Flexibility and egalitarianism: musical insights from hunter-gatherers

Abstract

Among egalitarian hunter-gatherer groups across the African continent, musical practices and egalitarian socialities are argued to be mutually implicated with one another. Southeast Asian hunter-gatherers also practice egalitarianism, however, and their musical practices represent a seeming anomaly alongside those of many African hunter-gatherer groups. Discussion of ‘hunter-gatherer musics’ that includes Southeast Asian perspectives has therefore been absent, even though cross-cultural, continent-spanning research with hunter-gatherers is common on topics such as politics, economics, and subsistence. Insights into egalitarianism can be gained through attention to the diversity in hunter-gatherer musical practices. This discussion of Ju|'hoan (Namibia) and Batek (Malaysia) musical practices demonstrates that egalitarianism can be understood in terms of its flexibility.

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