MUSIC 194 R /BU: MH854

SPRING 2016
MUSIC AND VIOLENCE
INSTRUCTOR: Prof. Marié Abe
CLASS SCHEDULE: Wednesdays, 3-5pm
ROOM: Davison Room, Music Building
OFFICE HOURS: Wednesdays, 1:15-2:45pm or by appointment
OFFICE LOCATION: Music Building, Office 7
EMAIL: marieabe@bu.edu

Image by Nazca Saatch & Saatchi Sao Paulo

COURSE DESCRIPTION & OBJECTIVES:

Music can be a form of weapon or torture; a mediating force in a process of conflict
resolution; a force complicit with violence; storehouse of memory and/or process of
healing for survivors of violence; a mode of resistance against a violent regime; and a
creative process of alliance-building, among many others. This seminar explores the
various intersections of music and violence, considered broadly—from mass political
conflict to everyday violence that is structural, symbolic, and otherwise—, and the
emerging body of scholarship within ethnomusicology over the last decade dedicated to
the subject. At the heart of seminar discussions will be an investigation into the role of
expressive culture in generating, mediating, contesting, or sustaining political and other
social violence, and the question of how music enables us to think creatively through the
relationship between critical attention, compassion, and commitment.

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The goals of the seminar are as follows:
• Explore theoretical tools to conceptualize various kinds of violence, particularly
paying attention to the ways in which social differences are conceived, managed,
and deployed in moments of violence or conflict.
• Gain ethnographic insights into the place of music/sound in generating,
mediating, contesting, or sustaining the forces that produce violence in particular
contexts.
• Demonstrate, through writing and conversation, the ability to synthesize critical
theoretical paradigms related to issues of structural inequalities, power relations,
racial politics, globalization and other issues relevant to considering music and
violence.
• Critically reflect on one’s own affiliations, assumptions, and principles as we
examine culturally, historically, and geographically specific forces that inform the
possibilities and limitations of music in generating or mediating violence.
• Design, produce, and present an original and rigorous research project related to
the course topic.

CLASS REQUIREMENTS AND EXPECTATIONS:

Class attendance
Since the seminar is based on active participation and oral presentation, attendance to all
meetings is mandatory. After three absences without any serious reasons, students will be
asked to drop the seminar. Please be on time to be respectful of others as well.

Reading
All the readings will be available on Canvas, unless otherwise noted. Class will be a student-
led presentation and discussion based on the reading material. Attendance at all sessions is
mandatory, and absences will be recorded. Students are required to complete the assigned
readings (by the class meeting under which they are listed) and come prepared to discuss
them.

I highly encourage you to keep notes of each reading. Take notes of: bibliographical
information, brief synopsis/main arguments (in your own words), keywords, and your own
observations, synthesis with other works, reactions, and questions. This will serve as your
notes during class discussion, and also as an invaluable guide for your future studies and
research.

Recommended Text
We will be reading chapters from the following books. It is not necessary, but
recommended, for you to find your own copies if possible.

Martin Dougherty. 2015. Listening to War: Sound, Music, Trauma, and Survival in Wartime Iraq.
Oxford: Oxford University Press. Selections.

Pilzer, Joshua. 2012. Hearts of Pine: Songs in the Lives of Three Korean Survivors of the Japanese
“Comfort Women.” New York: Oxford University Press.

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Presentation/Leading Discussion
You will be responsible for leading discussion around 1-2 times a semester (may vary
depending on the size of the class.) It involves:
• Gathering and making available to the rest of the seminar supplementary materials
related to the reading, which may include biographical information of the authors,
book reviews, a bibliography of works on the same or related topics, or other
materials that contextualize the author/writing (due on Canvas by 10pm on
Mondays.)
• Giving a 20-minute presentation in class. You are to lead and incite generative
discussion, and not to summarize the reading. You are strongly encouraged to bring
in any related and relevant material, from sound recordings, newspaper articles to
multimedia clips. You should also provide discussion questions/topics to the rest of
the seminar in class. You should tease out conceptual connections, counterpoints,
provide synthesis among the readings, and raise productive questions that the
seminar should explore in the following hours.

