Feminist Theory and Music Day 3 and Day 4

I came across quite a few student article presentations on day 3 and day 4, and had some observations:

-          The subjects are often more “docile” and less “outrageous”. They tend to work within the boundaries. Surprises do not feature often. (So are papers I wrote before, I felt.)

-          Analyses on feminism or sound sometimes are less in depth. I felt that they tend to stay in a format of quoting and explaining, but there is a lack of fluid flow from one idea to the other.

-          The subjects are, nevertheless, provocative and usually have a lot of potential for further research.

Movie and music studies, and popular music studies by different people sometimes sound monotomous. The topics of irony (although in more than half of the cases they didn’t mention it) recurs. I think more effort can be devoted to music that reflects cultural problems, and how music actively shaped the cultural problems. That will make musicology useful for other disciplines. I also felt that many papers can be presented in other non-music conferences, especially ones that are related to violence.

The two papers on Diamanda Galas, done by professors in the UK and Germany, are puzzling. They tried to describe Galas’s music as unspeakable voice and weapon, but they metaphor failed to come through (to me, at the very least). There were a lot of quotes, interviews and descriptions, but the arguments were not clear and cogent enough.

That leads me to ask (again), is musicology “describing music”? This is an overly simplistic definition.

A quick note on skype article delivery: get good connection, and read slowly. Even better, try to ask the organizer to test the connection and speaking quality before the presentation. Read the article for about 10 minutes in the test, to see if the connection is stable. Sometimes it runs well in the first 5 minutes, but then it may just turn bad for some reasons.

The final speech by Judith Tick was inspiring. Her survey of feminist theory and music was efficient, and her wish-list for future musicological ambitions are practical and, necessary for the healthy development of the field.

I felt that there is a strong bonding between the scholars in the meeting. People are so genuine! It is perhaps because they have endured a long period of time where feminist musical criticisms have been suppressed. They now have their voice heard, but the potential is clearly not totally fulfilled.