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| Ian Dahlman of Ryerson and York Universities presents his paper on indie rock band Broken Social Scene (Ryan McNutt photo) |
Whether it鈥檚 blasting out of a stereo or pumping through a pair of headphones, music surrounds us every day. It鈥檚 no wonder, then, that there are many academic researchers interested in popular music not only as form and structure, but as a way of better understanding our society鈥檚 politics, economics and culture.
This past weekend, dozens of professors and graduate students gathered at AV俱乐部 for the 2009 Canadian conference of the International Association for the Study of Popular Music (IASPM). They came from a wide variety of research backgrounds 鈥� from popular culture to musicology to fine arts 鈥� but all shared an interest in studying the soundtrack of our lives.
The topics discussed were as wide-ranging as the most eclectic iTunes playlist. Barry Promane of the University of Western Ontario used Queen to explore rock and roll鈥檚 relationship with the AIDS crisis and homophobia聽in the 1980s. Nicholas Greco of Providence College and Seminary analyzed Feist鈥檚 I Feel It All in the context of literary theorist Roland Barthes鈥� concept of 鈥渃ruising鈥� the text. And Barbara Ching of the University of Memphis delved into how song collecting 鈥� or 鈥渟ongcatching鈥� 鈥� is changing in the digital age.
But doesn鈥檛 talking about music in such a fashion miss the point? Isn鈥檛 it just, as it鈥檚 famously been described, 鈥渄ancing about architecture?鈥�
鈥淲hat鈥檚 so wrong with dancing about architecture?鈥� asks Jacqueline Warwick, assistant professor in the Department of Music and chair of the local arrangements committee for the conference. 鈥淲e can learn a great deal from talking about music and why people care about it. There is such an emotional connection there that, whether it鈥檚 from an historical or a cultural perspective, we can learn a quite a lot.鈥�
Over a dozen faculty, staff and students from AV俱乐部 were involved in putting the conference together, which was titled 鈥淕oing Coastal: Peripheries and Centres in Popular Music.鈥� Assistant professor Steven Baur also was a presenter at the conference with a paper exploring class dynamics of 19th century blackface minstrel shows.聽
Two student papers received special prizes from conference organizers. The first, by Tara Rodgers of McGill University, surveyed 19th- and early 20th-century literature on sound production to better understand the evolution of our conceptualization of sound forms. The second, by Ian Dahlman of Ryerson and York Universities, used the indie rock band Broken Social Scene as a case study to evaluate collectivist models of band membership.
鈥淲hat really drove me to explore [the topic] was actually the band鈥檚 self-titled album, because I felt you could feel all the ruptures and breaks and cracks,鈥� said Mr. Dahlman. 鈥淚t didn鈥檛 seem like it was always necessarily a happy, utopian place but actually something that was constantly in flux and had its own share of anxiety, fear and love. It was collecting the emotion of all these constantly-shoving people in one project.鈥�
The conference was a good fit for AV俱乐部, which earlier this year launched the first masters program in musicology in the Maritimes. The degree program, which admits its first students this fall, allows students to investigate music鈥檚 role and meaning in various social and historical contexts.