Restriction lift date: 2033-05-31
The sociology of unpopular music: permanent liminality in post Celtic Tiger Ireland
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Date
2020-05
Authors
Corcoran, Robert
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
University College Cork
Published Version
Abstract
The central focus of this thesis involves the combined application of reflexive historical
genealogy and liminality theory to investigate emergent forms of social networks
organized around specific forms of cultural activity, specifically in this instance, the
realm of independent alternative music. This liminal borderland of cultural and
subcultural activity is characterized in the context of globalized neoliberalism as
instantiated in post-Celtic Tiger Ireland. These undertakings are achieved by constructing a large theoretical edifice which is periodically supplemented with a wide range of empirical data and hermeneutical
analysis invoked illustratively, selectively and strategically throughout. The range of
research is spread across four major research chapters which apply this theoretical
framework and the concomitant methodology to topics surrounding the emergence and
ultimate decline of Ireland’s Celtic Tiger economy, the periodic renegotiation of music
and noise over the last century, the emergence of ‘alternative’ as an aesthetic and
socio-cultural designation quite distinct from its original meaning as the inverse of
mainstream practices.
This discussion highlights a variety of social science research initiatives into the
relationship between youth groups and popular/fringe music forms to evaluate if any
privileged relationship between the two can be established.
Once such a framework is advanced in suitable detail, the focus is switched to the
manner with which contemporary communications technology has modified such
activities, paying particular attention to the conditions which both give rise to such
technology and the forms of consumption and communication which they subsequently
instantiate. The final section of the research attempts to assess how the major themes
and discussion up to this point are discernable within the contemporary context via the
incorporation of observational, ethnographic and hermeneutic methods.
Description
Keywords
Unpopular music , Post Celtic Tiger Ireland , Historical genealogy , Independent alternative music
Citation
Corcoran, R. 2020. The sociology of unpopular music: permanent liminality in post Celtic Tiger Ireland. PhD Thesis, University College Cork.