Title Information
Title
Community Powered Resistance: Radio, Music Scenes and Musical Activism in Washington, D.C.
Name: Personal
Name Part
Loughran, Maureen Elizabeth
Role
Role Term: Text
creator
Origin Information
Copyright Date (keyDate="yes", encoding="w3cdtf")
2008
Physical Description
Extent
xi, 212 p.
digitalOrigin
born digital
Note
Thesis (Ph.D.) -- Brown University (2008)
Name: Personal
Name Part
Titon, Jeff
Role
Role Term: Text
director
Name: Personal
Name Part
Smulyan, Susan
Role
Role Term: Text
reader
Name: Personal
Name Part
Miller, Kiri
Role
Role Term: Text
reader
Name: Personal
Name Part
Spitzer, Nicholas
Role
Role Term: Text
reader
Name: Corporate
Name Part
Brown University. Music. Ethnomusicology
Role
Role Term: Text
sponsor
Genre (aat)
theses
Abstract
This dissertation explores of various modes of musical activism within the Mount Pleasant neighborhood of Washington, D.C. Music is an important aspect of life in Mount Pleasant, and it has become the conduit and mirror for many other issues about urban life in the neighborhood. From arguments about noise pollution, to protests featuring local popular musics, to concerns about the gentrification of the soundscape, people in Mount Pleasant live their lives as residents in an urban city often in relation to music. Within an ethnographic study of the neighborhood underground radio station, Radio CPR, I investigate how the station acts to encourage activists for the Mount Pleasant community while also building an alternative community within the station. Musical activism is found in group settings, such as Radio CPR meetings, protest rallies or punk fueled benefit concerts, and in the individual actions of Radio CPR DJs during their radio shows. The activism in this neighborhood connects to larger national protest movements, such as the anti-globalization and anti-media consolidation movements. I also seek to understand the nature of place memory in the Washington, D.C. punk scene, as well as question the difference between scene, neighborhood and place. I aim to demonstrate that the complexities of place, class, gender, and race all inform how music is celebrated, discussed and advocated for in urban neighborhoods in the United States. In addition, through a discussion of the field of applied ethnomusicology, I theorize a different sense of scholarly engagement, that of activist-driven applied ethnomusicology. I argue that as responsible scholars, we cannot look narrowly at places and communities, singling out musical traditions for study without also examining the ways in which lives are lived in these same places. In the end, this dissertation is an exploration of how people live in communities, how they express themselves in twenty-first century America, how music contributes to self-expression and protest, and how media contributes to peoples' understandings of cultural diversity.
Subject (Local)
Topic
music scenes
Subject (Local)
Topic
musical activism
Subject (Local)
Topic
punk
Subject (Local)
Topic
activism
Subject (FAST) (authorityURI="http://id.worldcat.org/fast", valueURI="http://id.worldcat.org/fast/1087053")
Topic
Radio
Subject (FAST) (authorityURI="http://id.worldcat.org/fast", valueURI="http://id.worldcat.org/fast/940296")
Topic
Gentrification
Subject (FAST) (authorityURI="http://id.worldcat.org/fast", valueURI="http://id.worldcat.org/fast/1084152")
Topic
Punk culture
Subject (FAST) (authorityURI="http://id.worldcat.org/fast", valueURI="http://id.worldcat.org/fast/1892738")
Topic
Applied ethnomusicology
Record Information
Record Content Source (marcorg)
RPB
Record Creation Date (encoding="iso8601")
20091218
Language
Language Term: Code (ISO639-2B)
eng
Language Term: Text
English
Identifier: DOI
10.7301/Z0Z036F6
Access Condition: rights statement (href="http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/")
In Copyright
Access Condition: restriction on access
Collection is open for research.
Type of Resource (primo)
dissertations