In this article, Erlmann emphasizes a sort of sensual scholarship. He states “attention to the senses might not only yield new and richer kinds of ethnographic data but, perhaps more importantly, also force us to rethink a broad range of theoretical and methodological issues (pg.248).” Erlmann calls for the rejection or replacement of this current thought of the eye as a modern sensory organ and hearing as a pre-modern mode of perception. Some case studies that Erlmann includes in his essay include an analysis of the sonic definition of the “home” and those in it. Also, he compares the historical continuities of the gramophone, radio, and Walkman. He states “Walkman users share with the flaneur the desire to aestheticize the alienating urban space by “colonizing” it sonically…(pg.251)”
Pious listening and, in particular, Qur’an reading are analyzed. Whether devout Muslims value the sonic aesthetic of Qur’an reading more or the direct meaning of the words more becomes a comparison between secular Muslims and more traditionalist Muslims, respectively.
This article focused on many separate studies on how music or sonic aesthetics are felt in different situations. Although the different studies allowed me to understand the vast possibilities and positive qualities of using sound rather than and in conjunction with the other senses, I only superficially understood all the studies. However, reading about the different uses of sound, especially the medical uses of sound and the art of hearing another person listen, has made me want to read more case studies.
Sunday, November 11, 2007
High Art as Tourist Art, Tourist Art as High Art by Eric K. Silverman
This article documented how, many times, the roles of art are reversed. In particular, the article talks about the Sepik River communities. Tourist art from the Sepik River has always been motivated by money. Although tourist art is generally seen as commodities, fakes, and not genuine art, Silverman argues that Eastern Iatmul tourist art from one part of the Sepik River is a genuine expression that reflects concepts of ethnicity and identity. Silverman focused on the Stanford University New Guinea Sculpture Garden, which was created to provide a new “public art space” for artists from the Sepik River communities of Papua New Guinea (PNG). Artistic categorization and contact zones are discussed at length in this article. Contact zones are defined as transnational zones and “the spatial and temporal copresence of subjects previously separated by geographic and historical disjunctures, and whose trajectories now intersect (pg.272).” These zones encourage hybridity between different art categories that might not have coexisted before. The sculpture garden at Stanford was seen by its director, Jim Mason, as “an opportunity to experiment with and reinterpret New Guinea aesthetic perspectives within the new context of a Western public art space (pg.278).” Although the art made in the garden by the Melanesian artists were to be enjoyed by foreigners, (much like tourist art is), the garden emphasized artistic individuality. The art was supposed to be viewed as art, rather than exotic crests and emblems.
It became apparent that even though some individuals aspire to blur artistic categories, and bring a more positive light onto the men and women that carve and paint for the enjoyment of visitors to their country, the majority would refuse to let that happen. In particular, Westerners will hold on tight to concrete distinctions between touristy, seemingly cheap art and high art.
It became apparent that even though some individuals aspire to blur artistic categories, and bring a more positive light onto the men and women that carve and paint for the enjoyment of visitors to their country, the majority would refuse to let that happen. In particular, Westerners will hold on tight to concrete distinctions between touristy, seemingly cheap art and high art.
Doing anthropology in sound by Steve Feld and Donald Brenneis
In this conversation with Feld and Brenneis, Feld’s work amongst the Kaluli people of Papua New Guinea (PNG) and his study of culture through acoustics, or the connection between sound and place, comes to light. Feld says, “…An ethnography should include what it is that people hear every day.” In addition to speaking in detail about his teachers throughout his undergraduate and graduate years, Feld spoke about the different CD’s he put together from his work in Papua New Guinea and also in Greek Macedonia. A common observation in both societies was the “layering” of sounds. In PNG, Feld recorded a structured kind of whooping in between speech and song that people do when they’re cutting trees. Feld states that, “Simultaneously and in sequence you get the layering of speaking voices, the birds and ambience, the overlapping of axes, trees falling, and the whooping, whistling, yodeling, and singing different snatches of song—12 minutes of life-up-over sounding, the local term for all the ways sounds alternate, interlock, and overlap.” (p.236) A similar layering of sounds was observed in Greece, but with different types of bells. Church bells, along with bells on sheep, along with funeral bells could be heard simultaneously.
