160027 VO World Music Studies (lecture series) (2014S)

The current situation of ethnomusicology is indeed a bit troubling. In 2010 Timothy Rice asserts a lack of theory in our discipline and calls for a theoretical muscle training to strengthen it and to discipline the deputies. Kofi Agawu (2003) on the other hand is strictly against any kind of disciplining, even more so when the brain from which these commands emanate, resides in the USA. Campaigning for a strict commitment to the diversity of methods and theories, he calls for – to put it in Veit Erlmann’s (2004) words – the disciplinary suicide of ethnomusicology. Martin Greve too comes to the same conclusion in 2002 when he speaks of the "indispensable disappearance of ethnomusicology". Under the heading "Should Ethnomusicology be Abolished?” Bruno Nettl even devoted an entire chapter in the last of his thirty-one essays (2nd edition 2005) to this subject. All in all, it seems that radical thinking in ethnomusicology has a strong tradition.

As the organizer of the lecture series WELT MUSIK WISSENSCHAFT at the University of Vienna, planned for 2014, I was wondering how – based on these controversial lines of thought – non-suicidal prospects for the future can be won? Is Ethnomusicology in reality badly prepared for the future? Is it – on the other hand – like mere coincidence that “new” musicology bears many features of the "old" ethnomusicology?

We have invited well-known representatives of our discipline to participate in the lecture series. We would like to learn from them about the interests and motivations their research is guided by. Which music do they explore, which questions do they ask, which methods do they apply, and how do they locate their specific research within the field? Based on their own research, we would like to discuss whether in their opinion ethnomusicology meets the challenges of our times? Are we methodically prepared for the future? Do we need to follow Timothy Rice's call for arming ourselves, or should we rather consider Ellen Koskoff’s question whether a “muscle” is necessarily a good thing (2010)?