Hannah Snavely

University of California, Riverside

December 2023

It is my absolute joy to welcome you to our first issue of our reimagined publication, Rising Voices in Ethnomusicology, previously titled SEM Student News. My initial desire to refashion the journal was due to a persistent dissatisfaction with the word “news.” We are not really a news forum, and we have moved to publishing increasingly academic, reflexive, and creative works. The editing team and I hope Rising Voices becomes a refuge for early career scholars to safely explore emerging ideas and new communication mediums. We desire to sing vitality into students through cultivating community and stimulating discussion across ethnomusicological (and adjacent) spaces. Echoing adrienne maree brown’s sentiments about emergence, we hold dear authentic connections, small acts, and listening to these rising voices “with all the senses of the body and mind” (brown 2017, 7). We aspire to move ethnomusicology forward through embracing such collective sentiments, especially in light of continued division around the world and within our (inter)discipline.

In dreaming about reconceiving our identity, former SEM president Tomie Hahn and I communicated with several scholars in the Medical Ethnomusicology SIG about our use of the word “voice.” Our primary concern was potentially ableist language. How do we carefully utilize this term when normative and/or loud voices frequently negate or commit violence against those that express ideas in more expansive ways? In line with Ailsa Lipscombe’s response to what she called a “sensitive exploration of vocal diversity,” we understand the “voice” to “exist in and as embodied multiplicities.”[1] Voices “unfold out loud–spoken by and amplified through both humans and machines–as well as through hands and protactile communication, and across pages and computer screens.” (email to author, August 22, 2023). Samantha Jones furthered these sentiments, stating, “the name change recognizes the transformation that students undergo as they find their scholarly voice while signaling support for that development” (email to author, August 24, 2023). I’m delighted to continue considering how rising scholars voice these multiplicities, and I’m honored to curate their ideas for you to explore.

Some of our staff had the opportunity to finally meet in person at the October SEM conference. The week was invigorating for me, as I connected deeply with graduate students I’d only met virtually to become what John Paul Lederach calls critical yeast—“small groups of people in unlikely combinations, in a new quality of relationship” (Tippett 2022). We share a vision and energy that is unique to rising scholars. We generate together in the capaciousness that exists amidst global and individual precarities; we pursue our (inter)discipline because we truly believe that musical collaboration offers entry into bettering the world.

At the same time, I spent hours of the conference listening to many students who do not feel that their needs are being attended to. These needs range from financial concerns and other institutional barriers to the lack of writing support and scholarly resources. Students’ voices are frequently inaudible to faculty for a multiplicity of reasons, whether that be professors’ lack of time and care to students’ fear of serious professional repercussions. Whatever the reason, many students feel that their advisors do not truly listen to them when they say they have burnout, need more time to write, or want to engage in creative forms presenting their research. Neurodiverse students and those with mental health struggles are frequently booted out of programs, perpetuating graduate school as a “survival of the fittest.” International students are disproportionately affected, as visa issues and lack of institutional funding means that they are often simply struggling to survive. And, when fragilely employed scholars are brave enough to speak out, they are frequently met with violence and distrust—as was made shockingly apparent in the Seeger experience.

What exactly are faculty doing to listen well to their future colleagues, when marginalized students still tell me that “no one cares about them?” While we acknowledge that many of these concerns arise from existing institutional inequities that also affect faculty, we call upon them to take better care of graduate students. We hope to work with senior scholars to address some of these concerns in this upcoming season, and we invite faculty to critically reflect on their relationships with their mentees.

I have a soft, growing sense that our (inter)discipline—and the university in general—is reaching a necessary tipping point, as we collectively move into new ways of being, thinking, and sounding. I am convinced that we, as emerging scholars, write and musick ethnomusicology into how we want it to be in the future. As rising scholar Abigail Lindo aptly notes in the roundtable of this publication, we have “great shoes to fill, but we’re just going to walk in them differently.”

Along with the shift to Rising Voices, we are in the process of re-orienting our values, mission, and vision. Throughout 2024, we will explore these ethics, values, and commitments in ethnomusicology, inviting scholars to join us in critical reflection. Amongst our community-building endeavors, we plan to establish peer mentoring programs and increase resources for students, especially considering trajectories of ethnomusicology in and outside of academia.

To end, I invite you to listen to the voices of our staff as they speak and sing the multiplicity of values that they aspire Rising Voices to embody. Listen to transformation unfolding out loud.

