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Editorial: "Musicologues sans frontières"Author(s): Alexander RehdingSource: Acta Musicologica, Vol. 79, Fasc. 2 (2007), pp. 261-262Published by: International Musicological SocietyStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/25071291 .
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Editorial: "Musicologues sans fronti?res"
Alexander Rehding Harvard University
For nearly eighty years now, Acta musicologica has
had internationalism emblazoned across its banner.
Such colors may appear to be the natural attribute of its status as the house journal
of the International Musicological Society. The internationalism of Acta musicologica,
however, has often been more than that; it has a long history of being programmatic.
Because of its special status, Acta musicologica?as well as its predecessors-in-spirit, the
Zeitschrift der Internationalen Musikgesellschaft and the Sammelb?nde der Internationalen
Musikgesellschaft?have typically been acutely sensitive to the political dimension of
academic endeavor. Thus, the supporters of Quido Adler and Hugo Riemann chose
the Zeitschrift der Internationalen Musikgesellschaft as a battleground to fight over the
historical and national pre-eminence of Viennese vs. Mannheim Classicism. One a few
years later, it was the same Riemann who, chastened by the dangerously narrow-minded
nationalism of the 1910s, called for a strengthening of the IMS to enhance international
relations and stop the catastrophe of the war. Such calls went unheard at the time: the
IMS fell victim to the powerful nationalisms that unleashed the First World War, and it
needed to be refounded in 1928.
In those days, needless to say, the field of musicology was shaped by a handful
of researchers: in 1928 the membership list of the IMS consisted of 192 subscribers, of
which about thirty were libraries. (Membership fees then were set at 5 Swiss Francs?the
amount was doubled within the first three years). Since then, the discipline has expanded
vastly, and the IMS has itself grown to unimagined dimensions. Acta musicologica evolved
out of the bulletin of the new IMS in 1931, when more space was needed for fully fledged
academic contributions. It was also at this moment of remaking, perhaps not coinci
dentally, that the timeless-classicizing Latinisms were introduced that characterize Acta
musicologica's design to this day.
Since those days, Acta musicologica has kept up with the increasing interna
tionalization of musicology and continues to be the only journal in the field to publish
articles in five major languages. As in 1931, a vital task for Acta musicologica is to provide a forum for an international exchange of ideas, and to bring institutional debates, which
Acta Musicologica, LXXIX/2 (2007), p. 261-262.
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Alexander Rehding, Editorial: Musicologues sans fronti?res
still largely happen within the framework of one language group, out of their national con
fines into the international domain. It is a great privilege for me to be presented with this
special opportunity to join Philippe Vendrix, who has already steered the journal across
international territories for the last half-decade, at the helm oficia musicologica.
What could such an international perspective, a "musicologie sans fronti?res",
look like? First, let's begin with a demographic point: most of the IMS members are clus
tered around a number of centers in Europe and North America, so it is no big surprise
that the majority of our contributions comes from the same geographical areas. (It might
be useful to add a reminder here that Acta musicologica considers submissions from non
members as well as from members of the IMS.) We would particularly encourage musicolo
gists from the under-represented areas to send us their work. Acta musicologica's main
languages of publication are English, French, Qerman, Italian and Spanish, but we will
make every effort also to consider submissions sent to us in a non-standard language.
Second, with the call for contributions from wider geographic areas we would
like to signal our openness to a wide range of areas of research, including those that
may not be the bread-and-butter topics of the discipline. Especially during our days of
increasing specialization, and the emergence of ever more journals for special interests
within the discipline, we would like to provide an inclusive forum where the purview of
musicology as a whole may be shaped and expanded.
Where the first two points have opened up a scenario that may appear like a
Babel of tongues and topics, it is particularly important that?as the metaphor goes?we
all speak the same language. As our third point, therefore, it is critical that we understand
each other and learn to appreciate methodological similarities and differences. Most
of our academic discourses still occur within a national framework; many of them only
make sense?think of the controversy over the New Musicology?within the institutional
context in which they occurred. In this situation it is all the more important to take care
to convey the big questions and issues to others. And to this, it seems, Acta musicologica
is ideally suited. For this reason we appreciate especially critical reflections that survey
recent publications or report on developments in a particular field from an international
perspective so as to communicate the state of the field to others.
It is in these three ways, then, that we hope to foster an increasingly inter
national dialogue. In many ways, none of this is startlingly new: Acta musicologica has
always been a forum for all aspects of musical scholarship, and it is the appropriate
venue for a confluence of ideas from the broadest possible background. Above all, we
will continue the course with which Philippe Vendrix has taken Acta musicologica into
the twenty-first century and which may, we hope, lead us to a truly international "musi
cologie sans fronti?res".
262
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