[ecrea] CfP Cinergie n. 9 - Reviewing Disco Music

Total Entertainment: Reviewing Disco Music.
Call for papers for Cinergie n. 9, expected release date: March 2016, 
www.cinergie.it<http://www.cinergie.it>
Edited by Claudio Bisoni, Paolo Noto, and Guglielmo Pescatore

In a famous article from 1979, Richard Dyer writes that disco music was 
not just a musical style, but also “kinds of dancing, club, fashion, 
film – in a word, a certain sensibility, manifest in music, clubs, and 
so forth, historically and culturally specific, economically, 
technologically, ideologically, and aesthetically determined”. Critical 
work in the area has read disco music from the perspective of its 
cultural or subcultural importance, therefore considering, for example, 
its value within specific communities defined by taste, or its escapist 
and restorative character during moments of social and political 
tension. The explosion of disco music has been read, in Italy too, in 
relation to a crisis of social engagement and the growth of political 
disaffection.
The aim of this issue of Cinergie is to reconsider disco music from the 
point of view of entertainment, therefore considering – in addition to 
its cultural and countercultural function – its “intrinsic value” in 
terms of individual and collective pleasure, gratification, and fun, and 
consequently its efficiency in regard to costume and shared behaviours. 
The field of analysis will not be limited to film and television: 
articles will also be accepted that relate to photography, fashion, 
costume and generally teose areas of cultural consumption that allow us 
to construct a global image of the phenomenon. Proposals therefore might 
reflect on (though not necessarily be limited to) the following questions:

* Models of entertainment: disco was born in the context of music, but 
it quickly extended into other fields (for example, clubbing is an 
activity that is not defined only by music). In what way can disco be 
read historically as a form of entertainment that had immediate 
transmedia elements? More generally, what was the role of disco music 
and its imagery in the development of the entertainment cultures? Does 
disco stand for a historically innovative moment, or a marginal 
phenomenon when it comes to models of entertainment?

* Disco music and the media: in what ways was disco music diffused, 
promoted and authenticated through cinema and television? How can disco 
contribute to redefinitions of the ever-complex and problematic 
relationship between musical and visual culture? To what extend has it 
become the object of exploitation in film and tv shows? How do trends of 
disco and club music intertwine with broader processes of music 
visualization that stabilize in the 1970s and ’80s?

* Periodicity and permanence: disco appears to be firmly linked to the 
’70s, yet in the following decades it returned, and regularly influenced 
the media and social trends. What are the temporal limits of the 
phenomenon? What kinds of practices have extended its duration? In what 
way have references to disco music catalysed the politics of nostalgia?

* Technology and consumption: how does the affirmation (and rapid 
decline) of disco music connect to the diversification of the market of 
young people? What was the role, in this regard, of home entertainment 
systems like video and cassette recorders, or services such as thematic 
cable tv channels?

* Local and global: is it still possible to explain the diffusion of 
disco music in terms of a global/local dialectic, as per other music 
genres? To what extent does the remediation of disco music in film and 
television, for example in music videos, absolve the need for the genre 
to be adapted locally or nationally? In what way do elements of musical 
creativity such as lyrics, arrangements and production, vary according 
to that dialectic?

Deadlines and information:
Abstracts, either in Italian or in English, max 300 words, should be 
sent to (paolo.noto2 /at/ unibo.it) by September 15th 2015. The contributors 
will receive notice of acceptance by September 26th 2015. If accepted, 
articles of 4000-5000 words must be submitted by December 15th 2015 for 
anonymous peer-review. The issue is expected to be published in March 2016.


---

Paolo 
Noto<http://www.unibo.it/SitoWebDocente/default.htm?mat=036477&TabControl1=TabContatti>
Dipartimento delle Arti - visive, performative, mediali
Via Barberia 4 - 40123 Bologna
tel. (+39) 051.20.92.004 - fax (+39) 051.20.92.001
skype: paolo_noto





---------------
ECREA-Mailing list
---------------
This mailing list is a free service offered by Nico Carpentier and ECREA.
--
To subscribe, post or unsubscribe, please visit
http://commlist.org/
--
To contact the mailing list manager:
Email: (nico.carpentier /at/ vub.ac.be)
URL: http://homepages.vub.ac.be/~ncarpent/
--
ECREA - European Communication Research and Education Association
Chauss�de Waterloo 1151, 1180 Uccle, Belgium
Email: (info /at/ ecrea.eu)
URL: http://www.ecrea.eu
---------------