Cohen

In this article, Sara Cohen attempts to rationalize why the study of popular music is lacking in anthropological context, having long been comprised of models abstracted from empirical data. She begins by discussing some of the issues addressed by traditional anthropological studies, such as kinship, ethnicity, identity, society, culture and community [p124].* While observing the broad range of these issues, Cohen then notes the narrow focus of popular music studies: "...lyrical and musical texts may be deconstructed and their 'meaning' asserted, but the important question 'meaning for whom?' is often neglected" [p126]; she traces varying foci from McLuhan to Hebdige to Grossberg to Frith. From these past approaches, Cohen begins to describe the value of ethnographic approaches to connect popular music (and its social context) with specific peoples and individuals, citing Finnegan's description of music's role as a personal 'path' for people in guiding activities and relationships. After describing her own past and present research in various Liverpool music scenes, Cohen expounds the value of ethnographical study: its ability to augment theoretical models, its versatility between macro and micro applications, and its emphasis on interaction, rather than mere observation.

Though she concludes by recognizing the emergence of popular ethnography, I think that this article highlights the fact that academics, disconnected from both mainstream and underground subcultures, do not realize that much of what they consider to be ethnographical study is commonplace to the individual within these respective scenes. Though historically, study was required to mediate the process of documentation, developments of the digital age (such as blogs and online communities) now facilitate the immediate chronicling of popular music and modern life.

Discussion question(s): How can technology directly reconcile the disconnect between popular music and academia? Can technology legitimize publication by younger authors? Will online communities serve as authentic subjects for study? As the Internet emphasizes the 'collective' over the personal, how will the course of popular music ethnography change trajectory?


*(Interestingly, she alludes to the fact that much of the current ethnographical studies of popular culture stems from past anthropological studies of native, foreign peoples. I believe, to read studies that use(d) such a methodology directly colors how the subject is viewed, regardless of the studies' conclusions.)

Thornton

Thornton begins her essay by describing a night out in the London club scene, bouncing from club to party to rave. Though her account seems somewhat distant from the culture, her descriptions are illuminating and preface her following evaluation of subcultures in the 1990s. She continues with a section on youth subcultures, tracing the recent history of varying theories and meta-theories that separate the field of cultural studies into their analyses of mainstream/alternative, and similar dichotomies. In this, Thornton seems to reject the traditional binaries for an expanded set of relationships she views as necessary in the 1990s, citing the observation of Grossberg that "the mass audience of pop, the mainstream of style, is the postmodern subculture" [p97]. Personally, I find this ridiculous, but she keeps going.

The following section, "The Social Logic of Subcultural Capital," Thornton discusses the social umbrella of the 'mainstream,' and what that designation suggests about class, age, scene, and status. Her argument is that the mainstream, though having multiple definitions, is something against which adolescents and young adults can differentiate themselves in order to carve out a social niche based on freedom and leisure, rather than structure and occupation; the mainstream exists as something they acknowledge and reinforce by simultaneously responding to, or rebelling against, its (seemingly omni-)presence. She concludes by discussing the gender differences in cultural capital and how these affect the composition of both the mainstream and subcultures.

Thornton concludes with a rather specific, yet uncaptivating, description of her methodologies in observing the British club scene. More relevant, in mind, is in her final conclusion, which provides not only a brief summary of her argument, but an explicit list of the social binaries that construct the larger positions of "us" and "them."

Discussion question(s): Individually, what are overlapping qualities between mainstream and underground cultures, if any? Style? Rebellion? Virtuosity? Beyond this, if cultures beneath the mainstream are formed via continual undermining of cultural authority (age, race, class, etc.), from where does subcultural authority emerge? How is it maintained, or can it be? Or does it even exist?

McClary

McClary aptly introduces her essay with Byrne's noted refrain "Same as it ever was" to describe the physicality of music, ever-present in its social impact. Tracing writings on music from Plato to Frith, she outlines the changes in the social perceptions and function of music, maintaining the role of the body as central throughout. McClary identifies gender and race as two social constructs particularly disrupted by music, noting that these subversions often go unnoticed in lieu of commercialism and cultural saturation. Though her historical analysis is broad, its closing seems to draw targeted conclusions regarding the history of African-American exploitation, the prostitution of the pop music performer, and the role of dance in subcultural development.