Written assignments
1. Weekly response papers. You are required to submit a total of 10 weekly response
papers throughout the semester, in response to the assigned readings and/or reading
questions prepared by the presenter(s)for the week. They are due every Tuesday by noon
in a designated folder on Canvas. They will focus on issues dealing with the assigned
readings and with concepts discussed in class. They will be short (no more than 350 words),
and require conciseness, clarity, and originality. This should not be a summary, but a focused
and critical engagement with the text. The response papers should raise issues and questions
you’d like to clarify or explore in the discussion, make an argument, synthesize or relate the
text with other readings in the course. Everyone is expected to read others’ response papers
before class. You will receive check, check minus, or check plus.

2. Independent Research Paper. At the end of the semester, you’ll have produced a
substantial research paper on your chosen topic, related to the course themes of music and
violence. You can approach the final project either as an exercise to apply the analytical
frameworks to your own project (thereby re-situating them in different geopolitical
contexts), or produce a close examination of a cluster of readings in relation to another body
of literature outside of the course. In all cases, it must demonstrate an original, critical, and
in-depth engagement with the material we read in the seminar. Please follow Chicago
Manual of Style, and use a 12pt font. All assignments must be turned in as an electronic copy
via email, ON TIME. No exception made.

You will be developing your independent research paper in multiple stages throughout the
semester. Please note the deadlines below in your calendar.
• March 2: Topic proposal & Bibliography
• March 21: Abstract
• April 6: Op Ed (750 words, broader audience)
• April 13: Outline
• April 27: Presentation
• May 5: Final paper

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Grading:
The course grade will be based on the following:
• Weekly responses: 40%
• Presentation/leading discussion 10%
• Active participation in discussion 10%
• Op Ed piece 15%
• Independent research project: 25%

Important Dates:
You are highly encouraged to attend these following events, which are highly relevant to our
seminar themes. We will integrate them into the seminar discussions whenever possible.
There may be additional events announced throughout the semester.

Wed March 30th 6:30pm Contemporary Noh performance on PTSD & discussion panel
on trauma and the arts @ Boston University, Tsai Performance Center. (free; Harvard
students should contact me to get tickets.)

Saturday April 2nd 8pm Craig Hella Johnson’s “Remembering Matthew Shepard”
performance s@ Harvard University, Memorial Hall.

Wed April 20th Cambodian Performance (12-1pm) & discussion panel on public
ethnomusicology and the arts in post-conflict societies (2-3:30pm) @ Boston University,
CFA Concert Hall. (free)

TBA Visit to the BU Medical Campus, on healthcare, immigrants to Boston, and the arts
(scheduling being negotiated.)

CLASS POLICIES, PROCEDURES, AND RESOURCES:

Course Content Note. At times this semester we will be discussing historical or
contemporary events that may be disturbing, even traumatizing, to some students. If you
suspect that specific material is likely to be emotionally challenging for you, I’d be happy to
discuss any concerns you may have before the subject comes up in class. Likewise, if you
ever wish to discuss your personal reactions to course material with the class or with me
individually afterwards, I welcome such discussions as an appropriate part of our classwork.

If you ever feel the need to step outside during a class discussion you may always do so
without academic penalty. You will, however, be responsible for any material you miss. If
you do leave the room for a significant time, please make arrangements to get notes from
another student or see me individually to discuss the situation.

Participation. Active participation is a crucial aspect of this course. You are expected to
come to each class, well prepared for the discussion; effective class participation can only be
reached if students read and critically examine the assigned course materials. Knowledge
production and successful classroom experiences depend on both the professor and students
engagement with the course material, informed discussion, and open exchange of thoughts
and ideas. Discussion forms the core of this course, and your respectfulness of the peers and
productive contributions to the class discussion are essential.

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Communication. Office hours are your primary forum in which you can communicate,
discuss, clarify or ask questions with me. Email is an alternative way to contact me, and I will
try to respond within 48 hours. However, do remember that it cannot always be the most
dependable way of communication; I cannot guarantee that I will receive or respond to last-
minute emails.

Students with disabilities. If you require assistance during the course due to a disability of
any kind, please speak with the professor as early as possible during the first two weeks of
the semester. Students requiring disability-related accommodations must register with the
Accessible Education Office (https://college.harvard.edu/about/campus-services-
resources/disability-services). Once AEO has authorized accommodations, students must
show the originally signed letter to the professor. No accommodations will be granted
without proper documentation.

Academic honesty. This course follows Harvard College’s policies on plagiarism and
collaboration ensure academic integrity. Specifically, any material submitted to meet couse
requirements is expected to be a student’s own work. Please make sure to bookmark and
consult regularly the Harvard Guide to Using Sources website at
http://usingsources.fas.harvard.edu. If you have any questions about what is considered
academic dishonesty, plagiarism, or about the policy, make sure you read the following links
on academic integrity and Honor Code carefully:
https://college.harvard.edu/academics/academic-integrity
http://honor.fas.harvard.edu/honor-code

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 COURSE SCHEDULE
[AS OF 1/27/2016; SUBJECT TO CHANGE DUE TO VISITORS’ AVAILABILIT.]

Week 1 January 27 Introduction

Course schedule - rescheduling in December
Introductions, projects
Presentation sign-up

Week 2 February 3 Conceptualizing Violence

Scheper-Hughes, Nancy, and Philippe Bourgois. 2004. “Introduction: Making Sense of
Violence.” In Violence in War and Peace: An Anthology, Nancy Scheper-Hughes and Philippe
Bourgois, eds., p. 1-31. Oxford: Blackwell Publishing.

Butler, Judith. 2004. “Violence, Mourning, Politics.” In Precarious Life. : The Powers of Mourning
and Violence, p. 19-49. London: Verso.

Žižek, Slavoj. 1998. “The Tyrant’s Bloody Robe” and “SOS Violence.” In Violence: Six
Sideways Reflections, p. 1-39.

Whitehead, Neil. 2004. “On the Poetics of Violence.” In Violence, p. 55-77. Santa Fe: School
of American Research Press.

View: Žižek lecture on violence, http://criticalstew.org/?p=410

Listen: What musical or sonic examples might highlight or problematize the formulations of
violence in the assigned text(s)? Bring at least one musical/sonic example to class for
discussion.

Supplementary reading:
Arblaster, Anthony. 1975. “What is Violence?” Socialist Register 12: 224-249.

Week 3 February 10 Violence and the State; Music as Torture

Hobbes, Thomas. 2004 (1651) “Leviathan.” In On Violence, A Reader. B.B. Lawrence ad A.
Karim, eds. Durham: Duke University Press, pp. 399-415.

Nagengast, Carole. 1994. “Violence, Terror, and the Crisis of the State.” Annual Review of
Anthropology, vol. 23:109-136

Cusick, Suzanne. 2006. "Music as Torture/Music as Weapon." Revista Transcultural de Música

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Cusick, Suzanne. 2008. “You Are in a Place That Is Out of the World” Journal of the Society of
American Music. 2(1): 1-26.

Listen:
Torture Playlist, Mother Jones.
http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2008/02/torture-playlist

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Supplementary Reading:
Cohen, Youssef, Brian R. Brown and A.F. K. Organski. 1981. “The Paradoxical Nature of
State Making: The Violent Creation of Order.” The American Political Science Review 75(4):
901-910

Week 4 February 17 Postcoloniality, Violence, and the Body

Foucault, Michel. “Discipline and Punish: The Birth of the Prison.” In On Violence, A Reader.
B.B. Lawrence ad A. Karim, eds. Durham: Duke University Press, pp. 444-471

Fanon, Franz. 1963. “Concerning Violence” in The Wretched of the Earth. New York: Grove
Press. Pp35-106

McDonald, David. 2009. “Poetics and the Performance of Violence in Israel/Palestine.”

