Abstract Scholarly knowledge about music has the potential to transform the ways individuals and groups think about and act towards pressing issues of concern. Writing primarily about the music and suffering of others, however, may not offer a wholly adequate form of reciprocity for people living in difficult situations. Is it possible to engage in ethnomusicological research that advances knowledge about music, produces theoretical innovation, addresses immediate social needs, and transforms oppressive conditions? In this chapter, I offer insights on possible ways to achieve these outcomes through discussing the workings of a collaborative ethnomusicological approach that merges critical analysis with activist research. I demonstrate how this approach works in practice through reflecting on and examining research activities from a social campaign aimed at reinstating meaningful religious activities carried out by members of Dinka Christian communities living in the Kakuma refugee camp in Kenya. I also reflect on the wider role that a critically oriented activist ethnomusicology can offer in transforming the debilitating conditions of encampment. This chapter thus adds to the growing number of ethnomusicologists engaging in and writing about the benefits and challenges of activist research at a time when there is an urgent need to create a more just world.
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