Not only was the Kaluli peoples’ interaction with the rainforest important in their culture, but also their interaction with each other was very strong. Feld gives one example of singer and mother, Ulahi, who changes the lyrics of her songs based on who is listening to them.
Feld’s work on music and human rights intrigued me immensely, because my main interest lies in human rights. His main passion, “recordings related to human rights, related to the way the indigenous, refugee, diasporic, and exile world of music has changed,” seems genius to me. His focus on oud player, Munir Bashir, and the story of how his talents were practically thrown away once he came to the United States touched me. I was also amazed to see how Feld focused his studies of musicians so much on emotion.
Not only was the Kaluli peoples’ interaction with the rainforest important in their culture, but also their interaction with each other was very strong. Feld gives one example of singer and mother, Ulahi, who changes the lyrics of her songs based on who is listening to them.
Feld’s work on music and human rights intrigued me immensely, because my main interest lies in human rights. His main passion, “recordings related to human rights, related to the way the indigenous, refugee, diasporic, and exile world of music has changed,” seems genius to me. His focus on oud player, Munir Bashir, and the story of how his talents were practically thrown away once he came to the United States touched me. I was also amazed to see how Feld focused his studies of musicians so much on emotion.
Ideas of Culture and the Challenge of Music by John Chernoff
This article provided a very comprehensive overview of how past anthropological studies have dealt with music (musicians, music-making, etc) in different cultures. First, Chernoff observes that in Western civilization, “culture” occupies its own territory within society instead of permeating the whole. “Culture is seen as a refinement of human experience…Culture is often associated and appropriated by people of means and power, those seemingly least affected by life’s bodily struggles...” (pg.222)
Because music is the least materialistic of the arts, it is harder for people to grasp the meaning of it. Chernoff makes an important point that music is rarely studied as “music”, but as an expression of culture. Anthropologists, in a sense, use a culture’s music in order to find out about other aspects of their lives. “An effort to ground music in a cultural context does not merely reflect a social scientific inclination to the abandonment of musicological analysis, nor does it merely reflect the belief that issues of musical meaning should be addressed with regard to the references and associations of indigenous people.” (pg.227)
Chernoff also briefly cites the Dagbamba of Northern Ghana, whose musical institutions offer a key to understanding the depth of their cultural life. The Dagbamba display their familial ancestry (back to around 600 years) through performance, drumming, and singing. The society embodies their personal relationship to history by dancing in musical contexts.
It is evident that music is not given the right sort of attention that it deserves. The emotions and sensitivities that are evoked from music are not looked upon effects of the music, but as clues to other parts of the particular culture. I do not think that music from another culture should be labeled as non-Western because it automatically creates a scale to which different music is compared.
Because music is the least materialistic of the arts, it is harder for people to grasp the meaning of it. Chernoff makes an important point that music is rarely studied as “music”, but as an expression of culture. Anthropologists, in a sense, use a culture’s music in order to find out about other aspects of their lives. “An effort to ground music in a cultural context does not merely reflect a social scientific inclination to the abandonment of musicological analysis, nor does it merely reflect the belief that issues of musical meaning should be addressed with regard to the references and associations of indigenous people.” (pg.227)
Chernoff also briefly cites the Dagbamba of Northern Ghana, whose musical institutions offer a key to understanding the depth of their cultural life. The Dagbamba display their familial ancestry (back to around 600 years) through performance, drumming, and singing. The society embodies their personal relationship to history by dancing in musical contexts.
It is evident that music is not given the right sort of attention that it deserves. The emotions and sensitivities that are evoked from music are not looked upon effects of the music, but as clues to other parts of the particular culture. I do not think that music from another culture should be labeled as non-Western because it automatically creates a scale to which different music is compared.
