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Articles 1 - 6 of 6
Full-Text Articles in Asian Studies
Changes In Identity: How Mongolian Musicians And Performers Have Responded To Geopolitical Transition, Heather Cook
Changes In Identity: How Mongolian Musicians And Performers Have Responded To Geopolitical Transition, Heather Cook
Independent Study Project (ISP) Collection
During Mongolia’s socialist period, traditional forms of Mongolian music were deliberately altered as the government, heavily influenced by the Soviet Union, attempted to modernize Mongolian culture. Throughout this period, traditional instruments were modified, the types of music that could be performed were strictly censored, and the structure of performances was set to strictly mimic those of Western orchestras. After Mongolia’s Democratic Revolution of 1990, the artistic freedom of Mongolian musicians has greatly increased, but even now, socialist cultural policies are deeply intertwined with Mongolian musical culture. Why is this the case? What is the common perception among performers about the …
Beyond Exile: The Ramayana As A Living Narrative Among Indo-Fijians In Fiji And New Zealand, Kevin Miller
Beyond Exile: The Ramayana As A Living Narrative Among Indo-Fijians In Fiji And New Zealand, Kevin Miller
Kevin C. Miller
Drawing on the themes of collective memory, cultural ideologies, and narrative constructions, this chapter proposes to examine the narrative of the Ramayana epic, its exegesis through performance, and its continued relevance to identity formation among Indo-Fijian Hindus both within Fiji and its Pacific Rim diaspora. Based on the recasting of the “twice-migrated” Indo-Fijian as the “twice-banished” by certain observers, we might expect the meaning of the Ramayana in the lives of Indo-Fijian Hindus in New Zealand to shift towards the theme of Rama’s exile, just as it did for the indentured laborers who made the original journey to Fiji. Nevertheless, …
Imagining Sri Lanka, Derick Kirishan Ariyam
Imagining Sri Lanka, Derick Kirishan Ariyam
Master's Theses, Dissertations, Graduate Research and Major Papers Overview
Analyzes the works of three Sri Lankan expatriates, the writers, Shyam Selvadurai and Michael Ondaatje, and the artist, M.I.A., giving particular attention to Selvadurai's Funny Boy and Ondaatje's Running in the Family, Anil's Ghost, and The Cinnamon Peeler. Though all three have been charged as "inauthentic" due to their dislocated positions, uncovers the various productive and complicated ways Sri Lanka has been configured by those outside its shores.
Ideology, Social Commentary And Resistance In Popular Music: A Case Study Of Singapore, Phua Siew Chye, Lily Kong
Ideology, Social Commentary And Resistance In Popular Music: A Case Study Of Singapore, Phua Siew Chye, Lily Kong
Research Collection School of Social Sciences
Popular music as a site of struggles over meaning is focused upon, where the social and political relations between different groups in Singapore society are mirrored. How ruling elites and everyday people make use of the same cultural form--popular music--for different purposes is examined.
Making "Music At The Margins"? A Social And Cultural Analysis Of Xinyao In Singapore, Lily Kong
Making "Music At The Margins"? A Social And Cultural Analysis Of Xinyao In Singapore, Lily Kong
Research Collection School of Social Sciences
Formalist critics and aestheticians have argued that music does not possess any kind of "extra-musical" significance, that there is no meaning beyond the form and structural relations of the notes. For them, music exemplifies the laws of mathematical harmony and proportion rather than the social and political contexts within which it is produced, reproduced and consumed. This view has been challenged by a number of social theorists: Max Weber, Theodor Adorno and Edward Said have all argued for an understanding of music within its social, cultural, economic and political contexts. Such analysis of popular music is now unquestioned. Indeed, it …
Popular Music And A Sense Of Place In Singapore, Lily Kong
Popular Music And A Sense Of Place In Singapore, Lily Kong
Research Collection School of Social Sciences
This paper illustrates how popular music written, produced, and performed by Singaporeans provides a means through which the culture and society of Singapore may be understood. Music with English language text conveys a sense of place and reflects a distinctively Singaporean spirit and identity. The paper examines four themes: the portrayal of Singapore's multiracial population which reflects a unique cultural synthesis; the Singaporeans' concept of urbanity, manifested as the simultaneous attraction and repulsion towards the city and the desire for nature and the rustic; the distinctive social engineering in Singapore; and the way in which global issues are imported into …