Jazz as Critique - by Fumi Okiji (Paperback)

About the Book

Bringing critical theory to bear on music, this book argues that the jazz form models progressive social relations through its foregrounding of a "communal self," an African-American subjectivity that demands recognition of black humanity and alterity.

Book Synopsis

A sustained engagement with Theodor Adorno, Jazz As Critique looks to jazz for ways of understanding the inadequacies of contemporary life. Adorno's writings on jazz are notoriously dismissive. Nevertheless, Adorno does have faith in the critical potential of some musical traditions. Music, he suggests, can provide insight into the controlling, destructive nature of modern society while offering a glimpse of more empathetic and less violent ways of being together in the world. Taking Adorno down a path he did not go, this book calls attention to an alternative sociality made manifest in jazz. In response to writing that tends to portray it as a mirror of American individualism and democracy, Fumi Okiji makes the case for jazz as a model of "gathering in difference."Noting that this mode of subjectivity emerged in response to the distinctive history of black America, she reveals that the music cannot but call the integrity of the world into question.

Review Quotes

"Jazz As Critique serves as an invaluable resource for thinking about the types of listening and conversations that need to take place in order to confront today's outstanding racial injustice and inequalities."--Alexander K. Rothe, Core Lecturer, Columbia University

"A lucidly argued, historically grounded, theoretically sophisticated, and timely book, Jazz as Critique redraws our maps of the relationship between black cultures, jazz music, and critical theory."--Alexander G. Weheliye, Northwestern University

"At stake in Okiji's text is not whether Adorno could have changed his mind about jazz but rather whether Black expression can, and should, change its mind about Adorno."--Mark Christian Thompson, Monatshefte

"Fumi Okiji combines a serious understanding of Adorno with a powerful portrayal of the black experience in the United States and melds it all with an encyclopedic knowledge of and respect for the jazz tradition. The world needs a book like this, as much as it needs jazz."--Martin Shuster, Goucher College

"Okiji's book is a rare treat, unexpected in its outcome, and unconventional in its methodological approach."--James B. Haile III, The Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism

"This important and engagingly written study offers new angles of vision on Adorno's notorious 'jazz critique, ' on the nature of the jazz work, and on jazz's utopian promise. Informed both by a judicious reading of Adorno and by considerable jazz literacy, it illuminates the intersections of critical theory, jazz studies, and African American studies."--Lorenzo C. Simpson, Stony Brook University

About the Author

Fumi Okiji is Assistant Professor of Women, Gender, Sexuality Studies at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst.