ABSTRACT

This volume analyses the narration of the social through music and the seismographic function of music to detect social problems and envision alternatives.

Beyond state-driven attempts to link musical production to the official narrative of the nation, mass musical movements emerged during the 20th century that provided countercultural and alternative narratives of the prevailing social context. The Americas contain numerous examples of the strong connection between music and politics; Woody Guthrie’s "This Land is Your Land" envisioned a socialist transformation of the U.S., the Chilean Nueva Canción created a narrative and affective frame for the recognition of popular culture as a central element of the cultural politics of the Chilean way to socialism, and Reggae emerged as a response to British colonialism, drawing inspiration and guidance from the pan-Africanist visions of Marcus Garvey.

Providing a significant contribution to the study of music and politics/social movements from an inter-American perspective, this book will appeal to students and scholars of U.S. and Latin American Cultural Studies, Transnational Studies, History and Political Studies, Area Studies, and Music Studies.

For additional information, please see the authors' Sonic Politics webpage: https://www.uni-bielefeld.de/cias/sonicpolitics/index.html

chapter |18 pages

Introduction

Sonic politics: music and the narration of the social in the Americas from the 1960s to the present

chapter 1|25 pages

Singing resistance, rebellion, and revolution into being

Collective political action and song

chapter 2|7 pages

African American music in the Americas

Slavery, sounds, and forms of “knowledge”

chapter 4|15 pages

Inter-public-agenda-setting effect through political activism

The role of hip-hop music in the 2004 U.S. Presidential Election 1

chapter 5|19 pages

“Calling out around the world”

How soul music transnationalized the African American freedom struggle in the black power era (1965–1975)

chapter 6|14 pages

“Si Una Vez”

Chicana sensibilities and Xicanista soundscapes

chapter 7|21 pages

Hip-hop in Ciudad Juarez

A form of political participation

chapter 8|16 pages

The Fandango Sin Fronteras movement and sonic migrations

Performing community across borders

chapter 10|26 pages

Rockin’ for Pachamama

Political struggle and the narration of history in Ecuadorian rock music

chapter 11|11 pages

Punk is dead. Or is it?

Strategies of subcultural positioning in the (re-)making of the punk movement

chapter 12|22 pages

Political pie-throwing

Dead Kennedys and the Yippie-Punk continuum 1