Everyday Musical Life among the Indigenous Bunun, Taiwan

by Jonathan P.J. Stock, Chou Chiener

Overview

Everyday Musical Life among the Indigenous Bunun, Taiwan contributes to multidisciplinary research on music in everyday human life by pushing beyond the urbanized Western populations routinely featured in such writing. Based on ethnographic study in Buklavu, a village in southern Taiwan mostly inhabited by the indigenous Bunun, the book explores villagers’ contemporaneous musical engagements and pathways, paying heed both to imported music—such as TV theme tunes, karaoke singing, church hymns—and to the transformation of Bunun traditions through school and community interventions and folkloric festivals. The case study underpins a new, widely applicable, theoretical model for the study of music in everyday life in global society which is historically engaged, sensitive to individual and group diversity, cognizant of the interplay of the mundane and the exceptional, and primed to support applied research.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780367748494
Publisher:	Taylor & Francis
Publication date:	09/25/2023
Series:	SOAS Studies in Music
Pages:	168
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x (d)

About the Author

Jonathan P.J. Stock is Professor of Music, University College Cork.

Table of Contents

Introduction Chapter 1: Echoes of the Past: Apprehending Indigenous Sound in Taiwan Chapter 2: Toward New Perspectives on Music in Everyday Life Chapter 3: Music in the Moment, Or One Day in Buklavu Chapter 4: Sunday Mornings, Friday Nights: Music at Significant Weekly Occasions Chapter 5: Elaborating the Everyday: Music in the Annual Ear-Shooting Festival Conclusions Glossaries, References, Index

Editorial Reviews

This everyday portrait of music in Bunun society is a significant contribution to the conversation about the reframing of "traditional/contemporary" binary in music studies. The book’s multifaceted, localized and dialogic approach unsettles conventional musical representation of Bunun society. The topics range across genres, generations, spaces and identities, as well as agency, embodiment and materiality to produce insightful music reflection of one of Taiwan’s most prominent indigenous communities. Meanwhile, nuanced analyses of music embodiment, vocality, and temporality shed new light on discussions about these important topics.

Nancy Yunhwa Rao, Rutgers University, author of Chinatown Opera Theater in North America

This everyday portrait of music in Bunun society is a significant contribution to the conversation about the reframing of "traditional/contemporary" binary in music studies. The book’s multifaceted, localized and dialogic approach unsettles conventional musical representation of Bunun society. The topics range across genres, generations, spaces and identities, as well as agency, embodiment and materiality to produce insightful music reflection of one of Taiwan’s most prominent indigenous communities. Meanwhile, nuanced analyses of music embodiment, vocality, and temporality shed new light on discussions about these important topics.

Nancy Yunhwa Rao, Rutgers University, author of Chinatown Opera Theater in North America

From the Publisher