Sound and Secularity: Introduction

Yale Journal of Music & Religion · 2021

• Political Science
• Acoustics
• Political Science

Guest editors Margarethe Adams and August Sheehy introduce their special issue on Sound and Secularity.

Steppe Dreams: Time, Mediation, and Postsocialist Celebrations in Kazakhstan

2020 · 2 citations

• Political Science
• Geography
• Ancient history

Women musicians of Uzbekistan: from courtyard to conservatory

Ethnomusicology Forum · 2018-01-02

"Women musicians of Uzbekistan: from courtyard to conservatory." Ethnomusicology Forum, 27(1), pp. 116–117

Music and the Play of Power in the Middle East, North Africa and Central AsiaNooshin, Laudan (ed.) (2009). <i>Music and the Play of Power in the Middle East, North Africa and Central Asia</i> . Burlington, VT and Surrey, England: Ashgate. SOAS Musicology Series. ISBN 978-0-7546-3457-7. 14 b&amp;w illustrations, 10 music examples, 340 pp. &lt;www.ashgate.com&gt; $121.60 (cloth)

Journal of Musical Arts in Africa · 2014-01-01 · 3 citations

Title: Music and the play of power in the Middle East, north Africa and central Asia Author: Nooshin, Laudan Publisher: Ashgate Publication year: 2009 ISBN 978-0-7546-3457-7

The Fiddle’s Voice: Timbre, Musical Learning, and Collaborative Ethnography in Central and Inner Asia

Collaborative anthropologies · 2013-01-01

The Fiddle's VoiceTimbre, Musical Learning, and Collaborative Ethnography in Central and Inner Asia Margarethe Adams (bio) A collaborative ethnography, as described by Douglas Holmes and George Marcus, involves a "deferral to the subjects' modes of knowing" (Holmes and Marcus 2008: 82), ideally practiced from the first step into the field and carried through the writing stage, an approach underscored by Joanne Rappaport, who advocates for "coproduction of theory" and is echoed by others in this journal (Field 2008; Lassiter 2005; Rappaport 2008). Rappaport writes, "It is precisely the possibility of constructing alternative research agendas outside of the academic orbit and, correspondingly, pursuing alternative forms of analysis, which make collaborative ethnography different from traditional participant observation" (Rappaport 2008: 2). For many of us who started our academic training with the participant observation model, our research approach has evolved over time, becoming more collaborative as we become more comfortable with "vulnerable" ethnographic writing, in which we eschew the techniques "intended to increase the authenticity of our ethnographic accounts and augment our authority as authors" (Lassiter 2005: 120). My own approach to collaborative ethnography emerged gradually during my ethnographic research on Kazakh music in Kazakhstan, China, and western Mongolia (2004–10), and my study of Kazakh aesthetics, particularly timbre, was informed by collaborative work with Kazakh musicians and teachers. In this article I build on the early collaborative ethnographies of others in my discipline by exploring how studying with local musicians (or indeed [End Page 149] other masters of performance and expressive culture) allows the development of collaborative discussion of aesthetics and sonic meaning. Ethnomusicologists, because of their close involvement with other musicians, depending on the research project, sometimes have easier "access" when first conducting fieldwork, though ethnomusicological studies, like those of anthropologists, ultimately involve local "modes of knowing" to wildly varying degrees. In parallel to developments in collaborative anthropology, various "threads" of collaborative work have been present in ethnomusicology for several decades (Lassiter 2005: 17).1 Because we are generally interested in hearing, producing, and describing sound, ethnomusicologists have long sought ways to involve native musicians and musicologists in discourse about the particular sounds they make. Particularly when studying aspects of aesthetics, as most ethnomusicologists do in some fashion, working collaboratively in musical performance (even at very elementary skill levels) provides a way to hash out ideas about music through sonic (musical), physical (embodied), and verbal means. Providing a nuanced ongoing conversation, continued collaborative performance helps to get at physical and musical manifestations of emotions as well as ideas. Working closely with local musicians in lessons or rehearsals also allows the ethnographer to be the follower, so that the local teacher/musician drives the both the sonic and the theoretical collaboration. Studies on sound as a focus of collaborative ethnography within the field of ethnomusicology have touched on a wide range of subjects, including aesthetics and ethics; technology, digital media, and the recording industry (Bates 2010; Fiol 2010); embodiment, belief, and philosophy (Keister 2008; Levin and Süzükei 2006); ritual, performativity, and framing (Fiol 2010; Wong 2001); perception and emotion (Perman 2010); and acoustic ecology (Feld 1988; Levin and Süzükei 2006). Early forays into collaborative ethnomusicology included attention to language and native musical terms and a concurrent striving to construct a theory that took into account lifeways, ecology, and social structure. Steven Feld's now well-known ethnography of the Kaluli's "lift-up-over sounding" embraced this approach. A major contribution to the field and a profound influence on later scholars, Feld's 1981 article, which drew a parallel between ecological and sonic aspects of Kaluli performance, [End Page 150] paved the way for a growing interest in native conceptions of sound and a burgeoning awareness of acoustic ecology (Feld 1981). Feld ventured further into collaborative territory when he discussed his monograph Sound and Sentiment (1982) with Kaluli members to gain their feedback on his characterization of their music and aesthetic concepts in a process of "dialogic editing" (Feld 1988). Other ethnomusicological studies that have influenced the collaborative direction of ethnomusicology include Jane Sugarman's 1997 monograph Engendering Song: Singing and Subjectivity at Prespa Albanian Weddings, which, though perhaps not consciously about collaborative ethnography, represents insightful...

