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Mbira - the musical tradition of the Shona in Zimbabwe
Šolcová, Magdalena ; Matoušek, Vlastislav (advisor) ; Slavický, Milan (referee)
In the traditional music of the Shona in Zimbabwe we often encounter a musical instrument called mbira. Throughout the country, it occurs in various forms. Generally speaking, it is a small instrument which consists of number of flat and flared metal strips (lamellae) fastened to a wooden board with a rod secured behind the board with a wire or nuts and bolts. It is held in two hands and played by plucking the reeds by thumbs and index fingers. The present study primarily aims to introduce the Shona musical tradition and the instrument mbira in both organological and anthropological points of view. In my description, I particularly concentrate on the type mbira dzaVadzimu, which plays an important role in the Shona religious ceremonies. The analytical part of my thesis deals chiefly with the rhythmic-harmonic structure of mbira pieces. In appendix, I show a set of mbira music transcriptions in my own variant of tablature and photo documentation taken during my study stay in South Africa. The basic sources of my information are my own experiences from southern Africa (mainly the personal contact with the Shona mbirists) and the literature listed at the end of the thesis. The ethnic group now classified as "Shona" originated from Bantu settlement of the high fertile plateau between the Limpopo and Zambezi...
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The Asian department's musical instrument collection of the Náprstek Museum of Prague from an ethnoorganological point of view
Friedl, Marián ; Matoušek, Vlastislav (advisor) ; Havlík, Jaromír (referee)
My theses The Asian department's musical instrument collection of the Náprstek Museum of Prague167 from an ethnoorganological point of view deal with several topics in seven parts: 1. The first part describes the evolution of the ethnomusicological thinking and also the thinking about musical instruments and classification in organology. This part is also aimed to reveal the interrelations between cultural anthropology, ethnomusicology, ethnoorganology and classificatory organology. 2. A specific classification based on Hornbostel-Sachs systematik is shown and explained here as a basis for one part of musical instrument's description in the Náprstek Museum's computer database. 3. How to work with the museum's computer software, how the describing terms from part 2 are used in the database and how they can help us while working with instruments, these topics are included here. 4. In part four we can find numerical and graphical evaluation of the content of collection based on work with the museum's computer software and the describing system devised for this purpose. 5. This part offers basic organographical description of the musical instruments formerly long-lastingly exhibited. (Since 2001 floods whole collection unapproachable.) 6. The Chinese instrumental ensemble and genre Jiangnan sizhu is depicted...
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Journey of Mantra from India to the Czech Republic: Contribution to Ethnography of Music and Globalization
Seidlová, Veronika ; Jurková, Zuzana (advisor) ; Stavělová, Daniela (referee) ; Matoušek, Vlastislav (referee)
This PhD thesis is a multi-sited ethnographical study (Marcus 1995) of globalized world through focusing on the social life (Appadurai 1986) of one of the well-known Vedic mantras (the Gayatri Mantra) as a globalized phenomenon and a commodity. Chanting of mantras (Hindu sacred chants in Vedic Sanskrit; pronunciation, intonation and rhythm of which is prohibited to change in the Brahmanic discourse) which had been a local cultural practice, has become a globally known phenomenon. During the globalizing process of their cultural transmission from India to the West and later to the Czech Republic, the mantras have gained new sound forms, new social and cultural contexts, new functions and new meanings. Contemporary cultural productions of mantras are a thick example how the present inter-continental connectedness works in everyday life, music and in the relationship to the Sacred. Selected places on this trajectory will be sites of the fieldwork. The project will research, how the transmission process happens, what music forms it takes, and what meanings are attached to them by their agents.
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Viennese Czechs and their music in the 21st century from an ethnomusicological perspective
Skořepová, Zita ; Jurková, Zuzana (advisor) ; Matoušek, Vlastislav (referee) ; Bittnerová, Dana (referee)
Around 1900, Vienna became the city with the greatest number of Czech-language speakers. Members of the Czech minority founded important community institutions and engaged in a wide range of cultural activities - music among them. The most important markers characterizing the contemporary Czech minority in Vienna are (1) several variously motivated and differently politically determined waves of voluntary, but also involuntary, migration, (2) presence of descendants of those Czechs who stayed on the territory of the former Austro-Hungarian Empire, and (3) coexistence of several generations and groups of people with different political orientation and attitudes towards integration into Austrian society. At present, the Czech Viennese minority is a heterogeneous community with different "culture cohorts". Using fieldwork, thus the participant observation of musical events together with the semi- structured interviews and combining the theoretical perspectives of ethnomusicology and diaspora studies, this dissertation deals with the three interrelated questions: How do the musical creativity and participation at musical events reflect the heterogeneity of the contemporary Czech Viennese minority? How does the migrant situation determine the creativity, respectively the participation at musical events? And how...
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Czech-Balkan counterpoint: Ethnography of the phenomenon Balkan music in Prague
Libánská, Alena ; Jurková, Zuzana (advisor) ; Matoušek, Vlastislav (referee) ; Skořepová, Zita (referee)
This Ph.D. thesis deals with the musical phenomenon Balkan music in Prague. The so- called Balkan music (in the sense of Shelemay's 2006 soundscape) is considered to be the result of social negotiating (counterpoint) between the agents, i.e., the Czech musicians and audience, and also those (musicians and audience) who originally come from the Balkan countries. Using the tools of ethnographic research, the thesis explores the nature of this relationship. Specifically, I focus on the very creation of the concept Balkan music in the Czech scene and the role the Balkan migration plays in its formation. It turns out that the very imagination of the 'Balkans' plays a key role in defining the phenomenon, and the form of music itself is the result of the imaginations of (an imaginary) milieu (i.e., stereotypes) that is perceived as culturally distant (Todorova 2009).