While I agree that examining this aspect of music is relevant to its overall history, I disagree with McClary's evaluation on the social impact of music since the 1960s, specifically her contention that the political music during Vietnam (i.e. rock'n'roll) disengaged the body from the music. Her theory of "technologies of the body" does little to reconcile music and politics/power, as it still fails to fully describe how one relates to/affects the other. Underscoring this, her subsequent emphasis on the African-American dominance of 20th century cultural imagery (specifically as it pertains to the body) discredits rock'n'roll as perhaps the most significant, if not the most physical, movement in music to popularly emerge at that time.

In my opinion, rock'n'roll did more to subvert social norms by physically empowering youth, the underclass, ethnic minorities, women or gay people than any African-American music between the 1950s and 1980s. Rock'n'roll did so by fostering internal "technologies of the body," which facilitated self-expression, in turn generating new sources of collective identity.
Glam rock with its self-indulgent theatricality, physchedelia tapping into the individual unconscious, punk rock defining youth rebellion with personal fashion and a fuckall ethos, these genres used their own conceptions of the body to manipulate predominant social constructions.

Conversely, the African-American genres McClary cites ("genres designed to maximize physical engagement") were consciously designed to have this corporeal effect, illustrated in her first example of Wilson Pickett. It was a formulaic change in the 'groove' that held sway, a type of calculation that shifted African-American music from the instinctive genres of jazz, blues, and r&b toward the popular genres of pop, soul, and disco (distinguished from the former by commercial potential). It seems that while trends like "the Motown Sound" and other highly stylized genres abandoned the modernist notion of the 'primitive' by glossing over its 'blackness', rock'n'roll adopted an updated primitivism by redistinguishing the individual from the collective by means of physical, personal expression. In my mind, the simple fact that African-American music was more danceable is overshadowed by the physical expressiveness of rock'n'roll; thusly, I believe that the latter has had more of a social impact and can be viewed to better illustrate the theoretical "technologies of the body."

(Granted these two are not mutually exclusive and overlap at numerous points throughout history. Furthermore, both have at one point or another succumbed to rampant oversaturation and commercialism, calling the authenticity of all genres and subgenres into question. I am generally responding to what I view as a generalization in McClary's theory, though I do not disagree with her observation that music, the body, and their effects are inherently, and irrevocably, connected.)

Discussion question(s): what specific musical ideas define something as 'white' or 'black'? What musical ideas (NOT lyrics) can be defined as political? How can we contextualize hip-hop in McClary's idea of music and the body?

Hebdige

The brief introductory excerpt from Hebdige's larger "Subculture: The Meaning of Style" addresses British punk as a (then) contemporary example of an emergent youth movement, one combined of musical, racial, and social components. It begins by describing the unusual social climate of Britain in the summer of 1976 when punk emerged there; Hebdige continues by discussing different cultural factors that impacted the would-be punk generation. He makes sure to foreshadow his discussion of race and racial tensions during this time, as he cites its particular relevance to punk in contrast to the impact of more commonly discussed social institutions--the school, the media, the family, etc. Musically, Hebdige introduces the major influences to British punk (David Bowie, American punk) as well as its biggest icons (The Clash, The Sex Pistols), though does not yet at length discuss their specific contributions.

The immediate relevance of this excerpt is its thorough analysis of a youth subculture, widely disregarded for its fuck-all ethos, in a way that is both effective and explicative. He defines punk by its multiple sources of identity, citing aesthetic minutia as subcultural linchpins, (... because punk style contained distorted reflections of all the major post-war subcultures. [p26]) This focus is just one of many that illustrates punk as a complicated representation of inherent questions to youth subcultures: the definition of signs and symbols, the balance of politics and apathy, the sources of personal and collective identity, the granting of (sub)cultural authority.

However, even though Hebdige identifies sources of inertia for the punk movement in this excerpt, beyond this passage he fails to fully reconcile punk 'style' with its underlying ethos: self-identity in punk relies on the constant subversion/perversion of cultural symbols, including any of its own (sub)cultural symbols; thus, at the moment anything is considered to be 'punk', it must immediately be rejected as such for having that label. By as early as 1977, as punk trends infiltrated the mainstream, the punk thing to do was to not be punk. Because of this ironic notion of personal v. collective identity, I believe Hebdige's early analysis of the punk's roots is far more revealing to the true nature of youth subculture than any analysis of punk's fate, marked by cultural saturation and social misinterpretation.

Discussion question(s): how can a subculture, defined by youthful rebellion, withstand commercialization? Is this possible? Why or why not? Examples?

test

start

prof. kiri miller
kiri_miller@brown.edu

TA. liam mcgranahan
liam_mcgranahan@brown.edu

T/TH 10:30-11:50am
grant recital hall