a breath of fresh air
I'm on Spring Break this week and some of what I have been doing in addition to working on a certain paper is reading current discussions about scholarship and academia. It's give me perspective that I don't always get when I'm at the daily grind, and it lets me know that other people out there are crazy, too.
An essay I read at the beginning of the week is one of the most refreshing polemics on scholarship that I have read in a very long time...if ever: "Historical Musicology: Is It Still Possible?" by Rob Wegman in The Cultural Study of Music: A Critical Introduction, edited by Martin Clayton, Trevor Herbert, and Richard Middleton (Routledge: NY and London, 2003): 136-145.
In this essay, Wegman begins by briefly summarizing the progression of historical scholarship from the 19th century ideal of obectivity, as in the goal of studying history is to see it "as it really was", to the early 20th century crisis of that ideal, realizing that our encounter with history can only be a subjective one, to the the late 20th century realization that there really is no object, such as the past, to study.
Wegman then brings in the myth of Narcissus as a poignant metaphor to the state of historical research.
Like Narcissus, or so critics remind us, we have gazed into a fountain, and have become enamored of the image reflected in its surface. The fountain, one might say, is the totality of the available historical evidence, and the image it returns is the product of our historical vision. We have wanted that image to be real, objective, autonomou, authentic, other. Like Narcissus, however, we have been frustrated in our attempts to capture the image--that is, to demonstrate its objective reality. Sooner or later we were bound to make a painful discovery. "Oh, I am he!" Narcissus cried, "now I know for sure the image is my own; it's for myself I burn with love; I fan the flames I feel." That was the moment of truth. Historical evidence, by itself, may be as real and tangible as the water in the fountain. Yet the past, as we read it into that evidence, has no objective reality, no independent existence, no autonomy, no otherness. Rather, it is always and necessarily the reflection of the viewing subject, the product of our historical imagination. That is why the Narcissus myth is of enduring relevance: it epitomizes the Western discovery of subjectivity. (pp139-40)
Wegman outlines possible reactions to this discovery: pain over the lost past, indignation over the past that failed us, the feeling of incrimination by our subjectivity, all like Narcissus upon his own self-discovery. And in a vicious cycle, critics, he says, will attempt to escape the prison of subjectivity by trying objectify other things than the past, e.g. other cultures, or by trying criticize to death musicological endeavor by exposing it for what it really is, hegemonic, positivist, modernist, etc. But what they end up with are not new things, but the same old self staring out them from the fountain.
Rather than leaving us in the depressing situation he has set up, though, Wegman finishes with a very refreshing conclusion:
And I'll quote directly the last two paragraphs:
Sill, I doubt that narcissism is necessarily the problem here. Nor, for that matter, are Western hegemony, positivism, objectivism, modernism, metaphysics, essentialism, reification, and all the rest. the real issue probably lies elsewhere. Let me put it quite bluntly: if we cannot accept that we are fallible human beings, that everything we do will always have its problems, then historical musicology will indeed be possible no longer. To put it even more bluntly: There is a certain arrogance in depreciating a worthwhile endeavor, in this case historical musicology, merely because we cannot attain perfection in it. Narcissism may be a human weakness, but instead of excoriating it for that reason, we might learn to live with it. True, narcissistic history may potentially trap us in delusion. Yet the fiction of a "real" past has undeniable heuristic value, and may well bring out the best in us--our historical imagination, for instance, or our subjectivity, or excitement, or yes, our love.What, exactly, have we become afraid of? We know that there is no real past, that there are no real others of whom we could be unworthy. The only world that is real is the one we live in today. History adds a rich dimension to that world. If we are in danger of being unworthy of anything or anyone, it is probably our readers--real others, whom we may perplex with our scholarly angst, annoy with our narcissistic self-torment, and exasperate with our defensive theorizing. It is only the paralyzing fear to take human risks that might render historical musicology impossible. Or rather, perhaps, it is the fear that we may not be forgiven for our failings. Yet we cannot ask anyone's forgiveness if we are unable to forgive ourselves, and the scholars who worked before us. That, I suspect, may be the hardest of all: to find it in our hearts to understand and accept those failings--before we blame them on the discipline, and critique it out of business altogether.
Why do I feel like I'm not in Kansas anymore? Hello, is this scholarship we're talking about here!? Wow. It's stuff like this that makes me think perhaps I actually can crack open the books another day.