In this book Shepherd and Wicke make a bold and original contribution to the understanding of music as a form of human expression. They argue that music is fundamental to social life. Music is not merely a form of leisure or entertainment: it is central to the very formation and reproduction of human societies. The authors pursue this argument through a wide-ranging assessment of some of the major cultural theoretical contributions to understanding music. Theories of culture, linguistic theories, structuralist and (...) post-structuralist theories and psychoanalytic theories of music are carefully explained and critically examined. The authors then develop their own account of music as a non-referential yet material form of human expression which embodies and conveys principles of symbolic structuring. They emphasize the human body as a principal site for the musical mediation of social and symbolic processes. Music and Cultural Theory establishes new links between musicology and cultural studies, showing how each discipline can inform and enrich the other. It will be recommended reading for students and professionals in musicology, media and communication studies, cultural studies and the sociology of culture. (shrink)

he study of music in its social context has expanded rapidly over the last fifteen years, yet little of this work discusses the music itself: the processes, textures and structures of sound which so powerfully affect us as individuals. Music as Social Text d begins by analysing the forces which have made this kind of discussion difficult within the intellectual tradition of the western world. The book argues that a society in which reality is grasped in an overwhelmingly visual way (...) has difficulty with expression that is non-designative in its use of sound. Shepherd moves on to develop a framework for the social analysis of music as sound, and the way in which music can be highly individualizing at the same time as powerfully social. (shrink)

"This innovative volume argues that any particular kind of music can only be understood in terms of the criteria of the group which makes and appreciates that music. This theme is in sharp contrast to established attitudes to music which utilize 'objectively' conceived aesthetic. These attitudes are revealed in the assumptions underlying most musicology and musical aesthetics including, perhaps paradoxically, the work of a number of cultural radicals such as Lukacs and Adorno. On a more practical level, they manifest themselves (...) both in music education policies and in the policies of arts and broadcasting administrators, who have the power to promote some kinds of music above others. (shrink)

It is a current commonplace that if the concept of deity is incoherent then no significant truth-claim is made for a formula like ‘God exists’, for it is neither true nor false but meaningless. This is the problem of factual meaning on which such emphasis is laid by critics like A. Flew, R. W. Hepburn, C. B. Martin, K. Nielsen and P. Edwards. I wish here to counter their challenge.

The concept of revelation is a pivotal one, both in the study of religion in general, and with regard to Christianity in particular. Yet it is a fluid concept that has undergone notable transformations down the ages as succeeding generations have re-interpreted it in the light of fresh presuppositions which they have come to share. My purpose here is to offer a re-interpretation in the light of some contemporary presuppositions which, though not universal, are, I shall argue, sufficiently widely held, (...) sufficiently basic, and sufficiently secure, to warrant accommodation. I shall be concerned primarily, though not in principle exclusively, with the concept of revelation in a Christian context. (shrink)

In his powerful anti-Christian polemic, The Misery of Christianity , J. Kahl charges Christianity with suffering from a rock-bottom lack of identity. ‘Theologians…have been looking for a continuous thread which will lead them out of the maze of contradictory forms of Christianity…into the open. They would like to be able to say with binding force what Christianity really is.’ 1 But, he urges, they cannot. P. van Buren agrees, but sees in this no cause for concern. ‘Christianity has been changing (...) since its beginning, the religion of the past constantly being adapted to the conditions of each new present. Once we see this character of Christianity, we are released from the misconceived task of trying to identify its unchanging essence.’ 2 Again more recently J. Hick has urged, in effect half agreeing with van Buren, that although there is an unchanging element in Christianity, it is restricted to ‘the originating events from which the moving stream of christian history has flowed’. ‘Christianity is an ongoing movement of life and thought, defined by its origin in the Christ-event and by its consciousness of that origin. It cannot be defined in terms of adherence to any doctrinal standard, for its doctrines are historically and culturally conditioned and have changed as the church has entered new historical and cultural situations.’ 3. (shrink)

Despite its plurality of forms and doctrines Christianity does contain a constant religious doctrinal core based on a putative continuity between Jesus' teaching and the church's kerygma. Its elements are: 1) human salvation through divine forgiveness; 2) the fact of decisive divine intervention in history to bring us salvation; 3) acknowledgement of the role of Jesus as supreme mediator of that salvation through his ministry and teaching (but not through an atoning death); 4) possible acceptance of the Resurrection in some (...) sense. A minimal, though untraditional, Christian orthodoxy might consist of faith in God and in Jesus as Saviour (or Lord), interpreting these formulae in terms of these three or four elements. (shrink)