NewsEvents
Music and (Con)text: Interdisciplinary Challenges
Report on RMA Study Day
17 Mar 07
Department of Music, University of Nottingham
Over 20 delegates attended the RMA Study Day, Music and (Con)text: Interdisciplinary Challenges on 17 March at the Music Department, Nottingham University.
The day started with Ben Walton's Keynote Address: '"So you do history, too?": Interdisciplinary Reflections'. Walton commented on three kinds of interdisciplinarity: first, use of the term as a 'shiny' but potentially meaningless buzzword; second, the inevitable interdisciplinarity involved in studying musical texts and contexts; and third, the genuine attempt at constructive interaction between disciplines.
Student papers showed a remarkable variety of musical topics (from Brahms to 'G-funk' hip-hop) and approaches (engaging with film studies, genre studies, communication theory, and psychoanalysis). The day concluded with a plenary round-table, in which there seemed a great deal of hope that the third kind of interdisciplinary is possible, although it requires hard work and indeed vulnerability on the part of individual scholars.
A full conference report will be published in the RMA Newsletter.
Postgraduate research is increasingly focussed on the role of music in cultural activity, often as an adjunct to dance, poetry, ceremony, theatre, film, etc. This study day provided a forum for students from any part of the discipline to discuss their own and others’ approaches to the inevitable interdisciplinarity of music research.
Nottingham University website.
Programme
Saturday, 17 March 2007
9:30 - 10:15 |
Welcome and coffee (Seminar Room) |
10:15 - 11:15 |
Keynote Address: Ben Walton (Endsleigh Room) |
11:15 - 11:30 |
Refreshments (Seminar Room) |
11:30 - 1:00 |
Paper Session: Practice (Endsleigh Room) |
Eva Moreda (Royal Holloway), ‘Researching Fascist influences in musical criticism: the case of Spain’ |
|
Sue Williams (University of Liverpool), ‘‘We are your children: what do you think of your creation?’ Punk Identity and the Clothing of Dissent’ |
|
Michael Byde (University of Leeds), ‘William Walton: Aspects of the Filmic in Concert Works’ |
|
1:00 - 2:00 |
Lunch (Seminar Room) |
2:00 - 3:00 |
Paper Session: Method 1 (Endsleigh Room) |
Dylan Robinson (University of Sussex), ‘Interdisciplinary Musicology as Inter-arts Practice’ |
|
Vanessa Hawes (University of East Anglia), ‘Music Theory: The Science of Music?’ |
|
3:00 - 3:15 |
Refreshments (Seminar Room) |
3:15 - 4:15 |
Paper Session: Method 2 (Endsleigh Room) |
Katy Hamilton (Royal College of Music), ‘From pigeonholes to pigeons: Brahms, Hausmusik and interdisciplinary scholarship’ |
|
Justin Williams (University of Nottingham), ‘The Automotive Womb: ‘Jeep Beats’ and Psychoanalysis’ |
|
4:15 - 4:30 |
Refreshments (Seminar Room) |
4:30 - 5:30 |
Round Table: ‘Was This Study Day Worthwhile? |
Study Day Organisers
Caroline Ritchie carolineritchie@yahoo.com
and Tim Shephard timshephard@hotmail.com.