Wednesday, November 7, 2007
Commodities of Authenticity: When Native People Consume Their Own "Tourist Art" by Alexis Bunten
Bunten talks about the Tlingit, Haida, and Tsimshian cultures of Southeast Alaska and, in particular, the role of a blanket named Yaakoosqé X’oow, or Blanket of Knowledge. This blanket was originally made for tourist markets to raise money for their heritage language programming. Bunten argues that “commercial Native art objects, often deemed as ‘inauthentic’ or regarded by collectors, curators, and academics simply as a by-product of cultural commodification, can become a tangible part of the contemporary Native cultural experience (pg.319).” Among the Southeast Alaskan natives, the circulation of objects through gift exchange, and the use of traditional objects in ceremonial contexts is common. By circulating commercial art objects, these objects can become part of the local socio-cultural system bounded by Native ideas that concern the function of their own art. Although commercial art has been integrated into Native communities, noncommercial objects are still produced for Native use.
The Yaakoosqé X’oow blanket is made for both Native and nonnative buyers. Because no one clan owns the main design on the blanket, a large raven and an eagle, the entire Tlingit social system can give, buy, and use it. Although this blanket was made for tourist buyers, it has become socially meaningful to Native consumers. In order to get this way, it had to undergo a process of symbolic transformation from a commodity of exchange to an owned object for exchange and/or display amongst Natives.
This process of “decommodification” was very foreign to me. Reading this article once again, (first time was in Silverman’s High Art as Tourist Art, Tourist Art as High Art), proved to me the fluidity of art categories.
The Yaakoosqé X’oow blanket is made for both Native and nonnative buyers. Because no one clan owns the main design on the blanket, a large raven and an eagle, the entire Tlingit social system can give, buy, and use it. Although this blanket was made for tourist buyers, it has become socially meaningful to Native consumers. In order to get this way, it had to undergo a process of symbolic transformation from a commodity of exchange to an owned object for exchange and/or display amongst Natives.
This process of “decommodification” was very foreign to me. Reading this article once again, (first time was in Silverman’s High Art as Tourist Art, Tourist Art as High Art), proved to me the fluidity of art categories.
The Disputed Value of Contemporary Papua New Guinea Artists and Their Work by Pamela Sheffield Rosi
The work of Urban artists in Papua New Guinea (PNG) have received little attention regarding their work, which has been called a "decoration without meaning or social function," in contrast to the traditional village arts of PNG. These ignored artists have found themselves "being professionally adrift, their artwork devalued or unnoticed."
This article analyzes the factors that have contributed to PNG's modern art system, pinpoints the hardships and conflicts that urban artists have had to face socially and economically, and also focuses on the challenges that these artists have had to face in the art market. The institutionalization of art in PNG was started by Georgina Beier and Tom Craig, two art teachers. Although universities started their own art departments, funding and support was not always available.
Rosi included great detail in this article about the completely different system of values and obligations in PNG in order to live as or become an artist. "Managing the wantok system" is very important to the artists, along with having a modern career. They send remittances to fulfill their kinship obligations, and host village relatives or unemployed kin. When the artist's own future is uncertain, much like that of artist Larry Santana, not only is it hard for him to help sustain himself and his immediate family, but it becomes hard to uphold his obligations to the wantok system.
The role and fate of females in PNG seemed extremely dreary. High rates of pregnancy cause many female art students to drop out of school, and physical and verbal violence is a huge problem. After reading this article, it seemed as if the problems that exist in PNG exist everywhere, but here are brought out in the open, and exacerbated because of the small population and close research and examination.
Art in rural India has seen some similar changes. The Shantal tribesmen and women lead similar struggling lives because their entire livelihood depends solely on their artwork, which many places label as outdated or inferior.
This article analyzes the factors that have contributed to PNG's modern art system, pinpoints the hardships and conflicts that urban artists have had to face socially and economically, and also focuses on the challenges that these artists have had to face in the art market. The institutionalization of art in PNG was started by Georgina Beier and Tom Craig, two art teachers. Although universities started their own art departments, funding and support was not always available.
Rosi included great detail in this article about the completely different system of values and obligations in PNG in order to live as or become an artist. "Managing the wantok system" is very important to the artists, along with having a modern career. They send remittances to fulfill their kinship obligations, and host village relatives or unemployed kin. When the artist's own future is uncertain, much like that of artist Larry Santana, not only is it hard for him to help sustain himself and his immediate family, but it becomes hard to uphold his obligations to the wantok system.
