Political Implications of Affective Response to Rhetoric in Oswald’s Spectre and Hatzis’s The Awakening

• Author / Creator

  Arsenault, Jeffrey A

• What does it mean to be emotionally affected by music? This study considers the experience of listening to music for political implications of affect in light of John Protevi’s concept of political affect and Eric Clarke’s concept of musical affordances. In considering this, I discuss John Oswald’s Spectre (1990) and Christos Hatzis’s The Awakening (1994), two string quartets that utilize electroacoustics to explore political issues. I consider potential affective responses to these quartets in light of each work’s musical affordances and the rhetoric of the interactions between the instrumental and electroacoustic voices that attempt to convince the listener of a particular political perspective expressed by each composer in their respective work. I argue that the affective responses experienced through listening to these works, and to music listening in general, are politically derived, communicated intersubjectively, and can therefore influence the flow of power within the listener’s polis.

• Subjects / Keywords

  • Hatzis, Christos
  • Clarke, Eric
  • Oswald, John
  • Political
  • Music Listening
  • Affective Response
  • Protevi, John
  • Rhetoric

• Graduation date

  Fall 2013

• Type of Item

  Thesis

• Degree

  Master of Arts

• DOI

  https://doi.org/10.7939/R38T2C

• License

  This thesis is made available by the University of Alberta Libraries with permission of the copyright owner solely for non-commercial purposes. This thesis, or any portion thereof, may not otherwise be copied or reproduced without the written consent of the copyright owner, except to the extent permitted by Canadian copyright law.