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Mbira - the musical tradition of the Shona in Zimbabwe
Šolcová, Magdalena ; Matoušek, Vlastislav (advisor) ; Slavický, Milan (referee)
In the traditional music of the Shona in Zimbabwe we often encounter a musical instrument called mbira. Throughout the country, it occurs in various forms. Generally speaking, it is a small instrument which consists of number of flat and flared metal strips (lamellae) fastened to a wooden board with a rod secured behind the board with a wire or nuts and bolts. It is held in two hands and played by plucking the reeds by thumbs and index fingers. The present study primarily aims to introduce the Shona musical tradition and the instrument mbira in both organological and anthropological points of view. In my description, I particularly concentrate on the type mbira dzaVadzimu, which plays an important role in the Shona religious ceremonies. The analytical part of my thesis deals chiefly with the rhythmic-harmonic structure of mbira pieces. In appendix, I show a set of mbira music transcriptions in my own variant of tablature and photo documentation taken during my study stay in South Africa. The basic sources of my information are my own experiences from southern Africa (mainly the personal contact with the Shona mbirists) and the literature listed at the end of the thesis. The ethnic group now classified as "Shona" originated from Bantu settlement of the high fertile plateau between the Limpopo and Zambezi...
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The Asian department's musical instrument collection of the Náprstek Museum of Prague from an ethnoorganological point of view
Friedl, Marian ; Matoušek, Vlastislav (advisor) ; Havlík, Jaromír (referee)
My theses The Asian department's musical instrument collection of the Náprstek Museum of Prague167 from an ethnoorganological point of view deal with several topics in seven parts: 1. The first part describes the evolution of the ethnomusicological thinking and also the thinking about musical instruments and classification in organology. This part is also aimed to reveal the interrelations between cultural anthropology, ethnomusicology, ethnoorganology and classificatory organology. 2. A specific classification based on Hornbostel-Sachs systematik is shown and explained here as a basis for one part of musical instrument's description in the Náprstek Museum's computer database. 3. How to work with the museum's computer software, how the describing terms from part 2 are used in the database and how they can help us while working with instruments, these topics are included here. 4. In part four we can find numerical and graphical evaluation of the content of collection based on work with the museum's computer software and the describing system devised for this purpose. 5. This part offers basic organographical description of the musical instruments formerly long-lastingly exhibited. (Since 2001 floods whole collection unapproachable.) 6. The Chinese instrumental ensemble and genre Jiangnan sizhu is depicted...
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|
|
Czech-Balkan counterpoint: Ethnography of the phenomenon Balkan music in Prague
Libánská, Alena ; Jurková, Zuzana (advisor) ; Matoušek, Vlastislav (referee) ; Skořepová, Zita (referee)
This Ph.D. thesis deals with the musical phenomenon Balkan music in Prague. The so- called Balkan music (in the sense of Shelemay's 2006 soundscape) is considered to be the result of social negotiating (counterpoint) between the agents, i.e., the Czech musicians and audience, and also those (musicians and audience) who originally come from the Balkan countries. Using the tools of ethnographic research, the thesis explores the nature of this relationship. Specifically, I focus on the very creation of the concept Balkan music in the Czech scene and the role the Balkan migration plays in its formation. It turns out that the very imagination of the 'Balkans' plays a key role in defining the phenomenon, and the form of music itself is the result of the imaginations of (an imaginary) milieu (i.e., stereotypes) that is perceived as culturally distant (Todorova 2009).
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Journey of Mantra from India to the Czech Republic: Contribution to Ethnography of Music and Globalization
Seidlová, Veronika ; Jurková, Zuzana (advisor) ; Stavělová, Daniela (referee) ; Matoušek, Vlastislav (referee)
This PhD thesis is a multi-sited ethnographical study (Marcus 1995) of globalized world through focusing on the social life (Appadurai 1986) of one of the well-known Vedic mantras (the Gayatri Mantra) as a globalized phenomenon and a commodity. Chanting of mantras (Hindu sacred chants in Vedic Sanskrit; pronunciation, intonation and rhythm of which is prohibited to change in the Brahmanic discourse) which had been a local cultural practice, has become a globally known phenomenon. During the globalizing process of their cultural transmission from India to the West and later to the Czech Republic, the mantras have gained new sound forms, new social and cultural contexts, new functions and new meanings. Contemporary cultural productions of mantras are a thick example how the present inter-continental connectedness works in everyday life, music and in the relationship to the Sacred. Selected places on this trajectory will be sites of the fieldwork. The project will research, how the transmission process happens, what music forms it takes, and what meanings are attached to them by their agents.
|
|
|
Viennese Czechs and their music in the 21st century from an ethnomusicological perspective
Skořepová, Zita ; Jurková, Zuzana (advisor) ; Matoušek, Vlastislav (referee) ; Bittnerová, Dana (referee)
Around 1900, Vienna became the city with the greatest number of Czech-language speakers. Members of the Czech minority founded important community institutions and engaged in a wide range of cultural activities - music among them. The most important markers characterizing the contemporary Czech minority in Vienna are (1) several variously motivated and differently politically determined waves of voluntary, but also involuntary, migration, (2) presence of descendants of those Czechs who stayed on the territory of the former Austro-Hungarian Empire, and (3) coexistence of several generations and groups of people with different political orientation and attitudes towards integration into Austrian society. At present, the Czech Viennese minority is a heterogeneous community with different "culture cohorts". Using fieldwork, thus the participant observation of musical events together with the semi- structured interviews and combining the theoretical perspectives of ethnomusicology and diaspora studies, this dissertation deals with the three interrelated questions: How do the musical creativity and participation at musical events reflect the heterogeneity of the contemporary Czech Viennese minority? How does the migrant situation determine the creativity, respectively the participation at musical events? And how...
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