The role and fate of females in PNG seemed extremely dreary. High rates of pregnancy cause many female art students to drop out of school, and physical and verbal violence is a huge problem. After reading this article, it seemed as if the problems that exist in PNG exist everywhere, but here are brought out in the open, and exacerbated because of the small population and close research and examination.
Art in rural India has seen some similar changes. The Shantal tribesmen and women lead similar struggling lives because their entire livelihood depends solely on their artwork, which many places label as outdated or inferior.
Tourism, Aesthetics, and Global Flows along the Swahili Coast by Sidney Kasfir
In this article, Kasfir explores the Swahili coast as a tourist destination in the late 20th and early 21st centuries. He brings together the mercantilist society of the Swahili coast and the recent splurge of modernity that the area has been experiencing. Kasfir focuses his article on the Swahili furniture-making workshops in Lamu, (an island near the border of Somalia), and on the group of Maasai and Samburu warriors that encamp seasonally in Mtwapa, (a beach settlement along the north coast of Mombasa), and sell spears and beadwork to tourists.
A Maasai and Samburu bachelor warrior settlement slowly developed near the Kenya Marineland business and the resort hotels. These warriors not only sold spears and artifacts, but also provide Western tourists with a “real” representation of Swahili life. “Tourist perceptions of the warrior with his decorations and weapons as both image and artifact blur the boundaries of what is conventionally considered ‘performance’ and ‘material culture’.” Although the Maasai and Samburu warriors sell their artifacts to tourists, (sometimes engaging in affairs with the women), they remain almost totally unassimilated, and interact only when they have to.
The second industry Kasfir talks about is the furniture-making industry of Lamu Town. The carved furniture, doorposts, and lintels are the most important local forms of material culture, and tourists are rarely the ones who purchase them. Most of the furniture clientele consists of families in town that purchase pieces for their daughters’ dowries. However, there are also some nontraditional uses of this furniture. More modern hotels and resorts commission traditional styled furniture for display in their public rooms to create a particular atmosphere. “In this case, there is a reversal of expected consumption patterns: the five-star hotel as an upholder of traditional forms…(Pg.122)”
After reading about these two forms of modernism and tourism in the Swahili coast, it became evident that the West is really making little impact on the traditional cultures of the coast. In the case of the Maasai and Samburu warriors, they are the ones in control of the Western tourists, and they are the ones teaching the tourists about their life. In the furniture-making industry of Lamu, it is the hotels located on the island that promote the production of traditional pieces of furniture.
A Maasai and Samburu bachelor warrior settlement slowly developed near the Kenya Marineland business and the resort hotels. These warriors not only sold spears and artifacts, but also provide Western tourists with a “real” representation of Swahili life. “Tourist perceptions of the warrior with his decorations and weapons as both image and artifact blur the boundaries of what is conventionally considered ‘performance’ and ‘material culture’.” Although the Maasai and Samburu warriors sell their artifacts to tourists, (sometimes engaging in affairs with the women), they remain almost totally unassimilated, and interact only when they have to.
The second industry Kasfir talks about is the furniture-making industry of Lamu Town. The carved furniture, doorposts, and lintels are the most important local forms of material culture, and tourists are rarely the ones who purchase them. Most of the furniture clientele consists of families in town that purchase pieces for their daughters’ dowries. However, there are also some nontraditional uses of this furniture. More modern hotels and resorts commission traditional styled furniture for display in their public rooms to create a particular atmosphere. “In this case, there is a reversal of expected consumption patterns: the five-star hotel as an upholder of traditional forms…(Pg.122)”
After reading about these two forms of modernism and tourism in the Swahili coast, it became evident that the West is really making little impact on the traditional cultures of the coast. In the case of the Maasai and Samburu warriors, they are the ones in control of the Western tourists, and they are the ones teaching the tourists about their life. In the furniture-making industry of Lamu, it is the hotels located on the island that promote the production of traditional pieces of furniture.
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