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Popular Music and the Anthropocene: Call For Articles

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  13 April 2018

François Ribac  and
Paul Harkins
François Ribac
Affiliation:
University of Burgundy
Paul Harkins
Affiliation:
Edinburgh Napier University
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Type
Special issue of Popular Music
Information
Popular Music , Volume 37 , Issue 2 , May 2018 , pp. 327 - 328
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2018 

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Many geologists, climatologists, philosophers, historians, sociologists, activists, and Non-Governmental Organisations believe that our planet has now entered into the Anthropocene Era (Bonneuil & Fressoz Reference Bonneuil and Fressoz2013). The common idea is that human activities now have a decisive effect on the earth's ecosystem: the fast and increasing disappearance of a considerable number of plant and animal species, the melting of glaciers and pack ice, rising sea levels, extreme climatic events, and pollution. These phenomena impact on human activities, leading to forced migrations, the pauperisation of entire communities (often those least responsible for climate change), and, ultimately, to major upheavals. The goal of this special issue of Popular Music is to understand how popular music should and can be described, analysed, and transformed in the Anthropocene, considered both as a concept as well as a material process.

The Anthropocene Era implies that we must engage societies in a socio-ecological transition towards less destructive forms of living, forcing us to reconsider the concept and the consequences of modernity itself. For modernity does not only mean social facts such as mechanisation, industrialisation, the conquest of the world, constant economic growth, and the rise of capitalism but also narratives and discourses: a distinction between humans and nature, differences between Europeans and ‘others’, a teleological conception of history, and a belief in endless progress (Latour Reference Latour1991).

We welcome proposals for articles that address one or more of the following broad categories:

History and narratives

  • • How does popular music give shape to the concepts of (non-)western culture and nature in recordings, performances, and films?

  • • Is the Anthropocene changing our understanding of the sonic dimension of the world (Krause Reference Krause2015)?

  • • How can popular music (worlds) contribute to new narratives about the socio-ecological transition (Ingram Reference Ingram2010)?

Theories

  • • What theoretical problems must we address in dealing with the Anthropocene? What kinds of (new) concepts and methodologies do we need?

  • • How do we conceive of popular music if we give up our understanding of context, environment, nature (Morton Reference Morton2007)?

  • • How can ethnomusicology, ecomusicology, sound studies, record production studies, cultural studies, queer studies, gender studies, subaltern studies, postcolonial studies, ecocriticism, and geology of media be enlisted in this project (Devine Reference Devine2015; Allen & Dawe Reference Allen and Dawe2016; Parikka Reference Parikka2015)?

Ecological costs and activism

Please send abstracts and queries to François Ribac () and Paul Harkins (). Proposals from all academic disciplines are welcome.

Deadline for abstracts (max. 500 words): 1 August 2018

Deadline for articles (max. 10,000 words, bibliography inclusive): 1 June 2019

Planned publication: January 2020

References

Allen, Aaron S., and Dawe, Kevin. 2016. Current Directions in Ecomusicology: Music, Culture, Nature (New York: Routledge)Google Scholar
Bonneuil, Christophe, and Fressoz, Jean-Baptiste. 2013. L’événement Anthropocène (Paris: Seuil)Google Scholar
Devine, Kyle. 2015. ‘Decomposed: A Political Ecology of Music.’ Popular Music 34/3, pp. 367–89Google Scholar
Ingram, David. 2010. Jukebox in the Garden. Ecocriticism and American Popular Music Since 1960 (Rodopi: Amsterdam)Google Scholar
Kagan, Sacha, and Kirchberg, Volker. 2016. ‘Music and Sustainability: Organizational Cultures towards Creative Resilience - a Review.’ Journal of Cleaner Production 135, pp. 1487–1502Google Scholar
Krause, Bernie. Voices of the Wild: Animal Songs, Human Din, and the Call to Save Natural Soundscapes (London: Yale University Press)Google Scholar
Latour, Bruno. 1991. Nous n'avons jamais été modernes (Paris: Éditions de la Découverte & Syros)Google Scholar
Morton, Timothy. 2007. Ecology Without Nature: Rethinking Environmental Aesthetics (Cambridge: Harvard University Press)Google Scholar
Parikka, Jussi. 2015. A Geology of Media (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press)Google Scholar
Pedelty, Mark. 2012. Ecomusicology: Rock, Folk, and the Environment (Philadelphia: Temple University Press)Google Scholar
Schippers, Huib, and Grant, Catherine. 2016. Sustainable Futures for Music Cultures: An Ecological Perspective (New York: Oxford University Press)Google Scholar