also established the
ethnomusicology graduate program at the University of Texas at
Austin in 1974, thereby influencing the training and thinking of
dozens of the field's practitioners. Among these are the volume's
eight authors, whose contributions reflect the heritage but also
contemporary trajectories of Behague's scholarly concerns. Prefaced
by an essay outlining key developments in the ethnography of
performance paradigm, the volume's seven case studies portray
snapshots of musical life in representative communities of the
Americas, including the southwestern and Pacific United States,
Puerto Rico, Bolivia, Chile, Cuba, and Ecuador. Situated in milieus
ranging from the indigenous festivals of the Andean highlands, to
the competitive public gatherings of poet-singers in post-Pinochet
Chile, to the Puerto Rican dance halls of the Hawaiian islands,
these studies pose anthropological inquiries into the ontology of
performance practice, the social power of poetic performativity,
and the experience and embodiment of sound in place.
Dedicated to the late Gerard Behague (1937-2005), whose pioneering
work in Latin American music, popular culture, and performance
studies contributed extensively to ethnomusicological discourse in
the 1970s-1990s, this anthology offers comparative perspectives on
the evolving legacy of performance ethnography in socio-musical
analysis. President of the Society for Ethnomusicology from
1979-81, editor of its journal, Ethnomusicology, from 1974-78, and
founder and editor of the trilingual Latin American Music Review
from 1980 until his death, Behague also established the
ethnomusicology graduate program at the University of Texas at
Austin in 1974, thereby influencing the training and thinking of
dozens of the field's practitioners. Among these are the volume's
eight authors, whose contributions reflect the heritage but also
contemporary trajectories of Behague's scholarly concerns. Prefaced
by an essay outlining key developments in the ethnography of
performance paradigm, the volume's seven case studies portray
snapshots of musical life in representative communities of the
Americas, including the southwestern and Pacific United States,
Puerto Rico, Bolivia, Chile, Cuba, and Ecuador. Situated in milieus
ranging from the indigenous festivals of the Andean highlands, to
the competitive public gatherings of poet-singers in post-Pinochet
Chile, to the Puerto Rican dance halls of the Hawaiian islands,
these studies pose anthropological inquiries into the ontology of
performance practice, the social power of poetic performativity,
and the experience and embodiment of sound in place.
