Music and Cultural Theory

242 Pages·1997·7.612 MB·English

by  John Shepherd, Peter Wicke

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John Shepherd and Peter Wicke
Music and Cultural Theory
... music itself [is] the supreme mystery
of the science of man, a mystery
that all the various disciplines come up
against and which holds the key to their progress
Claude Lévi-Strauss
Music and Cultural
Theory
John Shepherd
and
Peter Wicke
Polity Press
Copyright © John Shepherd and Peter Wicke 1997
The right of John Shepherd and Peter Wicke to be identified as author of this work
has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
First published in 1997 by Polity Press in association with Blackwell Publishers Ltd.
2 4 6 8 10 9 7 5 3 1
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ISBN 0-7456-0863-9
ISBN 0-7456-0864-7 (pbk)
A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library and the
Library of Congress.
Typeset in lOi on 12pt Palatino
by Wearset, Boldon, Tyne and Wear.
This book is printed on acid-free paper.
Contents
Preface viii
Acknowledgements x
Introduction 1
1 The Problem of Affect and Meaning in Music 7
Musicology: The Question of Context and Text 8
Sound in Music: Fixity and Negotiation of Meaning 14
The Move to Structuralism 23
2 Music and Cultural Theory 28
Subcultural Theory and the Question of Style 28
Raymond Williams and the Social Character of
Art 31
The Structural Homology and the Analysis of
Music 34
The Structural Homology and its Problems 39
Music, Structuralism and Semiology 41
The Introduction of the Subject 48
3 Music and Psychoanalysis 56
Post-Freudian Analyses of Music 57
Lacan and the Linguistic Production of the
Subject 64
vi Contents
4 Theorizing Difference in Language and Music 73
Kristeva, Language and the Subject 74
Difference in Language 80
Difference in Music 85
5 Music as a Medium in Sound 95
Primary Signification and Secondary Signification 103
Music as a Structured and Structuring Medium 108
The Technology of Articulation 117
6 Music as Structure 125
The Auditory Environment, Music and Language 125
Auditory Time-Space in the Service of Music as
a Structure 129
Music as Structure 136
Addendum 1 The Hegemony of Language in
Understanding Music 139
Addendum 2 The Generalizability of
Zuckerkandl's Arguments 150
7 Music's Semiological Moment 153
The Sonic Saddle 159
8 Music: A Performative Semiological Model 169
Terms and Relations 170
Fixity and Negotiation in Music 174
Music and the Body 178
9 Music and Language in the Constitution of
Society 183
The Material Basis of Signifying Practices 185
Language, Music and Imagination 188
The Material and the Symbolic 192
Music and Language in the Constitution of
Society 194
Conclusion 200
Contents vii
10 Towards a Sociology of Sound 204
The Signifying Potential of Sound 205
'Music' and 'Language' as Discursive Formations 206
Power in 'Music', Power in 'Language' 213
'Language' and the Conscious, 'Music' and the
Unconscious 216
Bibliography 218
Index 225
Preface
This book has been the product of seven years' work made
possible by an exchange agreement between Carleton
University, Ottawa, and the Humboldt University, Berlin.
Although university-wide, this agreement was negotiated
initially between the then Department of Music at Carleton
(now part of the University's School for Studies in Art and
Culture) and the Centre for Popular Music Research at the
Humboldt. The agreement was signed in 1987, when the
Humboldt University was part of the German Democratic
Republic, and was the first agreement of a cultural or scientific
nature concluded between Canada and the GDR. Events in 1989
and the years which followed altered dramatically the situation
of the Humboldt University and its Centre for Popular Music
Research. Progress on the book was as a consequence slowed
while the future of the Centre in the unified Germany was
assured. We would both like to extend our sincere thanks to Dr
D. R. F. Taylor, Assistant Vice-President (International) and
Director of Carleton International, for his unstinting and skilful
support of the exchange agreement during a most difficult
period. Without this support, it is entirely conceivable that the
agreement would not have lasted and that this book would not
have been finished. We would also like to thank Dr Bruce
McFarlane, Acting Director of Carleton International in the
period leading up to the signing of the agreement. We wish to
thank as well the authorities of the Humboldt University as well
Preface ix
as the University's former Directorate of International Rela­
tions which, although experiencing frequent changes of person­
nel, continued to support the agreement with energy and
commitment.
We would like to thank Georg Knepler, Veit Erlmarm, Philip
Tagg, Alan Gillmor, Don Wallace and Alan Stanbridge, all of
whom read earlier versions of the manuscript and discussed
with us the ideas contained therein. We would also like to
extend our thanks and appreciation to John Thompson at Polity,
who was for seven years the epitome of a patient and under­
standing editor, as well as to Gill Motley, who was so helpful as
our project neared completion. Our deepest gratitude, however,
goes to our wives, Gisela and Norean, who have tolerated with
good grace absences both physical and spiritual, and whose
support and understanding have made this long and difficult
project enjoyable.
Berlin and Ottawa
August, 1996