Ethnomusicology 53(1): 58-85.

Thomas, Deborah. 2011. Exceptional Violence: Embodied Citizenship in Transnational Jamaica.

Durham: Duke University Press, pp87-171 [undergraduates: skim chap 3 for main
arguments/content, focus on chap 4]

Listen:
Redemption Song, Bob Marley https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QrY9eHkXTa4

“In Ramallah, some of the hottest pop tunes are about stabbing Israelis” PRI The World
http://www.pri.org/stories/2016-01-25/ramallah-some-hottest-pop-tunes-are-about-
stabbing-israelis

Week 5 February 24 Everyday Violence/Memorializing Violence: Mexican

Narcocorridos
Gramsci, Antonio. 2000. The Gramsci Reader: Selected Writings 1916-1935. D. Forgacs, ed. New
York: NYU Press. Read: VI Hegemony, Relations of Force, Historical Bloc, XI Philosophy,
Common Sense, Language and Folklore. Pp. 189-221, 323-362

Bourdieu, Pierre. 2007. “Symbolic Violence.” In Violence in War and Peace, An Anthology. N.
Scheper-Hughes and P. Bourgois, eds. Malden: Blackwell. P. 272-3

McDowell, John. 2000. Poetry and Violence: The Ballad Tradition of Mexico’s Costa
Chica. Urbana: University of Illinois Press. Introduction, 1. Violence and Its Verbal Icons, 8.
Violence as Social Drama

Simonett, Helena. 2006. “Los Gallos Valientes: Examining Violence in Mexican Popular
Music.” Revista Transcultural de Música 10

Supplementary Reading:
Williams, Raymond. 2004 (1976). “Keywords; Marxism ad Literature. In On Violence, A
Reader. B.B. Lawrence ad A. Karim, eds. Durham: Duke University Press, pp. 180-187

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Gramsci, Antonio. 2000. The Gramsci Reader: Selected Writings 1916-1935. D. Forgacs, ed. New
York: NYU Press. Read: X Intellectuals and Education, 300-322.

Listen:
Explore Elijah Wald’s website on narcocorridos, esp. the YouTube links to current
songs: http://www.elijahwald.com/corrido.html

Week 6 March 2 Loudness and Excess: Colombia’s Pacific Coast

Guest: Prof. Michael Birenbaum Quintero
Birenbaum Quintero, Michael. Unpublished. “Sounding the “Pacific,” Silencing the Violent:
Music and the Cultural Policy of Peace in Colombia.”

Bat-Ami Bar, On. 2002. The Subject of Violence. Rowman and Littlefield, pp.3-58

Vladimir Jankelévitch. 2003. Music and the Ineffable. Princeton: Princeton University Press,
pp.16-76 (undergraduates: read only 56-59, 62-76)

Bourdieu, Pierre. 2000. Pascalian Meditations. Palo Alto: Stanford University Press, pp. 164-
182 (undergraduates: read only 168-179)

Writing:
Independent Research Project Topic Proposal

Week 7 March 9 Music, Sound, and War

[BU students: meet on BU campus on March 16.]
Doughtry, Martin. 2014. “Thanatosonics: Ontologies of Acoustic Violence.” Social Text
32(2): 25-51.

Doughtry, Martin. 2015. Listening to War: Sound, Music, Trauma, and Survival in Wartime Iraq.
Oxford: Oxford University Press. Selections.

Sumera, Matthew. 2013. “The Soundtrack to War.” In Virtual War and Magical Death:
Technologies and Imaginaries for Terror and Killing. Durham: Duke University
Press. Pp. 214-233.

