Events

Time: Tuesday, December 19, 2023, from 5:00PM to 6:30PM (JST)
Venue: DAICEL Studio, 1st floor of Science Commons Bld. (Center for Education in Liberal Arts and Sciences), Osaka University Toyonaka Campus (and online via Zoom)
Languages: Book talk will be held in English. Comments and discussion will be held in both English and Japanese.

Registration: Please register from the URL or QR code on the flyer by December 18, 08:00 AM. The registration period for this event has ended.

【Book talk】
Scott W. AALGAARD (Assistant Professor, Wesleyan University)

【Comments】
WAJIMA Yusuke (Professor, Osaka University)
Anita DREXLER (Doctoral Student, Osaka University)
Nicholas LAMBRECHT (Assistant Professor, Osaka University)

【Abstract】
In Homesick Blues, author Scott W. Aalgaard explores how artists, fans, amateur practitioners, and others have used music to tell stories of everyday life in Japan from the late 1940s to 2018, a practice that the book calls ‘musical storytelling.’ At its core, musical storytelling is a political practice, presenting potent—if ambiguous—world-producing potentials as social actors generate and share stories of themselves and others in ways that intersect with and inform social and political life. Homesick Blues assembles a diverse ensemble of voices, some of whom are now appearing in English-language scholarship for the very first time, including industry stakeholders, rock stars, fans, newscasters, Kyoto-based folk singers, jazz singers, karaoke enthusiasts and even US military personnel. An equally diverse selection of scholarship and methodology, from ethnomusicology to literary studies, from philosophy to history, creates a richly interdisciplinary and accessible analysis of musical modes of politics.