Sustainable Futures in Popular Music: The Pandemic and Beyond

MUSICultures Special Issue

MUSICultures solicits articles for publication in a special theme issue: Sustainable Futures in Popular Music: The Pandemic and Beyond, guest edited by Dr. Alexandra Boutros (Wilfrid Laurier University) and Dr. Brian Fauteux (University of Alberta).

Contemporary discourse is fraught with concerns about sustainability as we reckon globally with climate change, resource depletion, and more. How can we think about sustainability in intersection with popular music? Sustainability is often associated with ecological discourse, where concerns about waste and the depletion of natural resources may shape how we understand everything from music festivals and music related travel, to streaming services. However, sustainability is also implicated in the social dimensions of musical life. A discussion about music and sustainability may ask; What is the role of popular music and musicians in the cultural shifts made necessary by climate change? But may equally query how claims of sustainability figure alongside local music production and consumption framed by ephemeral archives and sometimes fragile cultural memories? Labour, venues, teaching and pedagogy, live performance, production and dissemination, capital and funding, and a host of other music related practices, systems, and infrastructures impact the sustainability or unsustainability of music.

Networks of musicians and fans have come to (re)consider how care (self-care, social care, community care) functions as a relational practice in the contexts of sustainable popular music making and music consuming. Questions about the sustainability of elements of popular music have been heightened during the COVID-19 pandemic, where components of musical life have been impacted by the pandemic in ways that may make us question their sustainability.

The editors invite papers that engage with the broad theme of sustainability, especially in the context of the multiple impacts of the global pandemic. Topics may include, but are not limited to, the sustainability or unsustainability of popular music in relation to record industry concentration; labour across social media platforms; copyright; catalogues or archives; social identities and music institutions, including age, ability, gender, sexuality, race, ethnicity, class, religion and others; Infrastructures and spaces. Following on the joint IASPM-Canada and Working in Music 2022 Conference, articles that examine sustainability and its inverse in popular music in relationship to the COVID-19 pandemic are particularly welcome.

MUSICultures is the peer-reviewed journal of the Canadian Society for Traditional Music / société canadienne pour les traditions musicales. It is published once a year under the auspices of the Society. Membership in CSTM is not a prerequisite for publication.

Articles are normally in the range of 6,500-8,500 words.
Please visit our website for complete submission details: https://cstm-sctm.ca/publications

We encourage authors who are interested in pursuing different formats to contact the guest editors ([email protected] or [email protected]) to discuss their ideas.

The deadline for complete manuscripts for the special issue is January 31, 2023.