Ph.D. Dissertations in Ethnomusicology

Abstracts, citations, and full text
(available within the Wesleyan domain only)

1971

Kebede, Ashenafi. The Music of Ethiopia: Its Development and Cultural Setting

1972

Pantaleoni, Hewitt. The Rhythm of Atsia Dance Drumming Among the Anlo (Eve) of Anyako

1973

Benary, Barbara Lynn. Within the Karnatic Tradition

 The Music of Bharata Natyam

Isaku, Patia Myrel. An Introduction to Japanese Folk Song

Maue, Kenneth Gregory. Encyclopedia

Starks, George Leroy. Black Music in the Sea Islands of South Carolina: Its Cultural Context—Continuity and Change

1974

The Soul of Mbira: An Ethnography of the Mbira Among the Shona People of Rhodesia 

Carriuolo, Ralf E. Materials for the Study of Italian Folk Music

 The New Musical Traditions in Ghana

Davis, Nathan Tate. Charlie Parker's Kansas City Environment and its Effect on his Later Life

Gutzwiller, Andreas Benedikt. Shakuhachi: Aspects of History, Practice and Teaching

Hartenberger, John Russell. Mrdangam Manual: A Guidebook to South Indian Rhythm for Western Musicians 

Afro-American Gospel Music and its Social Setting with Special Attention to Roberta Martin 

Ramanathan, Subrahmanya. Music in Cilappatikaaram

Shankar, L. The Art of Violin Accompaniment in South Indian Classical Music 

Tewari, Laxmi Ganesh. Folk Music of India: Uttar Pradesh

Whitney, Carol. Flamenco, Foreigners and Academia: A Study in Small Worlds

1975

The Style of John Coltrane 1955-1967

Kaloyanides, Michael G. The Music of Cretan Dances: A Study of the Musical Structures of Cretan Dance Forms as Perfomed in the Irakleion Province of Crete

Murphy, Dennis Alan. The Autochthonous American Gamelan

Read, Carolyn B. A Study of Yamada-Ryu Sokyoku and its Repertoire

Song, Bang-Song. Komun’go Sanjo: An Analytical Study of a Style of Korean Folk Instrumental Music 

Avaz: A Study of the Rhythmic Aspects of Classical Iranian Music

. Raga Alapana in South Indian Music

1976

Chen, Fu-Yen. Confucian Ceremonial Music in Taiwan with Comparative References to its Sources

Garner, Edwin C. Mode: Three Modes of Shingi Shingon Shomyo as Analyzed by ECG

Shepherd, Frances Ann. Tabla and the Benares Gharana

1977

Abisa Festival: A Ghanaian (Nzema) Music Institution 

Asiama, Simeon D. Abòfoò: A Study of Akan Hunters’ Music

The Rainbow Bridge: A Perception of the Images and Myths of Musical Creation 

Jarrett, Janice C. The Song of Lament: An Artistic Women’s Heritage

1979

The Music of Atsiagbeko

MacLeod, Bruce Alan. Music for All Occasions: The Club Date Business of Metropolitan New York City

Vega-Drouet, Hector. Historical and Ethnological Survey on Probable African Origins of the Puerto Rican Bomba: Including a Description of Santiago Apostol Festivities at Loíza Aldea 

1980

 Wayang Wong in Contemporary Bali

Dea, Alexander. Bawa: A Javanese Solo Vocal Music

Sorrell, Neil F. The North Indian Classical Sarangi: Its Technique and Role 

Thrasher, Alan R. Foundations of Chinese Music: A Study of Ethics and Aesthetics 

1982

Cho, Chae-son. Aspects of melodic Formation and Structural Analysis in Sujecheon

1983

Dargan, William Thomas. Congregational Gospel Songs in a Black Holiness Church: A Musical and Textual Analysis 

A Musician's Tool-Kit: A Study of Five Performances by Thirugokarnam Ramachandra Iyer 

Tang, Jianyuan. Shang Musical Instruments.

