Ethnomusicology: Towards the holistic study of music

Abstract

Throughout its history, ethnomusicology has been persistently regarded as a field of one or other of the two ‘parent’ disciplines from which it took issue rather than as a discipline in its own right. This, it is argued in the first section of the article, has had a significant impact on the search for definition, theory and method in the subject acting largely as a disincentive to the development of an independent theory and method with a precise set of research objectives. There has nevertheless been a convergence of several models in ethnomusicology over the last 25 years from quite separate traditions of scholarship, all of which advocate a comprehensive integrative approach to the study of music. These are discussed in the middle section of the article. Finally, as what might be seen as the logical culmination of recent developments, there is the presentation of a holistic model for the study of music.

Oor die jare heen is musieketnologie beskou as 'n onderafdeling van een van die twee gronddissiplines waaruit dit ontstaan het, eerder as 'n outonome dissipline in sigself. In die eerste deel van hierdie bydrae word aangetoon dat bogenoemde opvatting verreikende gevolge vir hierdie studieveld gehad het—veral wat betref begripsomskrywing en die uitbouing van teoretiese en metodologiese grondslae. Dit het belemmerend ingewerk op die ontwikkeling van 'n outonome teorie en duidelike navorsingsdoelwitte. Desondanks het daar in die afgelope 25 jaar 'n ineenvloeiing van musieketnologiese modelle vanuit heel verskillende denkrigtings en tradisies plaasgevind, wat almal 'n samehangende en geïntegreerde benadering tot musiekstudie voorstaan. Laasgenoemde word in die middelste gedeelte van hierdie bydrae behandel. Laastens word 'n holistiese model vir musiekstudie voorgehou wat beskou kan word as die logiese kulminasie van resente ontwikkelingsop hierdie studieterrein.