On Two Traditions of Black Music Research

Abstract

If we accept a simple dictionary definition of research as a diligent and systematic inquiry into a subject, then there is reason to place special value on black music research done by Afro-Americans themselves. Black American scholars who study black music can claim a share of common experience with the musicians they study. Both, after all, belong to an ethnic group that in the United States has diligently and systematically been singled out for distinctive social treatment. Experiences shared by many Afro-Americans-W. E. B. DuBois described doubleconsciousness, this sense of always looking at one's self through the eyes of others (Dubois 1903, 3)-link the modern black scholar to the black musician of the past by ties more direct than the customary researcher's wish to know. These ties, when joined with intellectual energy and sound methodology, put black scholars of Afro-American music in a position to illuminate their subject with special insight. Black scholars' relationship to their subject may be said to invite a particular quality of empathy in their work, but the quantity of that work is not large. Afro-American music is so distinctive, its presence and influence so pervasive, and the story of its origins, development, and meaning so fascinating and complex, that countless observers, both black