Wickwire, Wendy C. Cultures in Contact: Music, the Plateau Indian, and the Western Encounter

1984

Durga, S. A. K.  A New Approach to Indian Musicological Methodology: An Ethnomusicological Perspective

1985

Cowdery, James R.  Rethinking the Concept of the Tune Family

Ross, Thomas Wynne.  A Tune Beyond us, Yet Ourselves: On Transcultural Hearing

1986

 Blood Drum Spirit: Drum Languages of West Africa, African-America, Native America, Central Java, and South India

Subramanian, Karaikudi Sambasivayer. South Indian Vina Tradition and Individual Style

1987

Condaris-Mannello, Christine. The Band Business in the United States between the Civil War and the Great Depression 

 The Estey Reed Organ: Imagination, Music, and Material Culture in Nineteenth-Century America

1989

Labaree, Robert R. 'Finding' Troubadour Song: Melodic Variability and Melodic Idiom in Three Monophonic Traditions

Sam, Sam-Ang. The Pin Peat Ensemble: Its History, Music and Context

Swift, Gordon Nichols. The Violin as Cross-Cultural Vehicle: Ornamentation in South Indian Violin and its Influence On a Style of Western Violin Improvisation

1990

Brown, Leonard L. Some New England African American Musicians' Views on Jazz: An Ethnomusicological Study

Herbst, Edward W. Voices, Energies and Perceptions in Balinese Performance

Wenguang, Wu. Wu Jinglue's Qin Music in its Context

 Static Harmony: Elemental, Contextual and Internal State Approaches to Pitch Structures in Late Twentieth Century Music

1991

 Mrdangam Mind: The Taniavartanam in Karnatak Music 

Wolberger, Lionel A. Music of Holy Argument: The Ethnomusicology of Talmudic Debate 

1992

Allen, Matthew Harp. The Tamil Padam: A Dance Music Genre of South India

Cormack, Josepha Anne. Svara Kalpana: Melodic/Rhythmic Improvisation in Karnatak Music

Modirzadeh, Hafez. Chromodality and the Cross-Cultural Exchange of Musical Structure

1993

 Dominican Merengue in Regional, National, and International Perspectives

Kelsey, John Russell. The Music of the Irumu People, Morobe Province, Papua New Guinea

Schloss, Myrna Frances. Out of the Twentieth Century: Three Composers, Three Musics, One Feminity

Skiba, Norman. Creation, Form, and Tradition: A Cybernetic Study of North Indian Tabla Drumming 

1994

Hast, Dorothea E. Music, Dance, and Community: Contra Dance in New England

 Unplayed Melodies: Music Theory in Postcolonial Java

Pillay, Jayendran. Music, Ritual, and Identity among Hindu South Africans

Stubbs, Frederick W. The Art and Science of Taksim: An Empirical Analysis of Traditional Improvisation from 20th Century Istanbul

Zheng, Su de San. Immigrant Music and Transnational Discourse: Chinese American Music Culture in New York City 

1995

Webb, Michael Hugh. "Pipal Bilong Music Tru" / "A Truly Musical People": Musical Culture, Colonialism, and Identity in Northeastern New Britain, Papua New Guinea, after 1875

Yih, Yuen-Ming David. Music and Dance of Haitian Vodou: Diversity and Unity in Regional Repertoires 

1996

Vélez, María Teresa. The Trade of an Afro-Cuban Religious Drummer: Felipe García Villamil 

1997

Sensational Knowledge: Transmitting Japanese Dance and Music

Mokkapati, Vijayasree. Modal Action: an Indo-European Perspective in Gregorian Chant

Power and Delight: Vocal Training in North Indian Classical Music

1998

Lausevic, Mirjana. A Different Village: International Folk Dance and Balkan Music and Dance in the United States 

The Indigenization of Tamil Christian Music: Folk Music as a Liberative Transmission System 

1999

Musical Labor Associations in Sukumaland, Tanzania: History and Practice

Rasmussen, Ljerka Vidic. The Newly-Composed Folk Music of Yugoslavia (1945-1992) 

2000

Galinsky, Philip Andrew. "Maracatu Atômico": Tradition, Modernity, and Postmodernity in the Mangue Movement and "New Music Scene" of Recife, Pernambuco, Brazil

Heffley, Mike. Northern Sun, Southern Moon: Identity, Improvisation, and Idiom in Freie Musik Produktion

2001

Western Art Music in Korea: Everyday Experience and Cultural Critique

Rumbolz, Robert Charles. "A Vessel for Many Things": Brass Bands in Ghana

Echo: Dub Music and the Acoustics of Diaspora

Political Economy of Music in China: The Impact of Danwei System on Luju

2002

Javanese Gamelan in Britain: Communitas, affinity and Other Stories

2004

Berkman, Franya.  Divine Songs: The Music of Alice Coltrane

   Beyond the Roda: The Berimbau de Barriga in Brazilian Music and Culture

Klezmer in 20th Century Philadelphia

2005

.   Penasar: A Central Mediator in Balinese Dance Drama/Theater

Lancefield, Robert.   Charles Hearing orientality in (white) America, 1900-1930

.  Musik Kontemporer: Experimental Music by Balinese Composers

2007

Hadley, Peter Duncan.   The Didjeridu Dispersion: The Transmission and Transformation of a Hollow Log

