3. The neglect of music by anthropologists

I find it both puzzling and frustrating, given what is known about the various families of traditional music worldwide, to read, in the field of anthropology, book after book, report after report, where theories about the history of languages, and their grouping into various families, are continually being referenced, especially in the literature on the origins and early migrations of "modern" humans, and yet what is known about the musical picture is all but ignored. In a sense this is a "good thing" for me, since I now find myself apparently without any competition at all, from ethnomusicologists or anyone else. But it's a huge problem for me as well, because the notion that the study of current or recent musical practices among traditional societies cannot be applied to the distant past is so ingrained into the thinking of so many.

Even in a book explicitly devoted to speculations about the nature and origins of humankind's earliest music, The Singing Neanderthals, archaeologist Steven Mithin makes a point of ignoring such practices (thus conveniently relieving himself of the need to do much of any reading in the ethnomusicological literature) on precisely those grounds. He bolsters this position by arguing that music changes at a much more rapid rate than language: "The speed at which music can evolve is readily apparent from the development since the early 1970s of rap, part of a more general subculture of hip hop, which includes break-dancing, 'cutting and scratching' records and graffiti." (p,. 21). This monumentally naive and amateurish observation, offered as evidence, would probably, and very sadly, be seconded by many professional ethnomusicologists, who now seem so obsessed with the notion of change that they have forgotten what the word "tradition" means.

First of all, it makes no sense to lump the practices of indigenous tribal peoples with current developments in Western society, where information can be transmitted instantaneously around the world to millions if not billions of people at a time. Second, it completely ignores all the many aspects of rap and hip-hop culture that can be seen as perpetuating very fundamental aspects of subsaharan African culture. It's even been argued that such practices constitute a revival of African traditions, as a reaction to the more Europeanized types of music that constitute the pop mainstream. As I argue in my essay, we have very good reason to believe that music, or at least certain musical traditions, are far more conservative than just about any other aspect of culture, certainly more than language. One of many reasons why it's important for anthropologists to start paying attention.