A distinctive feature about flamenco discourse, whether in publications or social media, is the presence of polemics-at times fierce and bitter-regarding themes such as traditionvs.-innovation, the definition of flamenco and its borders, and the role of specific places or communities in the evolution and current state of the genre. I believe that at the heart of many of these controversies lies a basic question: Is flamenco a universal art, or is it inherently embedded in realms of social meaning and sentiment, linked to specific communities, whether of ethnicity, barrio, or even family? In fact, flamenco is a unique genre in the sense that it has grown and flourished in both manners and contexts, in such a way that has enriched the art, while giving rise to polemics, confusions, and mystifications.

Una cosa notable en el discurso sobre el flamenco, sea en publicaciones o las redes sociales, es la presencia de polémicas, a veces feroces y mordaces, en torno a temas como el de tradición-contra-innovación, la definición del flamenco y sus perímetros, y el papel de sitios o comunidades específicas en el desarrollo y el estado actual del género. Creo que en el fondo de muchas de estas controversias hay una cuestión básica: ¿Es el flamenco un arte universal, o es algo inherentemente embebido en capas de sentido y sentimiento sociales, vinculados a comunidades específicas, sean de etnicidad, barrio, o hasta familia? De hecho, el flamenco es un género raro en el sentido de que ha crecido y florecido en ambas maneras y contextos, de una manera que ha enriquecido el arte, y al mismo tiempo ha impulsado polémicas, confusiones, y mistificaciones.

While the styles and sources of Rosalia's music are diverse and eclectic, flamenco is certainly the genre of which she has made most consistent and extensive use, with her idiosyncratic and original interpretations provoking much controversy in flamenco circles. Without discussing such polemics, this article explores in some specificity the particular flamenco forms she has used, from her first album Los Angeles through her 2022 Motomami. it further makes some general observations about her flamenco interpretations, though these resist facile categorization. Some of the specific flamenco forms (cantes and estilos) that she performs are familiar and iconic, such as the "yeli yeli" tango chorus in "di mi nombre." others, such as the tango of porrina de badajoz in "Juro que," are items that only flamenco connoisseurs would recognize. Similarly, some of her interpretations are straightforward and por derecho, while others are strikingly original, whether in terms of instrumental accompaniment, production effects, or her own vocal rendering. a close observation of these rearticulations reveals both her originality as well as her deliberate engagement with traditional flamenco forms.

In 2018 Spanish singer Rosalia attained international popularity with her innovative flamenco-fusion album El mal querer. Within the flamenco world, the Rosalia vogue provoked vehement and ongoing polemics involving whether or not her music should be regarded as "flamenco; whether she had the social credentials to be accepted as a flamenco innovator, and whether it was proper for her to adopt the persona of a ghetto-girl Gypsy in her hit music video, "Malamente." These controversies reveal much about flamenco culture and the tensions inhering to its status as both a concert art form and a traditional idiom embedded in Gitano subculture.

This essay reviews the basic contours of the cultural appropriation controversies as they have been waged in reference to music in both academic and vernacular circles. It discusses some of the debates that have involved white performers’ musical borrowings from African American culture, and also musical flows outside the Euro-American mainstream. It explores relations of these ethical polemics to notions of copyright and argues that the latter can provide a moral guide to the propriety of many cultural interactions. It further critiques the terminological and conceptual distortions and obfuscations that have tended to plague discussions, both on scholarly and popular levels. These problems are evident in the very notion of “cultural appropriation,” which can be seen to emerge as a confused attempt to reconcile the anxiety generated by hegemonic borrowings, on the one hand, with the inevitability and ultimate desirability of cultural flows on the other.

For the last century, probably no region has contributed more rhythmic vitality to the global soundscape than Latin America and the Caribbean. More than any other musical element, it has been the uniquely compelling rhythms that have driven the early twentieth-century Parisian vogue of the tango, the transnational spread of salsa and Cuban dance music, and the current global appeal of Jamaican reggae and dance hall. Much of this rhythmic dynamism is a product of the development of syncretic idioms drawing from African as well as European roots. This ongoing and endlessly creative process has generated a great variety of rhythmic styles, and is supplemented by other vital music genres, such as northern Mexican conjunto music and Trinidadian tassa drumming, that owe little or nothing to African influence.

