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Social and cultural anthropology. v. t. e. Ethnomusicology (from Greek ἔθνος ethnos ‘nation’ and μουσική mousike ‘music’) is the multidisciplinary study of music in its cultural context, investigating social, cognitive, biological, comparative, and other dimensions involved other than sound.
- Research Questions
- History
- Key Theories/Concepts
- Methods
- Ethical Considerations
- Sources
Ethnomusicologists study a wide range of topics and musical practices throughout the world. It is sometimes described as the study of non-Western music or “world music,” as opposed to musicology, which studies Western European classical music. However, the field is defined more by its research methods (i.e., ethnography, or immersive fieldwork with...
The field, as it is currently named, emerged in the 1950s, but ethnomusicology originated as “comparative musicology” in the late 19th century. Linked to the 19th-century European focus on nationalism, comparative musicology emerged as a project of documenting the different musical features of diverse regions of the world. The field of musicology w...
Ethnomusicology takes as given the notion that music can provide meaningful insight into a larger culture or group of people. Another foundational concept is cultural relativismand the idea that no culture/music is inherently more valuable or better than another. Ethnomusicologists avoid assigning value judgments like “good” or “bad” to musical pra...
Ethnography is the method that most distinguishes ethnomusicology from historical musicology, which largely entails doing archival research (examining texts). Ethnography involves conducting research with people, namely musicians, to understand their role within their larger culture, how they make music, and what meanings they assign to music, amon...
There are a number of ethical issues ethnomusicologists consider in the course of their research, and most relate to the representation of musical practices that are not “their own.” Ethnomusicologists are tasked with representing and disseminating, in their publications and public presentations, the music of a group of people who may not have the ...
Barz, Gregory F., and Timothy J. Cooley, editors. Shadows in the Field: New Perspectives for Fieldwork in Ethnomusicology. Oxford University Press, 1997.Myers, Helen. Ethnomusicology: An Introduction. W.W. Norton & Company, 1992.Nettl, Bruno. The Study of Ethnomusicology: Thirty-three Discussions. 3rded., University of Illinois Press, 2015.Nettl, Bruno, and Philip V. Bohlman, editors. Comparative Musicology and Anthropology of Music: Essays on the History of Ethnomusicology. University of Chicago Press, 1991.Winnie Lai, Hong Kong, 2020. Ethnomusicology is the study of music in its social and cultural contexts. Ethnomusicologists examine music as a social process in order to understand what music is and what it means to its practitioners and audiences. Ethnomusicology is highly interdisciplinary.
Ethnomusicologists believe that humans make music as a constituent element of culture. To narrow down their study of music and culture, ethnomusicologists study the connections through particular themes, issues, and questions.
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Ethnomusicology, field of scholarship that encompasses the study of all world musics from various perspectives. It is defined either as the comparative study of musical systems and cultures or as the anthropological study of music. Although the field had antecedents in the 18th and early 19th.
Mar 1, 2023 · From religious ceremonies to social gatherings, music plays a significant role in different cultures around the world. Ethnomusicology is the study of music across cultures and seeks to understand how music reflects cultural values and beliefs.
Learning Outcomes. By the end of this section, you will be able to: Define ethnomusicology. Describe evidence of musical instruments in prehistory. Articulate the importance of sociocultural context to the understanding of music. Describe how music can form the basis of subculture and community.
