Thomas Turino’s Music and Social Life is intended as a textbook for introductory world music courses, and thus situates itself within the storied company of other books of this genre. It distinguishes itself from its kin in two important ways. First is its conceptual orientation: Turino provides a workable survey of ethnomusicological theory, focusing on performance theory, semiotics, and social theory. From there, he examines five in-depth case studies that he uses to illustrate the themes that run throughout the book. Music and Social Life thus is to be distinguished from surveys of world music whose chief organization is by geography and musical style.

His second ambition pertains to the experience of contemporary students in world music courses. Post-millennial students bring to universities deep concerns about the world they inherit. Turino believes that music has a significant role to play in twenty-first-century life, and his book gathers ideas relevant to that role as it explores the way various societies experience social life through music. So, again, his book seeks departure from texts that observe the music of others, instead drawing from world music realms to relate to the concerns his students face today.

Turino establishes a conceptual orientation that carries through the sequence of in-depth examples. The aim is to conceive of music as a unitary art form and to provide students a series of models by which to recognize and understand music as broadly conceived. Chief among these is the distinction between cultural formations and cultural cohorts. Cultural formations are the primary models for socialization, the social grouping based on the pervasiveness and time-depth of widely-shared habits.

Cultural cohorts, in contrast, are guided by habits that are emphasized or selected and that form the basis for identity. There is a close correspondence of cultural cohorts to what in folklore are identified as folk groups; likewise, cultural formations correspond loosely to what we know as tradition. Turino aims to get students to "start to really internalize fundamentals of different value systems, priorities, and habits that underlie those styles of music making and styles of life" (227). Thus his conceptual system is designed to neutralize the tendency of ethnomusicology to exoticize and distance the very musical forms it values.

To model musical performance, Turino identifies four fields of music-making. The most prominent are the paired fields, participatory and presentational performance. Some of the attention devoted to these fields is geared toward divesting students of biases associated with staged musical performance. But it also incorporates robust arenas of discussion, such as the formation of community, the spatial organization of performance, and musical competence.

The other two fields pertain to technology. High-fidelity recording addresses the role of recorded musical performance. In one prominent case study, Turino explores the role of recordings in Zimbabwe, such as the use of high-fidelity sound to incorporate indigenous music into national symbol. The last musical field, studio audio art, challenges preconceived notions of the way music is produced.

Although many world music forms are mentioned, Turino focuses on five case studies whose differences illuminate the concepts introduced in the early chapters. Shona music formations in Zimbabwe, Aymara music in Peru, and old-time music in the U.S. With the Shona, the interaction of indigenous and Western forms and also of different social classes fosters a rich discussion of musical cosmopolitanism, nationalism, and concert performance. Aymara music features participatory performance, virtuosity, and improvisation. In old-time music, the particular cohort he examines provides the basis for discussing identity formation, authenticity, community, and flow.

The most compelling cases are saved for the end and address the role of music in social change. Turino recounts the intense camaraderie and spirit of resistance in the U.S. civil rights movement when music formed the basis for social protest. Then, turning to an opposite example, he explores the use of music in the rise of Nazism in interwar Germany as well as its use as social control during Nazi rule.

These examples are a prelude to the closing discussion of the U.S. college students who populate world music courses today. Turino believes students come to universities seeking meaningful solutions to the problems their generation faces now and in the future. Prevailing musical styles form a component of the dominant cultural formation, so learning about musical difference provides students tools for imagining alternatives to the dominant cultural paradigm. Moreover, small-scale cultural cohorts provide the basis for alternative values and, ultimately, for social change.

The book’s main shortcomings are transparent and pertain to its ambition as a purveyor of ethnomusicological concepts and not as a comprehensive and balanced survey of world music forms. I am convinced, however, that this sacrifice is worthwhile. In focusing on in-depth examples, Turino provides firmer ground for challenging the biases students bring to world music courses.

There is also, in presenting cultural cohorts as instruments of solidarity, a bias towards social consensus. Whereas cultural formations are habits that form a baseline from which we select and manipulate identity, Turino’s cohorts constitute a refuge of consonance. Some readers will object to this depiction not only because cohorts are messier groups than Turino describes—with competing loyalties, internal conflicts, and systems of bias or oppression—but also because of consensus implications of music-making itself.

Music and Social Life is packaged with an accompanying CD that includes example tracks from the book’s chief case studies. It is available in both cloth and paper, and the paper edition is modestly priced. An annotated discography provides a useful catalog of recordings available in the U.S. for further exploration in the styles of music discussed in the book.

--------

[Review length: 926 words • Review posted on February 9, 2011]