This article provides an overview of the diverse and principle dimensions of transnationalism in Indian (or, more properly, South Asian) music culture. These include: the international interest, especially since around the 1960s, in South Asian musics, such as Hindustani music, qawwali, and Bollywood music; the growth of diasporic populations–from descendants of nineteenth-century indentured workers to Punjabi bhangra enthusiasts in the UK, with their own consumption, performance, and, in some cases, active creation of South Asian music genres; the diverse sorts of impact that these communities have exercised on music culture in South Asia itself; and the emergence of genuinely transnational music scenes. The article's final section presents a more focused, albeit concise, case study of aspects of diasporic South Asian music culture in the New York City area, from lively classical music scenes to performance of Bollywood dance routines at weddings.

InChocolate Surrealism, NjorogeNjoroge haswritten a survey of selectedmusic cultures in the Caribbean and the United States, presenting them as exemplars of the dynamismof blackNewWorld artistic expression.His book supplements what is by now a quite substantial body of literature on these idioms. The introduction addresses notions of “black Marxism” and “black science” and suggests that continuities among diverse genres might be found in concepts of polyrhythm and “rootwork”; however, he does not attempt to develop these ideas in any depth. The subsequent chapters provide overviews of variousmusic cultures, emphasizing, where relevant, their status as components of local and regional black culture. The first chapter surveys Trinidadian calypso to 1940. The second provides an overview of Afro-Cuban popular music culture in the especially vital period of 1945–55. The idea of “clave consciousness” is invoked here, but, as with the other interpretive tropes mentioned, it is not elaborated. The third chapter shifts focus to the United States, covering aspects of jazz in the subsequent decade, with an emphasis on the racial consciousness exhibited by such musicians as Thelonious Monk, Yusef Lateef, and Ahmed Abdul-Malik. The fourth chapter surveys the flowering of NewYork salsa in the seminal 1965–75 decade. A brief final chapter concludes the book. The utility of this book may not be readily apparent. On the one hand, it provides readable, competent, and unobjectionable surveys of the genres in question. Njoroge seems to know the subjects reasonablywell, and the relevant source literature is cited appropriately. On the other hand, Njoroge provides little or no material that is original, whether in terms of data, interpretation, or insight. No subject is explored in any depth, and thematerial presented derives entirely from easily accessible, primarily English-language publications. This book might constitute a handy survey for an undergraduate student, but there already exist various textbooks covering these music cultures, not to mention an extensive corpus of more focused scholarly literature, including thoseworks referenced by Njoroge. Students and scholars seeking fresh findings and perspectives on Afro-Caribbean music and jazz may find it more profitable to consult that literature rather than this slender, if nicely crafted, volume.

"Everyday Creativity: Singing Goddesses in the Himalayan Foothills." South Asia: Journal of South Asian Studies, 41(3), pp. 700–701

Research Article| October 01 2018 Afropop.org Peter Manuel Peter Manuel John Jay College, and the Graduate Center of the City University of New York Search for other works by this author on: This Site Google Ethnomusicology (2018) 62 (3): 508–511. https://doi.org/10.5406/ethnomusicology.62.3.0508 Cite Icon Cite Share Icon Share Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Email Permissions Search Site Citation Peter Manuel; Afropop.org. Ethnomusicology 1 October 2018; 62 (3): 508–511. doi: https://doi.org/10.5406/ethnomusicology.62.3.0508 Download citation file: Zotero Reference Manager EasyBib Bookends Mendeley Papers EndNote RefWorks BibTex toolbar search Search Dropdown Menu toolbar search search input Search input auto suggest filter your search All Scholarly Publishing CollectiveUniversity of Illinois PressEthnomusicology Search Advanced Search The text of this article is only available as a PDF. Copyright 2018 by the Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois2018 Article PDF first page preview Close Modal You do not currently have access to this content.

