The public lecture series continues to discuss
various approaches and critique within the field of Transcultural Studies. It aims to pursue and deepen the four intertwined
thematic strands of ecologies, economies, histories of European imperialism and colonialism, as well as practices of critique
and resistance in image, sound, text, and translation processes which had been introduced in the spring term.
Guest
lectures will also focus on bringing together disciplines and cultures of knowing and learning that are often treated as being
separate from each other when they are not. Topics include ecology and emancipatory pedagogy, environmental history and fascism,
sound (production) and postcolonial theory, as well as critical infrastructure studies.
Next Event:19.10.2022
17 Uhr
Auditorium VZA 7
„Wie
ich höre“ – Populäre Musik und Sound Studies als repräsentationskritisches
Theorieprojekt
Guest Lecture by Prof. Dr. Johannes S. Ismaiel-Wendt
Johannes Ismaiel-Wendt argues that
popular music is postcolonial music. Whenever we listen to music, we interlace sounds, melodies, rhythms, and instrumentation
– consciously or unconsciously – with political maps of the world or maps of cultural representation. Popular music emerges
against the backdrop of colonial logics and relates to them in one way or the other. But popular music isn’t just postcolonial
background music, it also functions as overtures that either introduce colonial fantasies or open up spaces of resistance.
Before we think about complex concepts such as political theory, critiques of representational forms or transcultural formations,
Ismaiel-Wendt’s lecture tunes us in to very subtle sounds beyond all the lines spit loudly.
During the lecture and
the subsequent listening and interpretation sessions, we will listen to intros in popular music and opening tracks of albums.
A small collection of samples will be created, which we listen to according to the thesis that the very first seconds and
beats of a track – not only on the level of lyrics – are always already about determining positions somehow: „Menschen
wie wir und keine Menschen wie wir. Der Ton der VerAnderung“ (Sabine Hark 2021: 60).
