Abstract

Songs of Social Protest is a comprehensive, cutting-edge companion guide to music and social protest globally. Bringing together established and emerging scholars from a range of fields, it explores a wide range of examples of, and contexts for, songs and their performance that have been deployed as part of local, regional and global social protest movements, both in historical and contemporary times. Topics covered include:

• Aesthetics
• Authenticity
• African American Music
• Anti-capitalism
• Community & Collective Movements
• Counter-hegemonic Discourses
• Critical Pedagogy
• Folk Music
• Identity
• Memory
• Performance
• Popular Culture

Encompassing nuanced historical-political-economic contextualizations and detailed ethnographic, socio-musicological analysis, this comprehensive book offers new and critical perspectives on genres already associated with protest alongside explorations of rich music traditions which may not be readily familiar to Western readers interested in protest movements and song. By placing historical approaches alongside cutting-edge ethnography, philosophical excursions alongside socio-political and economic perspectives, and cultural context alongside detailed, musicological, textual, and performance analysis, Songs of Social Protest offers a dynamic resource for scholars and students exploring song and singing as a form of protest.
Music has a unique power. But why and how can music develop such an energy that public articulation of protest is almost unthinkable without it? Whether American 1960s folk music or Indian activist movements in the new millenium – this unique collection dissects the interconnections of music and political articulation from any possible perspetive. The findings are globally more relevant than ever.
Britta Sweers, Professor of Cultural Anthropology of Music at the University of Bern
From the outset the coverage of Songs of Social Protest is exciting and comprehensive. It brings to life the social, cultural and personal engagement of popular music across genres and historical periods. The book evokes the power of social struggle and the passion of musical artists who want to change the social world.
Shane Blackman, Professor of Cultural Studies at Canterbury Christ Church University
Songs of Social Protest is unprecedented in its international and multidisciplinary scope. It questions any single definition of the protest song, considering sound and performance as well as lyrics. It grounds the agency of songs in social movements, organizations, socialism, feminism and the politics of self-determination. Anyone asking the question ‘Where have all the protest songs gone?’ should start here.
Nabeel Zuberi, Associate Professor in the Department of Media and Communication at the University of Auckland
To hear the songs of social protest in this remarkable volume is to discover renewed purpose in a world whose ideals are now at greatest risk. These are the songs of local struggle and the voices of the global collective, calling us to action and sounding the ways to endow music with power in our own day and beyond.
Philip V. Bohlman, Mary Werkman Distinguished Service Professor of Music and the Humanities, The University of Chicago
Aileen Dillane is a Lecturer at the Irish World Academy of Music and Dance, University of Limerick, Ireland.

Martin J Power is a Lecturer in Sociology at the University of Limerick, Ireland.

Eoin Devereux is a Professor of Sociology at the University of Limerick, Ireland.

Amanda Haynes is a Senior Lecturer in Sociology at the University of Limerick.