Music in the Afghan North, 1967–1972 (review)

Music in the Afghan North, 1967–1972 offers a valuable resource, rich in information and clearly written and constructed. It should be useable for the general public, for students from high school through university, and for advanced scholars conducting research. While its title may seem arcane and restricted in scope, in fact the site immediately places the user in the midst of the richness of a music culture familiar in many parts of the Middle East and Central Asia. Available free of charge with minimal system requirements, this site could be appropriately featured in Web offerings of public and school libraries as well as in the universities that might seem to be its primary audience.

The site is based on research conducted by Professor Mark Slobin in Northern Afghanistan that resulted in his book Music in the Culture of Northern Afghanistan (Tucson: Published for the Wenner-Gren Foundation for Anthropological Research by the University of Arizona Press, 1976), which proceeded from nearly ten years of research on music of the region. Slobin's book, which is included in full on the site, was ground-breaking at the time of its publication and was well-received by the few reviewers who were invited to write about it (see reviews by Lois al-Faruqi in Ethnomusicology 21, no. 3 [1977]:506–8 and Gen'ichi Tsuge in Journal of the American Musicological Society 30, no. 3 [1977]:539– 41). (Afghani music was not a widespread topic of scholarly interest at the time, nor were there many English-speaking experts who could be approached for a review; and the products of ethnomusicological research were not as commonly used as they are now in related disciplines such as anthropology and history.) The reviews are worth recalling here, as both reviewers remarked on Slobin's skill as a music researcher. Tsuge wrote, "This is one of the rather few ethnographies done by a researcher equipped with adequate musical hearing and sufficient musical sensitivity ... it is remarkable that the musical behavior of each [of the numerous ethnolinguistic] group[s] is generally so well documented in terms of the shared vs. discrete aspects" (p. 540); similarly in al-Faruqi's view, "... Slobin is a thorough researcher, and he has a sharp eye for extracting the significance of the musical data" (p. 507). Thus Slobin's book embodies an important essence in ethnomusicological research and justifiably remains today a staple for anyone interested in the cultures of the Middle East and Central Asia.

Slobin has added new text to the Web site that expands the scope of the book, bringing the narrative into the twenty-first century. While he carefully identifies the "ethnographic present" of the information as 1967–72, he adds that "Occasionally, the text switches focus, from present to past, to suit the narrative" (http://afghanistan.wesleyan.edu/intro/warning.html). The added context and these "switches" are extremely useful for younger generations of readers who probably will not remember Afghanistan as anything but the demonic state depicted in much present-day American public narrative. My favorite examples from his new text are the sections "Understanding the Book" and "The Fieldwork Project," in which Slobin contextualizes his work in a colorful description of his early academic life with its prevailing scholarly and political winds. I recommend that readers consult these pages early in their use of the site. Throughout the text, Slobin often links his own work to that of other scholars and there is a useful page of related links to other online resources.

The site opens to a colorful page featuring a musician and a brief description of the contents of the site (oddly, presented in a box that seems to obscure part of the top page). A toolbar common to nearly all of the site's pages offers subsections entitled "Introduction," "Fieldwork," "Background," "Shared Music," "Ethnic Subcultures," "Instruments," "Archive," and "Resources." Clicking on...