Film: Soundtrack to War (2005)

———Spring break———

Monday March 21
Independent Research Paper Abstract & Annotated Bibliography due

Week 8 March 23 Colonial Domination, Sexual Violence, and War

Guest: Prof. Joshua Pilzer
Pilzer, Joshua. 2012. Hearts of Pine: Songs in the Lives of Three Korean Survivors of the Japanese
“Comfort Women” [excerpts]. New York: Oxford University Press.

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Pilzer, Joshua, 2014. “Music and Dance in the Japanese Military "Comfort Women" System:
A Case Study in the Performing Arts, War, and Sexual Violence.” Women & Music - A Journal
of Gender and Culture, vol. 18:1-23

Pilzer, Joshua, 2015. “Study of Survivor’s Music.” In Svanibor Pettan and Jeff Todd Titon
Eds. Oxford Handbook of Applied Ethnomusicology, 481-510.

Supplementary Reading:
Finding, Deborah. 2011. “Unlocking the Silence: Tori Amos, Sexual Violence, and
Affect.” In Popular Music and Human Rights, Ian Peddie, ed., p. 39-50. London: Ashgate.

Listen:
Explore the companion website for the book and listen to the songs referenced.
http://global.oup.com/us/companion.websites/9780199759576/songs/

Week 9 March 30 Individual Consultation

No collective class. Sign up for individual meeting to discuss your final project.
BU students: sign up for individual meetings.

Week 10 April 6 Music, Narration, and Traumatic Memory: Holocaust and Peru
Arendt, Hannah. 1970. On Violence [excerpts]. New York: Harcourt Brace & Co.

Jelin, Elizabeth. 2003. “Trauma, Testimony, and Truth.” In State Repression and the
Labors of Memory, p. 60-75. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.

Gilbert, Shirli. 2005. Music in the Holocaust: Confronting Life in the Nazi Ghettos and Camps. New
York: Oxford University Press. Chapters 3, 4, Epilogue

Ritter, Jonathan. 2012. “The ‘Voice of the Victims’: Testimonial Songs in Rural Ayacucho.”
In The Art(s) of Truth Telling in Post-Shining Path Peru, Cynthia Milton, ed. Durham: Duke
University Press.

Optional:
Lafreniere, Bree. 2000. Music through the Dark: A Tale of Survival in Cambodia. Honolulu:
University of Hawai’I Press.

Writing:
Independent Research Project Op Ed piece due

Week 11 April 13 Silence, Politics, and Resistance

Scott, James. 1990. “Domination, Acting, and Fantasy.” In Domination and the Arts of
Resistance: Hidden Transcripts. New haven, CT: Yale University Press. Pp. 17-44

Halberstam, Judith. 1993. “Imagined Violence/Queer Violence: Representation, Rage, and

Resistance.” Social Text, 37: 187-201

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Devi, Nomi. 2014. “The Politics of Silence: Music, Violence and Protest in Guinea.”
Ethnomusicology 58(1): 1-29.

Abe, Marié. Forthcoming (2016). “Sounding Against Nuclear Power in Post-3.11 Japan:
Resonances of Silence and Chindon-ya.” Ethnomusicology 60(2).

Schwartz, Jessica. 2012. “A ‘Voice to Sing’: Rongelapese Musical Activism and the
Production of Nuclear Knowledge.” Music and Politics 6(1).

Writing:
Independent Research Paper Outline due

Week 12 April 20 Empathy

Sontag, Susan. 2003. Regarding the Pain of Others [excerpts]. New York: Picador.

Laurence, “Music and Empathy” in Music and Conflict Transformation: Harmonies and Dissonances
in Geopolitics. New York: I.B. Tauris, pp. 13-25.

Blog posts on the limits of empathy:

http://www.blackgirldangerous.org/2015/08/empathy-wont-save-us-in-the-fight-against-
oppression-heres-why/

http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2015/09/between-the-world-and-me-
empathy-is-a-privilege/407647/

Week 13 April 27 Independent Research Project Presentations

May 5 Independent Research Paper due

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