Description
Book SynopsisPhonographic Memories is the first book-length analysis of Caribbean popular music in the Caribbean novel. Tracing a region-wide poetics that attends to the centrality of Caribbean music in retrieving and replaying personal and cultural memories, Hamilton offers a fresh perspective on musical nationalism and nostalgic memory in the era of globalization.
Trade Review“Njelle Hamilton’s
Phonographic Memories explores how a set of Caribbean novelists has foregrounded music as a locus for memory, nostalgia, and selfhood. Her study attests to the importance of music in the region in both personal and national senses of identity and suggests original ways of interpreting its representation in fiction.” -- Peter Manuel * author of Caribbean Currents: Caribbean Music from Rumba to Reggae *
“Njelle W. Hamilton’s
Phonographic Memories is a resonant and remarkable contribution to the fields of Caribbean studies and literary sound studies. Her substantive interdisciplinary work interweaves critical insights from neuropsychology, ethnomusicology, and literary studies with meticulous close-reading and close-listening analyses of musical styles, performance genres, and recording technologies in a multiplicity of Caribbean contexts. In harmony with the practice of
liyannaj that Hamilton relates in her analysis, this important and impactful work will appeal to audiophiles and bibliophiles alike." -- Julie Huntington * author of Sounding Off: Rhythm, Music, and Identity in West African and Caribbean Francophone Novels *
Table of ContentsPreface and Acknowledgments..... vii
Introduction.....1
1. Phonographic Memory:
Tracing the Calypsonian’s Work in Lawrence Scott’s
Night Calypso .....35
2. “Record Your Memories”:
The Bolero Aesthetic in Oscar Hijuelos’
The Mambo Kings Play Songs of Love…..80
3. Re-Membering “Body and Soul”:
Gender, Gwoka, and Jazz in Daniel Maximin’s
Lone Sun.....128
4. Roots, Romance, Reggae:
(Dis)Placing Memory in Colin Channer’s
Waiting in Vain .....182
5. Memory as Mixtape:
The Dub Aesthetic in Ramabai Espinet’s
The Swinging Bridge.....236
Coda.....283
Notes .....296
Works Cited .....TK
