http://www.salvoraodj.it/420487865
Most people confuse race and ethnicity as being the same. Race and ethnicity can overlap, but they not the same. According to Lifescience.com, “ethnicity is the term for the culture of people in a given geographic region, including their language, heritage, religion and customs”(Lifescience.com). Your ethnicity is not your race, but where you are from, your culture, your religion, your values, and your language. Your race cannot be chosen, but depending on what you identify with, your ethnicity could be chosen. Lifescience.com gave a great example of this as well, a Japanese-American or anybody who lives in United States but has different backgrounds than Americans can choose whether they identify with their Japanese culture and customs, or the American culture and customs. So, you can be from Hispanic, Japanese, Polynesian and many more ethnicities and still have a choice on if you are a part of that ethnicity.
Your ethnicity influences your music choice. Going back to the definition of ethnicity, your ethnicity is your culture, religion, heritage, customs, and where you are from. All of these factors have a play in how you grew up, which makes you into the person you are today. If you are Polynesian, you will be raised differently than Hispanics. Each ethnic group is different therefore each ethnicity brings with it different frame of references, likes and dislikes and values. Each ethnicity has a different culture. Within your culture you will have certain traditional clothing, stories, values, and music. Each ethnicity has their own music. There is all different types of genres of music from all over the world, from all different ethnicities. There is traditional ethnic music, custom to each ethnicity, there is music sang in their languages. There is music that is that ethnicities tune or genre, and when you hear it you know it is from that ethnicity. Reggae, rap, country, Spanish music, folk music and many more, all come from different ethnic groups.
The United States is a huge melting pot; “a place where a variety of races, cultures, or individuals assimilate into a cohesive whole”(Merriam-Webster). The United States is made up of all different ethnicities, but they all get combined into the American ways and their own ethnic culture and heritage gets left behind. Even though the United States is the land with all of the different ethnicities in one, they do not pay mind to them, but only to their own American culture. Rather than being a melting pot, the United States should act as a “salad bowl with people of different cultures living in harmony, like the lettuce, tomatoes and carrots in a salad”(cglearn.it). The United States should be proud of everybody who lives within it and show off the different cultures.
http://edi-nasution.blogspot.com/2014/08/ethnic-music.html
The readings in Amusing Ourselves to Death by Neil Postman and A Different Mirror by Ronald Takaki, have shown that the United States never appreciated or celebrated the different ethnicities within its country, but almost the opposite. Japanese and Hispanics would immigrate to the United States to make money hoping to create a better life for their family. In A Different Mirror, in chapters “Pacific Crossing” and “El Norte”, Takaki talks about the Japanese and Mexican life in the United States. Japanese women would get married to Japanese strangers just so they could get to America. They would be gone from their families for years, or even forever. They would do this just so they could get to America to better their family back home. Mexicans would immigrate to the United States to work. The work in America was dirty and horrible conditions, but paid more than usual. Mexicans and the Japanese created their own communities within the United States, trying to make it feel more like home. The barrio was “a Mexican-American world” created by the Mexicans who came to America. This is where they could be their own people, feel at home the best they could, this is where they let their ethnicity free. “They did not feel like aliens in a foreign land as they did.. [in] the Anglo world”(Takaki,p.307). The United States welcomes different people into the country, but not into it’s life. Different ethnicities have to create their own life in the U.S., they are not a part of the United States.
In Amusing Ourselves to Death, in chapter “Now…This”, Postman also talks about the unimportance of important topics to the United States. Postman reveals the meaning behind the saying “’Now…this’… on radio and television newscasts to indicate that what one has just heard or seen has no relevance to what one is about to hear or see”(Postman, p.99). That the media is speed up so much that it has “no order or meaning and [therefore] is not to be taken seriously”(Postman, p.99). The media will click through devastating events occurring outside or even inside the United States like you are flipping through television channels. The United States government cannot be taken seriously or held accountable to get things done.
https://www.mfiles.co.uk/film-music-cliches.htm
That is how different ethnicities are treated in the big scheme of things in the United States, they are not cared about. In music however, there is some pros and cons. Your ethnicity and frame of reference can mold out what you like and don’t like pertaining to music specifically. You will most likely like your ethnicities music, and then the world will open your horizons to different types of music. Depending on your culture, values, and maybe even language will help you venture out into the world of music. The United States has all different ethnicities within it which also means it has all different types of music in it. But not all music gets the same recognition. The gatekeepers and the master narrative decides which music gets the recognition. Since the United States language is English, you can count out all music that is not of the American culture. To be honest, I don’t know what America’s culture music is, but my best guess would be country and rock music since that is the most played on the radio, so any music genre that is not that is not recognized.
But why is it not recognized. We would hope that all different types of music is recognized since the United States is made up of all these different people but that is not the case. And this is the question I asked our community partner Meaghan Leferink. Leferink is the Director of Community Engagement at Seattle Music Partners. On May 24th my group and I made a phone call interview with her at 11am. I asked Leferink if in her nonprofit organization they taught the kids about their ethnicities music. Her answer was that they did not have the resources to do so. She said that her and the other workers do not teach different ethnic music that is not of their own because they do not have the knowledge of it. So, they do not teach ethnic music because they do not have people of different ethnic backgrounds working with them to do so. Next, I was going to ask her if they did any multicultural music events but my first questions answer answered my follow up question. I think that it is important for everybody to learn about different types of music, you do not have to be of that ethnicity to learn and listen to others music. Music is created to be appreciated by all. Our experience with our community partner was excellent as always. Even though my question was short lived, she had lots of information for everybody. We were very appreciative to have such a great community partner to work with.
Taken by Chris Brooks
Takaki and Postman realized the importance of different ethnicities in the United States. Some people and most Americans do not realizes that minorities are the backbone of this country. This country would not be half of what it is today if it were not for minorities. And how does the United States repay them, by still being cruel to them. Even though the United States does not recognize different ethnicities they are very important to the country and to the music industry. Without different ethnicities the music industry would not be what it is today. With different ethnicities comes different unique sounds, stories, and always new ideas.
By Ali Sutton
Phone Interview:
References
Leferink, M. (2018, May 24). Phone Interview.
Melting Pot. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/melting pot
Melting Pot or Salad Bowl? (n.d.). Retrieved from https://www.cglearn.it/mysite/civilization/american-culture/a-story-of-immigration/melting-pot-or-salad-bowl/
Postman, N. (2007). Amusing ourselves to death: Public discourse in the age of showbusiness. London: Methuen.
Staff, L. S. (2012, May 09). What is the Difference between Race and Ethnicity? Retrieved from https://www.livescience.com/33903-difference-race-ethnicity.html
Takaki, R. T. (2008). A different mirror: A history of multicultural America. New York: Back Bay Books/Little, Brown, and.
American Media 