Unsayable Music: Six Reflections on Musical Semiotics, Electroacoustic and Digital Music

Chapter 3 III – Communication and Meaning: Music as Social System

65 Chapter 3 III – Communication and Meaning: Music as Social System Niklas Luhmann’s theory for analyzing contemporary society is characterized as a “transition towards a radically anti-humanistic, a radically anti-regionalist, and a radically constructivist conception of society (Luhmann 1997, 35).1 This system theory breaks with the Western philosophical tradition that assigns a central role to the subject as a frame of reference in accounting for the dimension of the social. It is a radical move away from humanism and towards a model of a society based on the concept of communication. The focus of analysis is not the human behavior and the social institutions, but the communications that occur within systems. Luhmann’s reflections on art, which include a significant number of essays (Luhmann 2008) and the book Art as a Social System (Luhmann 1995; 2000) develop a complex and precise understanding of the differentiation of modern art correlated with the differentiation of modern society. In this theory we find robust concepts for dealing with issues in contemporary art. The following investigations will explore some aspects of this theory in order to develop a reflection on music as a social system focused on communication and meaning. The first part discusses key concepts of the theory of social system and presents a preliminary account of contemporary music within this framework. The second part examines different views of sound, music, and society. The method employed confronts Luhmann’s theory with other approaches, 1 Niklas Luhmann (1927-1998) was until recently practically unknown for English readers. The first volume of translation of his magum opus Die Gesellschaft der Gesellschaft [The Society of Society] was published in 2012 (Luhmann 2012). Luhmann’s thinking is complex and his writing style is difficult to translate. This affects the receptivity of his work. The Introduction to Systems Theory (Luhmann 2013) presents the transcription of series of lectures in which Luhmann explains the theory for a larger public. The oral style makes it more accessible. For a comprehensive and critical reflection on Luhmann’s theory cf. Radical Luhmann (Moeller 2012). Unsayable Music 66 Unsayable Music 66 including some in opposition, that function as objects of comparison for assessment in the hopes of bringing to light more concealed aspects. By seeking to create dissonance and heterogeneity, a deeper and more insightful understanding of music in the contemporary world may open new paths for future exploration. I 1. System and Environment Luhmann’s theory of social system, as Knodt observes, challenges the humanistic tradition at the level of its most fundamental presuppositions: (1) The principle of a unified, autonomous subject; (2) the idea of the social as a derivative sphere of intersubjectivity; (3), the corollary of communication as an interaction between subjects; (4) the notion of communication as a transmission of mental contents between separate consciousnesses;(5)thecorrespondingideaoflanguageasarepresentation of such contents. (Knodt 1995, xxiv) System theory begins not with unity, but with the difference between system and environment. The difference is both a self-reference and an observation. There is no difference between self-reference and observation, for the one who observes something must distinguish himself from that which he observes. This concept of difference is inspired by George Spencer-Brown’s mathematical logic of calculus, which is expounded in Laws of Form (SpencerBrown 1969), a book that influenced second-order cybernetics.2 SpencerBrown defines form as a call to draw a boundary that marks a difference. In other words, one draws a distinction that creates a difference between system and environment. By creating this distinction, one is referring to oneself and, at the same time, observing the distinction. Spencer-Brown’s logic of form 2 Norbert Wiener introduced the term “cybernetics” in the scientific discourse as “the theory of communication and control in the machine and in the living organism” (Wiener 1956, 269). Second-order cybernetics develops a more consistent epistemology by including the observer as part of the system. It reshapes the cybernetic concept of circularity by focusing on the circular dynamic of reflexivity. Heinz von Foerster postulates the idea that we experience the world by constructing a reality. The fundamental cognitive operation performed by an observer it a distinction that separates reality into an inside and an outside (cf. Foerster 2003c). 67 Communication and Meaning: Music as Social System 67 tells us to draw a distinction; otherwise nothing will happen at all. “Creation is the imposition of a mode of distinction...