engleski

Women and Music: A Discourse Analysis of a General Lexicon

This article focuses on the presence and mode of the representation of women musicians in the Hrvatski opći leksikon (“Croatian General Lexicon”, published in 1996). The quantitative part of the analysis addresses the structure of women’s music professions in Croatian and other musics. It also deals with entries of women musicians in relation to entries of important musicians (those who are accompanied by portraits). The qualitative analysis has revealed certain patterns in women’s descriptions and values in relation to patterns of descriptions and values of particular music professions, fields, genres, and national traditions. A thesis about the dependence of results on the conceptualization of music and its values, and on the selection of representative material has been examined by comparing the presence of Croatian women musicians in the Hrvatski opći leksikon and the Leksikon jugoslavenske muzike (“Lexicon of Yugoslav Music”, published in 1984), and by comparing the information about selected women musicians in various other sources. Special attention is given to four music professions: singing, composing, piano playing, and ethno/musicology and music journalism. Singing is by far the most represented female music profession and also the only one that is dependent on factors related to biological sex. In contrast, within the value system of high culture, composing is by far the most respected music profession and almost exclusively male. The remaining two professions are predominantly female spheres of activity – piano playing testifying to how climbing the social ladder is inversely proportional to the presence of women, and ethno/musicology demonstrating a special value assigned to the past.

women, music, gender, musicians, musicology, high culture, Croatia

Rad je izvorno napisan na hrvatskom i objavljen 2006. pod naslovom “Glazbene umjetnice”. Verzija na engleskom je u pojedinostima ažurirana.