Punk Rock and the Value of Auto-ethnographic Writing about Music

Sarah Attfield

doi:10.5130/portal.v8i1.1741

Abstract

Why do many of the books on punk rock and hardcore punk come with punk attitude? Why are a good number of the books written from a personal perspective? What kind of value do the diary entries of Nils Stevenson in 'Vacant: A Diary of the Punk Years 1976-79' have compared to an article on the rhetoric of class by David Simonelli in the journal 'Contemporary British History'? In some respects scholarly writing on punk rock seems like a contradiction. How can music so rooted in anti-establishment sentiment be appropriated into an institutional setting? The auto-ethnographic approach found in many of the studies of punk might be an answer to this question. The writers have used their own experiences as musicians and fans to reflect on and analyse the music and scenes which arguably provides the reader with a more immediate insight. This paper argues for an auto-ethnographic approach to the writing of punk and hardcore punk and suggests that this style of writing about music offers the reader an ‘authentic’ insight into these particular music scenes.

Highlights

Many of the books on punk rock are written from a subjective, personal perspective and come with what could be described as punk attitude
In some respects scholarly writing on punk rock seems like a contradiction
Ethnographic approaches to music have increased and this shift has occurred alongside a growing interest in the study of ‘consumption and audiences’ (Shuker 2005: 96). This may be linked to the emergence of ‘new’ ethnography—a style of anthropology favoured by anthropologists such as Kathleen Stewart (1996), which follows on from the work of James Clifford and George Marcus (1986)

Summary

Introduction

Many of the books on punk rock are written from a subjective, personal perspective and come with what could be described as punk attitude. The writers have used their own experiences as musicians and fans to reflect on and analyse the music and scenes which arguably provides the reader with an ‘authentic’ and immediate insight.

Results

Conclusion