The Cruelty of Jazz: Toward a Hemispheric Politics of Sound

Musicology Colloquium Series

Talk Title:

 THE CRUELTY OF JAZZ: TOWARD A HEMISPHERIC POLITICS OF SOUND

Date and Time:

Thursday February 7, 2:00-3:30pm

Location:

Latin American and Iberian Institute (LAII) Conference Room

Talk Description:

Rooted in concepts of affect and Empire, this paper argues that jazz operated in various 20th century Latin American settings as a vital touchstone bearing the risks and benefits of urban modernization, hemispheric geopolitics, and transnational cultural production, “cruelly” echoing the United States’ cultural, political, and economic dominance in the hemisphere and beyond.

Biography:

Jason Borge is an Associate Professor of Latin American Culture at the University of Texas at Austin, where he teaches courses on Latin American and Hemispheric popular culture, music, film, and literature. He has published widely on such topics as vernacular music and sound studies, Hollywood in Latin America, popular vanguardism, and the intra-hemispheric dimensions of literature and film. His latest book is Tropical Riffs: Latin America and the Politics of Jazz (Duke University Press, 2018).

Caption for book cover: Tropical Riffs: Latin America and the Politics of Jazz (Duke, 2018)

  Sponsored by The University of New Mexico Department of Music, The Department of Spanish & Portuguese, and The Latin American and Iberian Institute