ABSTRACT

The role of the mobile phone among people on the move has featured in several disciplinary discussions in recent years, but it remains relatively neglected by ethnomusicology. Exploring the gap, this article draws observations from Media and Communications Studies, Migration Studies and Anthropology to bear on a participatory music education project that the author led among unaccompanied migrating minors in Sicily 2017–2019. It interrogates the ethics of music research among migrant communities particularly when it involves participatory work such as performing, recording and publishing music. It also examines how Africans are caught up in, and negotiate, the racist colonial legacies that continue to inform musical consumption in Italy. The central arguments of the article are that mobile phones empower participants in their day-to-day lives and music-making, but have complex social consequences; and that within a macro socio-economic sphere, phones link participants ever more tightly and more powerfully into the historical chain of mass production that is exploiting humanity and the environment. Ethnomusicologists would do well to turn their attention more critically towards phones and related audio technologies, and reflect on the very deep socio-political entanglement in which all our networked lives – migratory or settled – are caught.

摘要

近年来，移动电话在移动人群中的作用已成为一些学科讨论的重点，但它仍然被民族音乐学相对忽视。为了探索这一差距，本文借鉴了媒体和传播研究、移民研究和人类学的观察结果，以支持作者在 2017-2019 年在西西里岛无人陪伴的移民未成年人中领导的参与式音乐教育项目。它质疑移民社区的音乐研究伦理，特别是当它涉及表演、录制和出版音乐等参与性工作时。它还研究了非洲人如何陷入并谈判继续影响意大利音乐消费的种族主义殖民遗产。文章的中心论点是，手机赋予参与者日常生活和音乐创作的能力，但会产生复杂的社会后果；在宏观社会经济领域，手机将参与者更紧密、更有力地连接到大规模生产的历史链条中，该链条正在剥削人类和环境。民族音乐学家最好将他们的注意力更加批判性地转向电话和相关音频技术，并反思我们所有网络生活——迁徙或定居——都陷入的非常深刻的社会政治纠葛。手机将参与者更紧密、更有力地连接到正在开发人类和环境的大规模生产的历史链条中。民族音乐学家最好将他们的注意力更加批判性地转向电话和相关音频技术，并反思我们所有网络生活——迁徙或定居——都陷入的非常深刻的社会政治纠葛。手机将参与者更紧密、更有力地连接到正在开发人类和环境的大规模生产的历史链条中。民族音乐学家最好将他们的注意力更加批判性地转向电话和相关音频技术，并反思我们所有网络生活——迁徙或定居——都陷入的非常深刻的社会政治纠葛。