“This year there were 16 submissions, which represented a remarkably wide range of topics, methodologies, and approaches within contemporary ethnomusicology. The overall quality was very good, and several papers stood out for quite different reasons - some for their ethnographic richness, others for theoretical or methodological innovation, and others for the particularly successful relationship between fieldwork and wider disciplinary questions.”

Upatyaka Dutta (University of Toronto)

“Sounding Kāmjāri: Maintaining and Subverting Plantation Logics in Assam’s Tea Plantations”

This paper stands out for its rich ethnographic material, original approach, and compelling exploration of the relationship between sound, labour, colonial power, and everyday forms of resistance. Its discussion of the kāmjāri genre is particularly significant. Through careful attention to calls and practices of listening and sounding, the author demonstrates how plantation logics are maintained and reproduced through sound, while also showing how these same sonic practices can become forms of everyday resistance. The combination of detailed fieldwork with a wider historical and social perspective makes this an especially strong contribution.

 

“Soundwalking as an Ethnographic Method: Sonic Affect in Istanbul’s Nightlife”

This paper offers an innovative methodological approach through its use of participatory soundwalking as a form of ethnographic research. It responds creatively to a fundamental question: Where does ethnomusicological fieldwork take place? Its particular strength lies in extending ethnomusicological enquiry beyond the musical event or nightclub into the surrounding urban environment, showing how musical experience is shaped by streets, movement, memory, feelings of safety and insecurity, and wider socio-political conditions. By combining soundwalking, interviews, autoethnography, and participant discussion, the author also enables participants to contribute actively to the production of ethnographic knowledge.

 

Kate Adams (SOAS, University of London)
 

“Sounding Out S/M/Othering: Rethinking Temporal & Musical Presence with People with Learning Disabilities”

 

This paper presents its subject in a highly innovative and original way, addressing an important question: Who can make music and communicate musically? Focusing on people with profound intellectual and multiple disabilities (PIMD), whose forms of communication extend beyond speech, the author pays particular attention to questions of time and temporality. Extensive fieldwork gives the research considerable depth, while the concept of “s/m/othering” provides an original framework for understanding these musical encounters. The paper combines sensitive and reflexive ethnography with strong ethical awareness and successfully brings together disability theory, temporality, and musical practice.

 

Prof. Razia Sultanova (Cambridge Muslim College) (Chair), Dr Vanessa Paloma Elbaz (Cambridge University), and Dr Jasmina Talam (Sarajevo Academy of Music).

 

And huge congratulations to Upatyaka, and to Günseli and Kate!

2025    Daniel Lee

2024    Rose Campion and Sheyda Ghavami (Honourable Mention to Jim Hickson)

2023    Ivan Mouraviev (Honourable Mentions to Pantea Armanfar and María del Mar Ocaña Guzmán)

2022    Caetano Maschio Santos (Honourable Mention to Rowan Hawitt)

2021    Dunya Habash

2020    [Annual Conference postponed - no competition]

2019    Vicky Tadros

2017    Hamidreza Salehyar

2016    Esbjörn Wettermark

2015    Cassandre Balosso-Bardin, Deirdre Morgan (joint winners)