A thousand militant voices will sing a freedom song The people united will never be defeated…" So proclaimed these verses of "El pueblo unido jamás será vencido," which, together with a host of nueva canción anthems, sustained the spirits of millions of Latin American progressives through the dark days of Cold War US-supported military dictatorships.But what happens when freedom is finally obtained?When the socialist ideal is discredited?When the economic hegemon is no longer an easily identified antagonist-the imperialist USA-but the intangible workings of an amorphous global financial network?Does the socially conscious music then stop?Is there anything for the thousand voices to sing of, besides love, dancing, and sex?Or, for that matter, nihilistic rage?However one might answer these questions, the third quarter of the twentieth century stands out as a historical moment in which progressive, activist songs occupied lively niches in popular music cultures throughout much of the world, serving as soundscapes for set of socio-political movements that, although diverse, shared a commitment to universalist values ultimately deriving from the Enlightenment.But whether in Jamaica, Pakistan, Spain, or Latin America, these musical movements have largely evaporated.What happened?In recent decades, historians have written extensively about what appears to be a dramatic and tangible change in global socio-political culture since the 1980s.This transformation has been interpreted from diverse perspectives, and with varying degrees of optimism or pessimism.In Francis Fukuyama's paradigmatic, seminal, and much-debated formulation 1 , it is the triumph of capitalism and liberal democracy, the exhaustion of structural political and economic alternatives, and, hence, the effective "end of history."For some cultural theorists, it is a postmodern condition marked by new aesthetic and epistemological sensibilities.For social activists, it is an era of progressive new social movements (NSMs) that have extended rights and dignity to women, gays, minorities, and other subalterns, and have raised public awareness and influenced policies on issues ranging from environmental concerns to animal rights.Meanwhile, for observers of less sunny dispositions, the "new world order" is an anarchic and unprecedentedly dangerous era of savage tribal, religious, and ethnic movements armed with modern weaponry.The decline of protest songs in the mainstream West since the 1970s has been oft noted, and has been traditionally related to specific developments such as the end of the Vietnam War.In this essay, I suggest that the decline was part of a much broader change in global culture, and that a cross-cultural exploration of the parallel trajectories of diverse political song movements can enrich our understanding of the global socio-political climate as a whole.I suggest that activist musical movements, in diverse parts of 1 Fukuyama, Francis, "The End of History?"The National Interest 16 (1989): 3-18; and The End of History and the Last Man (New York: Free Press, 1992). Music and Progressive Activism in the Post-War, Post-Colonial Decades: A Global ProjectAs someone whose sensibilities were formed in the 1960s, and as a member of the great American baby-boomer generation that invented youth counterculture, and that would never get old, it is of course hard for me to imagine that any music could rival '60s rock in quality or socio-political significance.Much of that music has not, of course, withstood the test of time, nor did my generation succeed in its goal of bringing down the military-industrial complex.There was no shortage of puerile narcissism, myopia, shallow hedonism, and political naiveté, and in the realm of commercial popular music, explicitly activist songs would constitute only a small percentage.And yet, that percentage was significant, and even in the most surreal flower-power fantasies of a song such as Joni Mitchell's "Woodstock" (popularized by Crosby, Stills, and Nash), there was a vision that linked celebration, rock music, and progressive protest against the Vietnam War: …and I dreamed I saw the bomber jet planes flying shotgun in the sky turning into butterflies above the nation This highly politicized decade was also the period of the massive 1968 student protests in Paris, Mexico City, and elsewhere, which, while displaying their own share of incoherence and naiveté, were animated by a shared opposition to imperialism, shallow materialism, social conformism, and reactionary attitudes toward sexual and recreational practices.In Europe, the US, and several Latin American countries, rock music was similarly interpreted, both by its fans and its critics, as inherently, if indirectly, linked to the spirit of progressive protest and countercultural sensibilities.Some commentators 2 have characterized the '60s countercultural protests as opposed to modernity and to Enlightenment ideals, especially insofar as the latter, in its early formulations, espoused an unquestioning faith in reason and science, which were then so discredited by the rationalized savagery of two World Wars, the ongoing rape of the environment, and the ethnocentric equation of reason with Euro-American ideologies.An arguably more productive and tenable perspective would be that of