Toward the Remodeling of Ethnomusicology

Abstract

thnomusicology, like any academic field, is constantly being created and recreated through research, writing and teaching of its practitioners. Direct action in form of new data, interpretations, theories, and methods effectively defines field. Modeling a discipline, on other hand, requires a step back from direct engagement in research to ask descriptive question, what are we doing?, and prescriptive question, what ought we to be doing? The answer will surely depend on intellectual and social matrix of modeler (Blum 1975 and C. Seeger 1977) and effectiveness of will depend either on extent to which it captures simply and elegantly current work being done in field or provides a kind of moral imperative for future action. Probably best example of an effective in recent history of ethnomusicology is Merriam's model proposed in 1964 in Anthropology of Music. His simple model involves study on three analytic levels-conceptualization about music, behavior in relation to music, and sound itself (p. 32). The is essentially circular in form (see fig. 1) with concept affecting behavior which produces sound product. And he continues, . .. There is a constant feedback from product to concepts about music, and this is what accounts both for change and stability in a system (p. 33). This was seminal in history of ethnomusicology and to that date was most forceful and cogent statement of anthropological concerns with respect to music. The defined ethnomusicology as the study of in culture and that view-even as modified to music as culture and the relationship between and culture--has remained one of core concepts in discipline ever since. We can of course argue about extent of its influence during last twenty years, but there can be no doubt that it continues to be influential. It is still frequently cited to contextualize particular research problems (for example, Yung 1984 and Sawa 1983), Bruno Nettl (1983) called it definitive, not just of study of but apparently of itself, and it provided basic for recent collaborative textbook, Worlds of Music (Titon 1984). If that book's authors, coming from a very wide range of backgrounds, could agree on this model, then continuing extent of its influence is clear-at least as an overall image or of field.