Shadows in the Field: New Perspectives for Fieldwork in Ethnomusicology

What are the new directions in ethnomusicological fieldwork? What do we see when we acknowledge the shadows we cast in the field? Will fieldwork continue as an integral part of ethnomusicological theory and method? Glancing forward and backward, the authors in this collection explore a range of issues that can help ethnomusicologists and those who study human experience and creativity to conceptualize the nature of fieldwork. This is the first book by ethnomusicologists to consider fieldwork as an issue-laden practice, rather than as a methodology requiring a prescriptive manual. The contributors challenge the very notion of its goals, the nature of knowledge gained, and the place of fieldwork in historical studies. Until now the focus in ethnomusicological writing and teaching centered around analyses and ethnographic representations of musical cultures. This book signals a new fieldwork, shifting the balance away from the data-collecting model toward an approach that is reflexive, humanistic, and experiential. It makes provocative reading for all fieldworkers, those in ethnomusicology as well as anthropology, sociology, folklore, area studies, linguistics, and other ethnographic disciplines.