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Music, Research, and Activism

Prospects and Projects in Northern Europe

A radical exploration of how music educators and artists are using research as a tool for justice in an era of crisis and transformation.

Can music research drive social and ecological change? Music, Research, and Activism: Prospects and Projects in Northern Europe argues that it can—and must. This bold collection studies the emerging activist turn in music studies, where researchers and artists engage directly in public debates and cultural movements.

By questioning systemic inequalities in the music industry and exploring the role of music education in an era of climate crisis, the contributors to this volume reflect on how their work can serve eco-social justice. Drawing on their diverse experiences as educators, critics, DJs, producers, and community organizers, they offer a compelling vision of music research as an agent of transformation.

Rooted in the independent research network Suoni, this volume speaks to music scholars and students eager to rethink the role of music in shaping a more equitable world. Engaging and accessible, it challenges us to ask: What does social responsibility look like in music research today?
 

222 pages | 5.83 x 8.27 | © 2025

Music: General Music

Political Science: Political and Social Theory


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Table of Contents

1. Introduction: The Activist Turn in Music Research

Kim Ramstedt and Susanna Välimäki

 

PART I: STRUCTURES AND DISCIPLINARITY 

2. Between Activism and White Saviourism: Unpacking the Racial Dynamics of Multiculturalism in Ethnomusicology and World Music

Kim Ramstedt and Miia Laine

3. Researcher as Minority and Majority: Hip-Hop Feminist Epistemologies

Inka Rantakallio

4. The Identity Crisis of Music Criticism

Sini Mononen

5. Internalized Orientalism in the Western Capitalist Organization of Music

Aman Askarizad and Kim Ramstedt

 

PART II: POSITIONALITIES AND PROFESSIONS 

6. Feeling Un/Comfortable: Positionality and Embodied Experience in Classical Music Research

Marika Kivinen and Anna Ramstedt

7. Journeying Towards an Activist Study of Musical Performance

Milla Tiainen

8. Activism in Vocational Music Education: Towards Norm-Critical Change

Kaj Ahlsved

 

PART III: METHODOLOGIES 

9. Music Historians as Feminist Activists: Gender Mainstreaming in Contemporary Concert Repertoires

Susanna Välimäki and Nuppu Koivisto-Kaasik

10. The Music Scholar as an Environmental Slow Activist: Theses on Ecomusicology and Nature

Juha Torvinen

11. Feminist Music Education and Autism Spectrum Condition: The Teacher-Researcher as an Ethical Agent

Katja Sutela and Linda Liukkonen

12. The Silences of Labour Music History: Music as a Tool for Social Change

Saijaleena Rantanen

 

Notes on Contributors

Bibliography

Index

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