This panel invites ethnographically-grounded papers on musical traditions and performance practices from across the world. We invite papers which show that the intellectual benefits of this work also have valuable contributions in applied community contexts.
Long Abstract:
For ethnomusicologists and other researchers who study the music of the world's diverse cultures the intellectual benefits of our research are clear. Ethnomusicologists, who often come from interdisciplinary backgrounds, study 'music in its cultural context'. These musical forms are often significant forms of intangible cultural heritage, such that research with this focus is strongly valued by communities in which we work. Many ethnomusicological projects centre on engagements with archival recordings and can assist with community revitalisation efforts in contexts where musical practices are changing rapidly. Additionally, musical traditions as studied in their cultural contexts are in most cases more than art forms; research is this area is therefore holistic and researchers delve into other surrounding social and cultural practices, ecological knowledge, language, ritual forms, and historical events, amongst other areas. For this panel, we invite papers that are grounded in ethnographic fieldwork and illustrate the community benefits of research into music and performance practices. We invite papers which come from broad interdisciplinary perspectives and encourage participation from musicians, performers and community members, as well as those which include a performance or multimedia component.
This paper explores links between performance practice in Warlpiri ceremony and hip-hop culture in order to provide a preliminary outline of the embodied capacities of hip-hop to activate primary relationships between country, person and place.
Paper long abstract:
Hip-hop workshops have become a key feature of community arts, youth-focused programs in remote Indigenous communities in Australia, North America and elsewhere. Yet there is little research on the importance of hip-hop in Indigenous contexts. On a surface level, hip-hop aligns with Indigenous tradition through the multi-modality of story-song-music-dance-art as it has indeed been called a "modern day corroboree" by Gumbaynggirr hip-hop artist Wire MC. But what does this "alignment" mean? What capacities do rap and breakdancing have for maintaining language, culture or more intangible aspects of heritage? How does hip-hop perform place, identity, in what terms? This paper explores these questions through the phenomenon of the biannual Milpirri Festival, Lajamanu, NT, coproduced by Tracks Dance Company. Milpirri is an unlikely confluence of experimental song, dance, performance and spectacle, combining vernacular hip-hop, rap, and break dancing with Jardi warnpa, Yawulyu, and other public versions of high Warlpiri ceremony. As Steven Wanta Jampijinpa Patrick and Jennifer Biddle model (2018), Milpirri demonstrates embodied capacities of hip-hop to activate primary links between country, person and place; re-animating vulnerable place-based forms of knowledge and experience. This paper points to the gap in research needed to understand the vital role of hip-hop specifically in Milpirri, and more generally in Indigenous futures globally. What are the enduring capacities and/or limitations of hip-hop as a vehicle for Aboriginal heritage?
This paper assembles the various recordings and historical references to an Aboriginal travelling ceremony known in some parts of the country as 'Wanji-wanji'. In combination with contemporary rememberings of it, this paper aims to understand the breadth and origins of this once popular ceremony.
Paper long abstract:
Indigenous Australian culture has many different kinds of ceremonies, including entertainment ceremonies. Early colonists adopted the term 'corroboree', based on a word from the Sydney region, for such ceremonies. Like folk songs, these traditions traversed political, ethnic and linguistic divides, despite being sung in a foreign tongue. 'Wanji-wanji' was one such ceremony which was known across the western half of Australia. The earliest reference to its performance dates back to the 1850s, and the ethnographer Daisy Bates witnessed the 'travelling dance' on the South Australian coast in 1913 (Bates 1938). The earliest known audio recording of it was made in 1954, close to 2,000kms away, at Roebourne on the Western Australian coast. Custodianship and the geographic origins of the ceremony are unknown. Bates suggests an origin in the north-west of the country and musically and textually it resembles ceremonies of inland Australia. This paper also discusses contemporary 'rememberings' of the ceremony by senior men and women from across the western half of Australia, including many who recall related performances. As approximately 100 singers and 'rememberers', spanning 25 language groups, have shared their memories and knowledge of this ceremony, we ask how and why traditions like Wanji-wanji became so widely known across such a vast region of Australia? Moreover, we describe the historical, socio-cultural settings of the period when ceremonies like this were popular, contextualising it with similar ceremonies such as the Molonga/Tjitjingalla, and show the importance of combined musical, linguistic and ethnographic analyses of Aboriginal ceremonies.
This paper looks at a variety of values in ethnography and addresses the return of archival documentation for revitalization of culture and self-esteem. The paper is based on fieldwork carried out in 1981-82 with the Warlpiri women in Willowra, N.T., and the return of the data many years later.
Paper long abstract:
This paper looks at a variety of values: the value of the ethnographer in the documentation of indigenous cultural and intellectual property; the intrinsic value of this documentation to the indigenous people themselves; and the benefits of archival documentation for revitalization of culture and self-esteem.
The hypothesis is: the ethnographer is essential for the historical record of a rapidly changing culture. The ethnographer can provide an insight into the values expressed by the culture, through analysis of the research data. When the ethnographic materials are returned to the indigenous community, the people are given the autonomy to govern what happens to the documentation. The documentation of "facts" can help provide the ability to revitalize and practice one's culture. The recorded evidence can contribute to the self-esteem of individuals and of the community as a whole.
The paper is based on fieldwork carried out in 1981-82 with the Warlpiri women in Willowra, N.T. The basis of discussion is the documentation of women's ceremonies, and the return of the data many years later to the indigenous community. Aspects of Warlpiri women's ceremonies, including recordings of songs and photos of designs, provide an audiovisual component to the presentation. The role of the ethnographer in the past, and the potential outcome of the ethnographic data, indicates there is much to be valued in the documentation of indigenous cultural and intellectual heritage.
Warlpiri people have in recent decades performed their traditional songs and dances in numerous Australian cities and other international locations. This paper shows how these performances strengthen these musical traditions, and open up opportunities for cultural exchange.
Paper long abstract:
For Warlpiri people living in settlements across the Tanami desert of Central Australia, songs and their associated cultural knowledge have been passed down through many generations in ceremonial contexts which incorporate music, dance, body designs, ritualised movements and surrounding social contexts. Performance of songs carry forward complex forms of inter-related cultural knowledge, including stories of Dreaming ancestors, features of the landscape, ecological knowledge of country and intimate social relationships amongst Warlpiri people. The last few decades have seen shifts away from traditional systems of exchange towards presentational modes that forge connections to non-Indigenous and inter-Indigenous audiences (Dussart 2004, 254). Through these shifting contexts, songs remain as mechanisms for forging social interconnections and passing down valued cultural knowledge and practices. With multi-media examples, this paper discusses several recent performances of public genres of Warlpiri song. These performances are about keeping stories strong in a time when the world is changing really rapidly and promote greater understanding of Indigenous lives in broader, mainstream Australian and international contexts.
In this paper I present a recent documentation project for the narrative genre 'pil' and the newly-published bilingual collection 'Pil: Ancestral Stories of the Lihir Islands'. I discuss the process of putting the book together and some of the challenges.
Paper long abstract:
In the Lihir Islands of Papua New Guinea there is a form of storytelling known as pil, where a fictional narrative is punctuated by recurring song. The practice of telling pil has been identified by the people of Lihir as a tradition under threat by recent social change—change that has been accelerated by the introduction of gold mining in the islands in the mid-1990s. This perceived threat has resulted in the pil genre being included in the Lihir Cultural Heritage Plan as something to be safeguarded through documentation and transmission.
In this paper I share this narrative form, reflecting on the role of song in the stories by examining a few key examples. I present a recent documentation project for pil which has resulted in the newly-published bilingual collection entitled Pil: Ancestral Stories of the Lihir Islands; I discuss the process of putting the book together and some of the challenges. Finally, in acknowledging that a primary funding source for this work on Lihir has come from the mining company itself, I reflect on this research partnership with industry and what this means for the documentation, promotion and very viability of Lihir performance traditions now and to come.
Since the 1990s, Teo Chew opera has been maintained by the Australian Chinese Teo Chew Association, a cultural stronghold for immigrants from the Teo Chew language group. This paper addresses various factors behind the gradual decline of this genre and offers possible methods for sustainability.
Paper long abstract:
Located in the heart of Western Sydney, the Australian Chinese Teo Chew Association (ACTCA) is a meeting place for diasporic Chinese hailing from Laos, Cambodia, Vietnam, Mainland China and other Southeast Asian countries. Their common link is the Teo Chew/Chaozhou language and culture, which originates in the locality of Teo Swa/Chaoshan in present-day Guangdong Province. Since the late 1990s, Sydney-siders of Teo Chew descent have gathered regularly to celebrate a common ethno-specific identity. In a large Chinese-style building complete with a traditional archway, community members partake in activities such as karaoke nights, ballroom dancing classes, kung fu and lion dance training, chess tournaments, and most significantly, Teo Chew opera. Arias and instrumental suites from various operatic classics are rehearsed on a weekly basis by a core group of predominantly elderly musicians. They are joined by professional artists invited from mainland China in large-scale productions hosted annually by the association. Although most synonymous with Teo Chew culture and seemingly popular in other diasporic communities, this classical art form is steadily losing currency, particularly amongst the younger Teo Chew population. Despite local patronage, it seems likely that the genre will survive for only as long as the current exponents are able to sustain it. This paper draws on fieldwork conducted from 2004 to address issues of language, transmission and other factors contributing to the gradual decline of Teo Chew opera in Western Sydney. Possible methods for sustainability are also discussed, with a case study involving Sydney Conservatorium's Chinese Music Ensemble.
This paper explores the way Portuguese Burgher identities are articulated in practices and discourse about their iconic song, music and dance traditions focusing on the káfriinha, a syncretic quadrille in which Portuguese Burgher identity, preservationism and politics of culture are played out.
Paper long abstract:
Portuguese Burghers are a minority ethnic community in Sri Lanka who speak an endangered creole language, Sri Lanka Portuguese and practice specific performance traditions. This paper explores the way Portuguese Burgher identities are articulated in practices and discourse about their performance traditions. Of particular focus will be a syncretic quadrille dance known as the káfriinha. This dance has a high level of cultural salience for Portuguese Burghers both as a prominent expression of their own identity and as an important social dance which is embedded in the proceedings of wedding celebrations and other formal events. Strongly held notions about the káfriinha including how it is danced, by whom and in what clothing, as well as its link to ideas about Portuguese identity both within and outside the community are revealing of issues relating to the politics of culture, preservationism and hybridity. I will draw on ethnographic observations relating to the Portuguese Burgher káfriinha, including movement, music, sung text and discourse about it by participants, as well as relevant historical perspectives to paint a picture of how Portuguese Burgher identity is expressed and performed through their dance.
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