Groove Theory: A Vamp on the Epistemology of Funk

Abstract

When asked to define funk, George Clinton once said, If it makes you shake your rump, it's funk.1 At most basic level, term signifies honesty and beauty of expression at depths of human emotion. As such, funk comprises secular counterpart of the spirit-what Albert Murray calls paroxysms of ecstasy-in black church worship. Writing about James Brown, musicologist Teresa L. Reed makes an observation that is applicable to funk music generally. She states that music captures soulful spontaneity of Sanctified church and animated exhortation of Sanctified preacher. [The music] also emulates and incites an emotional intensity parallel to Holy Spirit possession that is a trademark of Sanctified worship service.2 Teddy Pendergrass makes a similar point in his memoir Truly Blessed. Recall- ing his childhood experiences in what he described as a rock-'em, sock-'em, sanctified, feel-the-Spirit church, Pendergrass said, We talk today about innovations in rhythm made great jazz musicians and pioneers James Brown, but truth is, they had nothing on a congregation going full force in praise of Lord.3 The musicologist Guthrie P. Ramsey, Jr. echoes Pendergrass's statement in his recollection of his experiences as a member of Sanctified Band in Chicago. According to Ramsey, was watchword . . . God liked funky. Funky ministered to people.4 Of course, black churches have always functioned as training repositories for black musicians, but frenzy and kinetic expression associated with holiness churches played a disproportionate role in funk music. These churches emphasized Africanist worship styles, and funk music showcased many of aesthetic sensibilities and epistemological principles that were central to their worship styles. Hence, jazz/funk guitarist James Blood Ulmer entitled his 1980 composition Jazz Is Teacher (Funk Preacher). Similarly, on initial recording of Papa's Got A Brand New Bag, Godfather of Soul can be heard saying that he feels like preaching.5 And Lyn Collins, who sang with Brown, was nicknamed Mama Feelgood and female preacher. Her comments regarding conceptual approach to Think (About It), which was a funkified womanist manifesto, typify spirituality of funk music. Seconds before Collins's recording, Brown told her, [W]ait, Miss Collins. . . . [W]hen you're talkin' to women, I don't want you to just talk. I want you to do that gospel thang. You know, I want you to tell 'em, I want you to preach to 'em. . . .6Introduction: Kinesis, Cognition, and Constructions of FunkMost discussions of funk music emphasize ideological relationships with Black Power Movement and musical innovations that establish conceptual foundations for subsequent forms such as Afro beat and hip hop. But while such approaches are vital to understanding larger significance of funk genre, they often overshadow psychosomatic construct known as funk. In this essay, I argue that funk/spirit-or, more simply, funk-operates as a distinct form of black vernacular epistemology. Though often mischaracter- ized as a lack of rationality, quasi-electric sensation that Clinton calls pleasure principle should be understood as an alternative form of rationality. Poet-critic Nathaniel Mackey touches on this alterity in an interview with Paul Taylor. Responding to a question about importance of mystical traditions in his writings, Mackey states that by juxtaposing mystical to reason as you do you're giving it status and scope of an alternative reason, much same way in which Pascal, in that famous formulation of his, writes of heart having reasons that reason knows nothing about. So we're talking about a rec- ognition, even within Western tradition, of limits of reason, a recognition of other ways of knowing, multiple ways of knowing.7 Naturally, prevailing notions of epistemology, which are based on mind/body split promulgated conventional notions of Christian philosophy, forecloses possibility that sensuality is involved in production of knowledge, that thinking can be both sensual and abstract. …