Category Archives: Studying popular music

The 7th Inter-Asia Popular Music Studies (IAPMS) Conference Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia (deadline extended)

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*** Dec 15, 2019: The deadline for the submission is extended to Jan 15, 2020. 

The 7th Inter-Asia Popular Music Studies (IAPMS) Conference Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

23-25 July, 2020

Organised by Inter-Asia Popular Music Studies Group (IAPMS Group)

Hosted by

Sunway University, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

Abstract Submissions Deadline

15 December 2019

Theme: Asia’s Sonic (under)Currents and Currencies

The recent international popularity of Korean pop groups BTS and Blackpink placed Asia from passive recipients to active participants of otherwise US and UK dominated global pop music. However, the extent in which they represent and personify the rich undercurrent of popular music circulation in Asia remains debatable in Asia’s culturally diverse landscapes. While the digital platform and social media as well as travel have intensified the flows of popular music participation, it is probably premature to idealistically suggest the levelling of more enduring historical and cultural boundaries and borders. The post•global or post•digital condition needs discussion.

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Deadline postponed, information on program / CFP IASPM-Norden conference 2020: Music in the Age of Streaming – Nordic Perspectives, Piteå, Sweden, 15–17 June 2020

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IASPM-Norden conference 2020

Music in the Age of Streaming – Nordic Perspectives

IASPM-NORDEN CONFERENCE

PITEÅ, SWEDEN, 15–17 JUNE 2020

The IASPM-Norden conference aims to shed light on various aspects of streaming of/in popular music within the Nordic context. Nordic popular music is a dynamic field comprising a great variety of artists, music producers and entrepreneurs on both ends of the cultural spectrum, from commercially successful to less known and underground. More broadly, listening to popular music has become an evermore accessible activity in people’s everyday life, and so have the “streams” of music flowing across many borders – geographical, ideological, socioeconomic, cultural, disciplinary, etc. In addition to the everyday distribution and listening of music through digital networks, we contend specifically that “streaming” may also be used to conceptualize musical cultures beyond the scope of Spotify or other streaming services. That said, even an analysis of a platform like Spotify may benefit from an approach that investigates the deeper currents and flows of its streams, as pursued by Spotify Teardown (Eriksson et al. 2019) recently. With this conference we wish to engage with the many intersections of musical streams and invite papers that highlight the ways in which “streaming” characterize music and musical cultures.

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cfp: Ethnomusicology Review Volume 22

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Ethnomusicology Review is now accepting submissions for Volume 23, scheduled for publication in Fall 2021. Starting as Pacific Review of Ethnomusicology (PRE) in 1984, Ethnomusicology Review is a refereed journal managed by UCLA graduate students and a faculty advisory board. We maintain an extensive editorial board and publish interdisciplinary music research in English, Spanish, Portuguese, Indonesian, and other languages on a case-by-case basis.

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Survey About Audio Engineering/Music Production

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Dear audio colleague,

We are inviting you to participate in an online survey that aims to capture important demographic information about the audio industry and recording producers/engineers’ experiences of discrimination in the studio. Our goal is to document experiences of discrimination within audio engineering and music production. The results from the study will be used for academic, educational and industry purposes. The survey would take about 20-30 minutes to complete (divided into two parts):

bit.ly/microaggressions_in_audio

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Media and the Night: An International Conference

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April 29 and 30, 2020

McGill University, Montreal

Organized by

Jhessica Reia, Mellon Postdoctoral Fellow, Department of Art History and Communication Studies, McGill University

Will Straw, James McGill Professor of Urban Media Studies, Department of Art History and Communication Studies, McGill University

Over the last decade, the study of the night has emerged as an international, interdisciplinary field of scholarly research. Historians, archaeologists, geographers, urbanists, economists and scholars of culture and literature have analyzed the night time of communities large and small, across a wide range of historical periods. The study of the night has expanded in tandem with new attention to the night on the part of city administrations, organizers of cultural events (like nuits blanches and museum nights) and activists fighting gentrification, systems of control and practices of harassment and exclusion which limit the “right to the night” of various populations. 

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The New Norient Space – Community Platform for Music Research

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Dear IASPM Colleagues

Over the last three years, we have worked hard to create the new Norient Space, The Now in Sound, a transdisciplinary virtual gallery and community platform for music research, music journalism and art. We shut down the Norient magazine yesterday. 

The planned Norient Space will offer an extensive archive and can increase the public visibility and acceptance of research fields such as ethnomusicology, popular music studies, sound studies, digital humanities, media studies, postcolonial studies and artistic research.

Please have a look at our crowdfunding campaign

In English: https://www.startnext.com/en/norient

Auf Deutsch: https://www.startnext.com/de/norient  

You can become 1 of 1000 Founding Members, or support it small or big, and you can test the existing beta-site. Please also help to share it with your colleagues, via email, social media, mailing lists, newsletters…  – The space will only go online, if supported by a strong community and dedicated membership. If we miss this big step, Norient could disappear altogether.  

Our goal is to create independent community of thinkers and artists worldwide. We will continue to produce and publish quality content, but we will also provide new formats to promote your books, journals, films, podcasts, or conference proceedings. We think such a platform is long overdue – Research must reach the public and must not be hidden in university libraries. Only in this way can it initiate social developments. 

Norient will continue to present great music, and will remain an advocate for music scenes from Bolivia to Ghana to Pakistan – and for a world beyond Eurocentrism, exoticism and discrimination.

As a founding member, you can make this vision of a multi-layered, polyphonic writing of contemporary history through music , sound and noise(s) a reality. Only together, can we defy algorithms and filter bubbles – and tell new stories that are heard far and wide.

We would therefore be delighted if you join us and support our idea. 

We can’t wait to get started!  


Kindest Regards,

Thomas Burkhalter and Sandra Passaro

PCA Canada (Pop and Politics)

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Pop and Politics:

State of the Field/State of the World

Annual Conference of the Popular Culture Association of Canada

Concordia University, Montreal, QC, May 7-9, 2020

After a one-year hiatus, the annual conference of the Popular Culture Association of Canada is back and looking forward—as well as up, left, right, down, and back. For our 9th annual conference, which will take place at Concordia University in Montreal, QC from May 7th-9th, 2020, we’re reflecting on the state of our field by inviting discussion on the relationship between popular culture and politics, broadly conceived.

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