Abstracts - American Musicological Society

30 Thursday Afternoon: Session 1- 26–27
AMS/SEM/SMT New Orleans 2012
Session 1-26 (SEM), 1:45–3:45
Roundtable
Publishing—A Dialogue for Young Scholars
Jessica Getman (University of Michigan, Ann Arbor), Chair
Mary Francis (University of California Press), J. Lawrence Witzleben (University of Maryland),
Timothy Rice (University of California, Los Angeles), Sean Williams (Evergreen State University)
In the changing academy, publication is of increasing concern to young scholars. The academic job market increasingly relies
on a candidate’s history of publication as evidence of scholarly rigor and future success. At the same time, publication can
seem daunting or inaccessible to the uninitiated writer, and though a scholar may have significant information and insight to
share with the field, navigating the publishing process may be difficult. This roundtable addresses several concerns along these
lines, including how to write and submit a successful article or chapter proposal, how to present a successful book proposal,
how to write and mine the dissertation for successful publication, and how to best use publication to bolster the scholar’s job
search and tenure portfolio. Our panelists will address how to best prepare a paper for publication consideration and how to
contact and communicate with journal editors and acquisition editors from publishing houses. The roundtable will consider
the hallmarks of a successful abstract, article, chapter, or book, and the ways in which various media can be used to the best
effect in publication. In addition, it will consider the benefits and drawbacks of print versus digital publication. The roundtable’s
panel brings together editors from academic publishing houses and journals with professional scholars with a history of
successful publication in several formats. In so doing, it encourages a dialogue of particular benefit to aspiring ethnomusicologists,
as well as historical musicologists and music theorists.
Session 1-27 (SEM), 1:45–3:45
Repatriation and Reclamation
Lorraine Sakata (University of California, Los Angeles), Chair
Heritage Extraction: Music and Memory in a Mining Town
Bradley Hanson (Brown University)
In 2001, Howard “Louie Bluie” Armstrong, a pioneering African-American stringband musician and National Heritage Fellow,
became the center of a cultural heritage movement in LaFollette, Tennessee, the community where he was raised in the
1920s. Though a success with folk music audiences and the subject of a well-received documentary film, Armstrong had been
largely forgotten in the town he left as a young man. At age ninety-one, however, Armstrong was discovered and reintroduced
to LaFollette by a group of residents organizing a cultural and economic coalition modeled on heritage, tourism, and “pride of
place” industries. LaFollette, like many Appalachian coal mining towns, had by then earned a reputation for economic depression
and social distress. Following the coalition’s marketing efforts and public events, the community, in an extraordinary act
of collective remembering, reclaimed Armstrong and his legacy. Though he passed away in 2003 after just one celebrated return
visit, Armstrong’s legend has since inspired a thriving yearly music festival, local exhibits, and community art projects. In
his heritage afterlife, Armstrong serves as muse and brand for his former homeplace as it works toward cultural, social, artistic
and economic renewal. Drawing on interviews and field research, I will offer a critical heritage case study at the intersection
of remembering, forgetting, race, and expressive culture. Informed by the work of Laurajane Smith, Barbara Kirshenblatt-
Gimblett, and Robert Cantwell, I show how one community is making something new from something old, and building a
heritage infrastructure with complicated social engineering goals.
“Repossessing the Land”: A Spiritual Retreat with Maher Fayez and a
Movement of Coptic Charismatic Worship
Carolyn Ramzy (University of Toronto)
Over the last decade, Egyptian Coptic Christians have witnessed a vibrant surge in satellite religious programming. While
the popular Coptic Orthodox Church Channel (CTV) represents Orthodox mainstream culture, Coptic Protestant channels
such as SAT-7 present alternative views. As both feature live streaming of community worship, this paper addresses one
worship convention as it was aired for SAT-7: famous Orthodox musician, Maher Fayez’s retreat “Repossessing the Land.”
For three days, a mixed congregation of Orthodox Copts and Protestants sang Arabic devotional songs known as taratīl.
Along with these impassioned musical worship sessions, Fayez invited three Ghanaian and Nigerian guests speakers from
the Global Apostolic and Prophetic Network, an organization “dedicated to raising leaders in Africa and establishing the
presence of God in every sphere of society,” (gapnetwork.org). Their sermons not only drew on Fayez’ original themes, but