Why I Don’t Teach Global Music History

  • Tamara Levitz

Abstract

This article warns against facile or celebratory applications of global music history in teaching. Levitz critiques the treatment of global music history as a “heuristic, concept, method, or pedagogical approach,” positioning it instead as “a decentering perspective.” The article addresses the difficulty of having a shared concept of the world within musicology and unpacks this limitation through a genealogical comparison of comparative literature and musicology. Levitz then uses Shu-mei Shih’s idea of relational comparison to outline pedagogical ideas that could be applied to music or music history courses, in place of using “global music history” as a framework.

Author Biography

Tamara Levitz

Tamara Levitz is a Professor of Comparative Literature and Musicology in the Department of Comparative Literature at UCLA. For the past decade, she has researched structures of white supremacy and racial exclusion in the formation of the music disciplines in the United States. She is currently working on a monograph on Settler Colonial Humanists and the Racial Foundations of Comparison, which will engage with the history of Comparative Musicology and Comparative Literature.

Published
2023-11-02
Issue
Vol 13 No 1 (2023): Special Issue: Teaching Global Music History: Practices and Challenges
Section
Special Issue: Teaching Global Music History: Practices and Challenges

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