New Books in Communications

Mark Anthony Neal, "Black Ephemera: The Crisis and Challenge of the Musical Archive" (NYU Press, 2022)


Listen Later

We are living in an era of unprecedented access to popular culture: contemporary digital infrastructure provides anyone with an internet connection access to a dizzying array of cultural objects past and present, which mingle and connect in fascinating, bizarre and sometimes troubling ways. 

In Black Ephemera: The Crisis and Challenge of the Musical Archive (NYU Press, 2022), Mark Anthony Neal considers the opportunities and challenges that this vast archive represents for Black American culture, with a particular focus on music and sound. He suggests that despite the profusion of what he terms ‘Black big data’ and the supposed democratisation of access this entails, the contemporary moment is characterised by a profound amnesia and an absence of attention to the dense web of connections that bind the analogue past with the digital present. Black Ephemera seeks to at once draw out and ‘mystify’ these links, by attending to recordings, historical moments and archival projects which have often been neglected in other studies of Black music. Neal’s explorations have a wide historical scope and operate simultaneously in microscopic and conjunctural registers. The book includes analyses of legendary Memphis record label Stax, the place of Aretha Franklin and Mavin Gaye’s overlooked early recordings in/as the Great American Songbook, the use of musical citation to try and combat the erasure of Black women’s experience from the historical archive, and the significance of archival ephemera to Black mourning practices from Pattie LaBelle to Kendrick Lamar.

We cover a lot of music in this episode, and there’s even more in the book! A good place to start might be with two mixes made in response to Black Ephemera, which you can listen to here and here.

Gummo Clare is a PhD researcher in the School of Media and Communications, University of Leeds.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/communications

...more
View all episodesView all episodes
Download on the App Store

New Books in CommunicationsBy Marshall Poe

  • 4.8
  • 4.8
  • 4.8
  • 4.8
  • 4.8

4.8

6 ratings


More shows like New Books in Communications

View all
All In The Mind by ABC listen

All In The Mind

756 Listeners

New Books in History by Marshall Poe

New Books in History

209 Listeners

New Books in Psychoanalysis by Marshall Poe

New Books in Psychoanalysis

193 Listeners

New Books in Military History by Marshall Poe

New Books in Military History

162 Listeners

New Books in African American Studies by New Books Network

New Books in African American Studies

161 Listeners

New Books in Biography by Marshall Poe

New Books in Biography

77 Listeners

New Books in Science by New Books Network

New Books in Science

13 Listeners

New Books in Philosophy by New Books Network

New Books in Philosophy

110 Listeners

New Books in Native American Studies by Marshall Poe

New Books in Native American Studies

104 Listeners

The LRB Podcast by The London Review of Books

The LRB Podcast

293 Listeners

New Books in American Studies by New Books Network

New Books in American Studies

29 Listeners

New Books in Intellectual History by New Books Network

New Books in Intellectual History

61 Listeners

No Such Thing As A Fish by No Such Thing As A Fish

No Such Thing As A Fish

4,858 Listeners

The New Yorker Radio Hour by WNYC Studios and The New Yorker

The New Yorker Radio Hour

6,670 Listeners

Mike Birbiglia's Working It Out by Mike Birbiglia

Mike Birbiglia's Working It Out

4,535 Listeners

Blocks w/ Neal Brennan by Neal Brennan

Blocks w/ Neal Brennan

1,283 Listeners

Fabriken by UR – Utbildningsradion

Fabriken

0 Listeners