The Online Program of events for the SEM 2024 Annual Meeting appears below. This program is subject to change. The final program will be published in early October.
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17J: Music and the Internet: A Roundtable on Online Methods, Metaphors, and Disciplinary Mapping
Time:
Friday, 25/Oct/2024:
10:00am - 12:00pm
Sponsored by the Sound Studies Section and the Popular Music Section
Presentations
Music and the Internet: A Roundtable on Online Methods, Metaphors, and Disciplinary Mapping
Organizer(s): Kate Galloway (Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute), Paula Clare Harper (University of Chicago), Steven Gamble (University of Bristol)
Chair(s): Kate Galloway (Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute), Paula Clare Harper (University of Chicago), Steven Gamble (University of Bristol)
Across the past three decades, popular music cultures, the music industry, and sonic social movements have increasingly intertwined with the internet. From fan reception to original creative production, heated online debates to meme creation, individual listening to communal identity formation, the web permeates everyday musical activity worldwide. This roundtable brings together key perspectives on music and the internet, providing a timely reflection on the state of the emerging field. With an ear to contemporary developments and conscious of the historicizing power of such an effort, the roundtable participants offer a diversity of epistemological and methodological perspectives. Harper and Shelley suggest conceptual framings for digital creative practice—Shelley posits homologies between musical and virtual space, while Harper forwards online virality itself as a mode of musical practice. Galloway examines the sounds of internet sites, attending to practices of digital listening to the ambient soundscaping of platforms. Gamble presents critical methodological considerations, urging careful treatment of internet data and cultural artifacts. Williams considers online participatory fan practices in the context of increasing demands for recognition and compensation of digital labor. Gaunt builds on their defining work on the online impacts of Black girlhood in contemporary musical contexts that magnify discourses of race, gender, and youth. Sprengel addresses the global topography of online music, examining international practices that challenge the normative assumptions of Western and Global North perspectives. With recent increased academic interest in this field, this roundtable offers a space for lively and productive dialogue that forwards shared methods and ethical frameworks.
Presentations in the Session
Roundtable Participants
Paula Clare Harper1, Braxton Shelley2 1University of Chicago, 2Yale University
N/A
Roundtable Participant
Kate Galloway Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute
N/A
Roundtable Participant
Steven Gamble University of Bristol
N/A
Roundtable Participant
Jenessa Williams University of Leeds
N/A
Roundtable Participant
Kyra Gaunt University at Albany, State University of New York