Music and entertainment in post-Soviet Kazakhstan: ideology and legacy

Illinois Digital Environment for Access to Learning and Scholarship (University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign) · 2011-01-01 · 4 citations

???Music and Entertainment in Post-Soviet Kazakhstani Holidays: Ideology and Legacy???&#13;\n&#13;\nMy dissertation examines the interplay between ideology and entertainment as reflected in the holiday cycle of post-Soviet Kazakhstan. During a two-year ethnographic study of holiday celebrations and expressive culture in Kazakhstan, Mongolia, and China between 2004 and 2006, I attended state-sponsored celebrations as well as holiday events at religious establishments, children???s daycares and schools, and observed the social, familial watching of televised holiday programs. I conducted the bulk of my fieldwork in Almaty, the cosmopolitan former capital of Kazakhstan, with shorter stints in Kazakh areas of China and Mongolia.&#13;\nNational and transnational ideologies and networks are intricately involved in celebrations in Kazakhstan and the Kazakhstani diaspora. My work examines how the state navigates between Kazakh nationalism and multiethnic harmony, a precarious balance that President Nazarbev has thus far has maintained fairly well, and how this managing of diversity dovetails with other important large-scale ideologies like Islam and globalism. In particular, I observe the use of calendars, zodiacs and habits of celebration as tools and reflections of nation building. In Central Asian New Year (Nauryz), for example, I look at the state???s effort to strengthen Kazakh nationhood, on the one hand, and the adherence to alternate identities on the other.&#13;\nThe cosmopolitan nature of Almaty, where I conducted the bulk of my research, is reflected in celebrations such as Purim in the Almaty synagogue and Easter in a Korean church, both of which involve complicated, transnational networks of funding and religious leadership. In dramatic, musical, and dance performances staged during these holidays, conflicting narratives from home and abroad bring to life the concurrent, overlapping ideologies at play in such celebrations.&#13;\nBecause I wanted this study to look both forward and back, I examine how both Soviet legacy and post-Soviet developments (particularly transnational religious, diasporic and business networks) have informed nationality policy, holiday celebrations and public cultural formations. My work on Kazakhstani celebrations of May 9th (Victory Day, WWII) is particularly revealing of the lasting import of the Soviet legacy. Interviews reflect ambiguous and contrasting opinions on Kazakhstan???s involvement in WWII, and the ubiquitous May 9th performances of romantic Soviet war songs reveal lasting loyalty to and nostalgia for the Soviet past.

palimpsest of sound in the urban environment

UCL Discovery (University College London) · 2006-01-01