Musical meaning and social significance : techno triggers for dancing
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Date
27/06/2014Author
Gadir, Tami Ester
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Abstract
Electronically-produced dance music has only recently achieved as much visibility in the
global pop music industry as ‘live’ or instrumental pop. Yet the fascination of cultural
scholars and sociologists with dance music predates its rise as a product of mass culture.
Much of this interest derives from early associations of dance music with marginalised
groups and oppositional ideologies. It therefore follows that many explorations of dance
music focus on the ways in which techno, house and practices of ‘raving’ are
expressions of dissent. As a result, the cultural aspects of dance music are necessarily the
focus of these studies, with few musicologists addressing musical features and fewer
dance scholars considering the specifics of dance movement. What is more, these
differing approaches tend to compete rather than collaborate. In my thesis, I seek to
address this divergence and to draw attention to the ways that contrasting disciplinary
approaches can complement and enrich the study of any music.
I use contemporary techno club nights in Edinburgh as a focal point for addressing
musical and social triggers for dancing. I explore subjective experiences of dancing,
DJing and producing by interspersing a review of existing literature with my own
ethnographic research and musical analysis. Subsequently, I consider how the
philosophies of techno are embodied within the movements and postures of the
dancing body and social interaction. Participants in techno settings adopt strikingly
similar attitudes to the institutionalised classical music world, despite the fundamental
differences between the practices of composition, performance and listening. Moreover,
these attitudes are repeatedly disseminated by participants, journalists and scholars. My
enquiry into social and musical dancing triggers leads me to question the perpetuation of
these ideas.