Lovingly,
Hannah

References

brown, adrienne marie. 2017. Emergent Strategy: Shaping Change, Changing Worlds. Chico, CA: AK Press.

Maler, Anabel. Forthcoming. Seeing Voices: Analyzing Sign Language Music. New York: Oxford University Press.

Sterne, Jonathan. 2022. Diminished Faculties: A Phenomenology of Impairment. Durham, NC: Duke University Press.

Tippett, Krista. 2022. “Taking a Long View of Time, and Becoming ‘Critical Yeast.’” Aired October 27, 2022 on On Being.   https://onbeing.org/programs/taking-a-long-view-of-time-and-becoming-critical-yeast/.

Garrett Groesbeck

Wesleyan University

Writing this letter, I am at the beginning of a year and a half of fieldwork in Tokyo, a long-awaited return to the city where I first encountered the koto. Nearly a decade and a half ago, I remember being intrigued and somewhat confused by the disjuncture between faculty support for my research interest in Japan and institutional barriers to study abroad in East Asia as an undergraduate music major. Though the popularity of Japanese video game music had been a significant factor in my desire to study music composition, study abroad programs aimed specifically at music students were dominated by European cities. Studying in Tokyo required special permission from the dean of the music school and extra work to cover the music credits I would not be able to take while away, as my school’s partner institution in Japan had no music department. As many ethnomusicologists know, however, sometimes the most exciting music can be found outside of for-credit classes: my encounter with the Sophia University sōkyokubu (koto music club) led to enduring friendships and a number of questions about music that would shape my future research. While grateful for this opportunity, I also cannot help but feel a complex mix of emotions at the fact that I am currently able to pursue this project while so many in the world suffer so deeply, and while graduate students as a broader community face increasing challenges to research such as lack of funding and travel restrictions.

The theme of this issue is “Ethnomusicology Now,” and while this allows for significant divergence in approaches, we note a number of shared themes between the works gathered here. Chan and Zaitseva-Hertz use images as jumping-off points for exploring memory. The former considers issues of fidelity and ephemerality in relation to film photography, underground live music, and the role of the observer in the Hong Kong indie scene (creatively incorporating photography throughout). The latter approaches distant and recent memories of conflict in Ukraine against the soundscapes of everyday life. Technology and its relationship to music is of concern to several authors: Kato’s contribution explores pressing questions about the subjectivity of AI and its use as a creative tool by musicians, while Hurr’s ethnographic interviews with English folk musicians provides insight into artists’ perspective on the role recording plays in their creative process, particularly contrasted with live performances. Woo’s contribution considers the history of electroacoustic music in Korea and the ways in which musicians have responded to changing access to technology throughout the past several decades, shaped by the transnational flow of information and goods. Political policy and its relationship to music emerged as a third important theme. Catinin calls for ongoing attention to the role of “capitalist realism” in shaping the economic realities under which ethnomusicologists are forced to operate. Pontecorvo draws from extensive autoethnographic experience in public radio broadcasting, supplemented with analysis of current events and recent proposals by conservative lawmakers in the United States targeted at defunding public media.

We were pleased by the response to our sensory prompt and creative submission categories. Pontecorvo’s sensory prompt response speaks to the relationship between humans and ecologies, and to human relationships within those networks. Neupane’s poetic contribution draws from sensory experiences to consider the complex relationship between ethnographic fieldwork and human perception. de Llera Blanes presents a creative writing approach to fieldwork experience, highlighting some of the many potential challenges ethnomusicologists encounter during research. We are also happy to include a Dear SEM contribution by Clendinning, Sudirana, and former SEM Student News editor Sweetman. Structured as a dialogue, Clendinning and Sudirana’s conversation highlights significant ethnomusicological questions in contemporary, particularly the increasingly interdisciplinary nature of the field and hopes for addressing barriers to equality and access by non-North American scholars in ethnomusicology. Sweetman describes the challenges and rewards of transitioning away from academic teaching and into public-sector research in New Zealand, where she completed her PhD, and the ways in which she has brought the skills developed during her time in graduate school to this current position. Each of the authors draws from a rich personal background and keen awareness of broader social and geopolitical events, and we are sure readers will find many more threads of connection among the contributions.

With appreciation to all of our readers and contributors,

Garrett Groesbeck