2008

Ferrigno, Emily Daus.   Technologies of Emotion: Creating and Performing Drum 'N' Bass

Poplawska, Marzanna.   Inculturation and Christian Music in Indonesia

Wu, Chao-Jung.   Performing Postmodern Taiwan: Gender, Cultural Hybridity, and the Male Crossdressing Show

2009

.   Handmade Sounds: The Sonic Arts Union and American Technoculture

Hurie Ranvig, Harriotte Cook.  Taking It To The Third Level: A Model for Identifying Aspects of Personal Style In The Khayal Genre

Strand, Julie Lynn.   The Sambla Xylophone: Tradition and Identity in Burkina Faso

2012

.  Music and Violence in Rio de Janeiro: A Participatory Study in Urban Ethnomusicology

Eagleson, Ian M.  From Thum to Benga International: Continuity and Change in the Music of the Luo of Kenya, 1950-2010

.  Parang in Perspective: Spanish Creole Culture and Nationalism in Trinidad

.  Performing Japaneseness in a Time of Postnational Transition

2013

.  Somos Colombianos en Nueva York/ We Are Columbians in New York: An Ethnography of a Colombian Musicians Community, 1995-2010

  Music for the Majority: Sinhala Song and the 1956 Cultural Revolution of Sri Lanka

Steele, Peter M.  Balinese Hybridities: Balinese Music as Global Phenomena

2014

 Multiplicity and Belonging among New York City Improvisor-Composers, 2000-2011

2015

 Speaking Time, Being Time:Solkaṭṭu in South Indian Performing Arts in South Indian Performing Arts

 Old Folks' Concerts: The Meaning and Mushrooming of an Antiquarian Music Craze, 1853-1856

 Hearing the Korean Global: Hallyu in the Music of K-dramas

 Global Cultural Flows and the Post-9/11 Secularization of Sufi Music of Pakistan

 Cosmopolitan, Nativist, Eclectic: Cultural Dynamics in Indonesian Musik Kontemporer

2017

Lueck, Ellen. Sacred Harp Singing in Europe: Its Pathways, Spaces, and Meanings

 Creating a Native Space in the City: An Inupiaq Community in Song and Dance

 Contextual Church Reform in Bali and the Secularization of "Sacred" Music and Dance: Forging Protestant/Hindu Music Networks in an Age of Mass Tourism

2018

 Sounding Original: Nature, Indigeneity, and Globalization in Mongolia (and Southern Germany)

Dankwa, John Wesley. When the Gyil Speaks: Music, Emotions, and Performance in Dagaaba Rituals

  Localization of Islam and its Engagement with Women's Practice of Acehnese Dance and Music in Three Indonesioan Citites

  New World, New Music: Creative Music Communities in New Haven and Woodstock in the 1970's and Their Legacies

2019

Terwilliger, Andrew. The Sonic Construction of Identity in Taipei's Kuajie (Crossover) Music Scene

2020

 Gender, Creativity, and Training: Transformation of Peking Opera Qinshi in Contemporary China

2021

. Theater as a Feminine Space:Music, Gender, and National Politics in Koa-á-hì (Taiwanese Opera)

2022

Kiman, Douglas. Klezmer Music and Jewish Festivals in Urban Europe: Sonic and Territorial Symbiosis

 Same but Different: Borrowing Signs and Citing the Aesthetic of Soundedness in the Development and Invention of Indian Youth Folk Drumming Ensembles in Singapore

2024

 Bridge Overtones: Lessons from the Sarangi

2025

Iannitti, Bianca Luisa. Tying the Practice Saree: Embodying Bharatanāṭyam and the Legacy of the Kandappa-T. Balasaraswati Dance Tradition in the United States 

  Music and Community: African American Male Youth Culture, HBCU Marching Bands, and New Orleans Brass Bands

Shatilova, Anya. Queer Lutes from the Russian Empire: An Exploration of Sonic and Visual Thingness of Balalaika and Domra Through Their Journey to the United States