Saying it with music: a theoretical exploration of musical encoding with reference to Western art music and the songs of the Ngqoko women

Simple item page
dc.contributor.authorJankowitz, Christo
dc.date.accessioned2012-11-26T07:10:11Z
dc.date.available2012-11-26T07:10:11Z
dc.date.issued2012-11-26
dc.descriptionMA, Faculty of Humanities, University of the Witwatersrand, 2012en
dc.description.abstractThis research-report presents a theoretical exploration of musical encoding which has its basis in general semiotic theory. By examining what this reveals about the problematic and mysterious issue of music’s meaning, I argue that the most visceral and direct form of it is found in the manner in which the composer shapes a certain kind of temporal experience (erlebnis) which is engendered by the music itself. This reveals that sensations of goal-directed movement, closure, tension and release are shaped in a phenomenological way against a background of continuity that is established by metrical cyclicity and phrasal periodisation. As a result, the interpretation of certain kinds of accumulative structural effects generated by the gestural (rhythmic and melodic/harmonic) inflections of the temporal and intonational planes become meaningful in a rhetorical, affective (affekten) and topical sense. A study of Ngqoko (Xhosa) overtone-music, as a case study into African indigenous music (as opposed to the examples cited of Western art music), shows that an intensification of the relationships between pitch and rhythm that exist in speech-tone results in the formation of melody and a culturally embedded vocabulary of intonations. I argue that this resultant edifice exists in the music of most cultures and that this ultimately serves as the basis of musical encoding. Therefore musical meaning develops in ways that are completely intrinsic to music.en
dc.identifier.urihttp://hdl.handle.net/10539/12219
dc.language.isoenen_US
dc.subjectencodingen_US
dc.subjectgesture theoryen_US
dc.subjectintonationen_US
dc.subjectmusical codesen_US
dc.subjectmusic and languageen_US
dc.subjectovertone-singingen_US
dc.subjectNgqoko Women's Ensembleen_US
dc.subjectpre-linguistic speechen_US
dc.subjectrhetoricen_US
dc.subjectsemanticsen_US
dc.subjectsemioticsen_US
dc.subjectspeech-toneen_US
dc.subjectspeech-tone melodyen_US
dc.subjecttemporal theoryen_US
dc.subjecttopical theoryen_US
dc.subjectXhosa musicen_US
dc.titleSaying it with music: a theoretical exploration of musical encoding with reference to Western art music and the songs of the Ngqoko womenen
dc.typeThesisen
Files
Original bundle
Now showing 1 - 3 of 3
No Thumbnail Available
Name:
Saying it with Music- TITLE PAGE.pdf
Size:
10.74 KB
Format:
Adobe Portable Document Format
Download
No Thumbnail Available
Name:
Saying it with Music - text only with corrections 12.6.11.pdf
Size:
1.04 MB
Format:
Adobe Portable Document Format
Download
No Thumbnail Available
Name:
Saying it with Music - contents pages and abstract with corrections 12.6.11.pdf
Size:
24.29 KB
Format:
Adobe Portable Document Format
Download
License bundle
Now showing 1 - 1 of 1
No Thumbnail Available
Name:
license.txt
Size:
1.71 KB
Format:
Item-specific license agreed upon to submission
Description:
Download
Collections
ETD Collection