Remapping musicology Thoughts of a disciplinary Other

Richard ParncuttCentre for Systematic Musicology

University of Graz, Austria

Musicology (Re-)MappedEuropean “Science” FoundationWarsaw 18-21 November 2009SysMus Graz

Musicology in AustriaCity No. of profs1

Uni + ArtUniQuality of research

Epistemological diversity of

BachelorWien 4+6? med2 medGraz 2+7? med2 high3

Salzburg 2+4? med2 medInnsbruck 1 med2 med

Austrian Society for Musicology• progressive: interesting historical projects and meetings• conservative: historically dominated

1PhD + international search 2little research evaluation 3collaboration Uni-ArtUni

A previous attempt

Parncutt, R. (2002)Interdisciplinary balance, international

collaboration, and the future of (German) (historical) musicology.

In A. Edler und S. Meine (Eds.), Musik, Wissenschaft und Ihre Vermittlung: Bericht zur Jahrestagung der

Gesellschaft für Musikforschung

Main points in Parncutt (2002)• Diversity and balance

– history, elites, Western culture, humanities?

• Professorial selection procedures– expertise in specific area; transparency

• Teaching– balance of subdisciplines; interdisciplinarity

• Research– peer review (books, articles, confs); English

Further points

• Ambiguity and power• Alterity in academe• Epistemological diversity• Things to do• New conferences and journal

Maintaining power with ambiguity

science= natural,

social, formal

humanities= lettres,

Geisteswiss. science = all academic research and scholarship

Which “science” are you talking

about?

musicology

ethnomusicology

systematic musicology

musicology systematic musicology

musicology = all research about all music

What do you mean by

“musicology”?

Alterity in academe

out-group: humanities• literature• history• art and music

intermediate• social sciences• legal studies• economics

in-group: sciences• physical sciences• life sciences

out-group (Others)• acoustics• psychology• physiology • computing

intermediate• ethnomusicology• pop/jazz research• sociology• philosophy• performance research

in-group (“musicology”)• history• theory/analysis• cultural studies

Alterity in musicology

Size matters

Humanities ≈ Sciences– amount of research– number of students– social relevance

Ethnomusicology ≈ Historical ≈ Systematic– IMS (“musicology”): 900 participants, mainly historical– ICMPC (music psychology): 400 – only part of SysMus– many ethnomusicological societies and confs!

Inherent epistemological diversity of musicology

1. definitions of music2. representations of music3. music versus its contexts

Inherent epistemological diversity of musicology1. Any attempt to define music involves several disciplines

(a) an acoustic signal that

(b) evokes recognizable patterns of sound,

(c) implies physical movement,

(d) is meaningful,(e) is intentional wrt (b), (c) or (d),

(f) is accepted by a cultural group and

(g) is not lexical (i.e. is not “language”)

Inherent epistemological diversity of musicology2. Representations of music subdisciplines of musicology

The “three worlds” (“Popperian cosmology”)

• World 1 physical: music as signal, ear, brain– acoustics, physiology, psychology

• World 2 subjective: music as experience– sociology, cultural studies, phenomenology, psychology

• World 3 abstract: music as info, knowledge– music theory, computing, psychology

…and why not also World 4 agents: listeners, performers, composers, stakeholders– sociology, cultural studies, psychology

Inherent epistemological diversity of musicology3. Different disciplines address “music itself” and its contexts

Scientific musicology• music’s representations

– as physics, experience, information, agency

• high separation researcher ↔object

Two nominally equal approaches:

Cultural musicology• music’s contexts

• historical, social, political, cultural

• low separation researcher ↔ object

Why be interdisciplinary?Combine different sources of evidence

Sources of evidence DisciplinesLogical argument philosophyPersonal experience and (inter-) subjectivity

humanities, cultural studies

Informants ethnomusicology, sociology

Historical documents historyScore analysis music theory and analysisEmpirical data psychology, sociology,

acoustics, physiologyComputational simulation information sciences

What else?

• Visibility• Quality control• Interdisciplinary collaboration• Language• Globalisation• Transferable skills• Relevance of musicology

Visibility• Research in the internet

– articles (permission of publisher)– books (out of print)– English abstracts

• Applications– popular writing– education, therapy, medicine– performances (e.g. rare or lost music)– CDs, instruments– projects

Globalisation

• Internet (see above)• Hire foreigners• Promote bi- and multilingualism

Quality control

• More and better peer-review procedures• More promotion of good researchers• Better interdisciplinary comparison• More articles, fewer books

Interdisciplinary collaboration

Increasingly necessary due to:• expansion of literature

– no-one can represent all of musicology

• peer-review culture– satisfy specialist reviewers

Needs explicit promotion!• funding• prizes

Language

• Quality control in international language– Why? Largest pool of possible reviewers– What? Best journals, all PhDs

• Promote local languages– multilingual abstracts of journal articles– extended local-language summary of PhDs– funds for translation of best articles

Transferable skills for students

• bi- and multilingualism• clear thinking• teamwork• computing

Relevance of musicology

Music• money (economy, GNP)• life (activity, identity, happiness)

Humanities• reflexion, wisdom, humanity

Musicology• dynamic, sensitive to social needs?• model of interdisciplinary collaboration?

The Conference on Interdisciplinary Musicology

CIM promotes interdisciplinary collaborationEach abstract has two authors representing two of humanities, sciences, practically oriented disciplines

CIM focuses on quality rather than quantity• anonymous peer review of abstracts• independent international experts• same disciplines as authors • procedure is transparent• reviews are impersonal and constructive

CIM promotes musicology's unity in diversity• all interdisciplinary music research• all musically relevant disciplines

Past and future CIMsYear Theme City Host Director

2004 - Graz University of Graz Parncutt

2005 timbre MontréalObservatoire

internationale de la création musicale

Traube

2007 singing TallinnEstonian Academy of

Music and Theatre Ross

2008 structureThessa-

lonikiAristotle University of

ThessalonikiCambou-ropoulos

2009instru-ments France

Université Pierre et Marie Curie Castellengo

2010nature / culture Sheffield University of Sheffield Dibben

Different themes bottom-up unification of musicology

The Journal of Inter-

disciplinary Music

Studies(JIMS)

(Re-)Mapping musicology

1. Take responsibility, take control

• be open to suggestions• want self-improvement• stop talking - start doing!

2. Promote diversity, redistribute power

• all relevant disciplines• women and men• Western and non-Western