ABSTRACT
Musical taste and its association with social position have been key foci of sociological research in recent years, following the groundbreaking work of Pierre Bourdieu (1984) and Richard Peterson (1992; Peterson and Kern 1996; Bennett et al. 2009; Bryson 1996, 1997; Chan and Goldthorpe 2007; Savage 2006). Within this body of research we find a growing strand focused upon social networks (DiMaggio 1987; Erickson 1996; Lewis et al. 2008; Lizardo 2006, 2011; Mark 1998, 2003; Relish 1997; Steglich et al. 2006; Upright 2004). Noah Mark (1998), in particular, has explained the abovementioned association between tastes and social position by reference to mutual influence within networks. This network strand significantly advances our understanding of tastes, their acquisition, effects and distribution. However, the data used in this work are mostly from large sample surveys with a wide focus not restricted to music. Though advantageous for some purposes, this approach is limited. Standard sampling strategies filter out dependencies between respondents, which means filtering out networks in anything but a very basic, ego-net format. Furthermore, information about alters is often sparse and does not extend to their tastes, such that the investigation of social influence and the transmission of tastes is, at best, indirect. And measures of taste are superficial and undifferentiated. Respondents express their liking for a small number of vague genre categories, on Likert scales, and their commitment to these genres is gauged, if at all, by their having listened to recordings or attended a live music event within a (usually generous) time period. This sets the threshold for ‘strong liking’ at a low level, failing to distinguish between those who attend an occasional high-profile gig and those who are more actively involved in a grassroots ‘music world’ (on worlds see Becker 1982; Lopes 2002; Finnegan 1989; Martin 2005, 2006; Bottero and Crossley 2011, 2014; Crossley 2015). Indeed, there is no acknowledgement of the collective nature of musical activity, captured by the concept of worlds. Respondents are addressed as individuals and their tastes treated as discrete individual attributes. We are given no sense of the way in which tastes are defined and contested by enthusiasts, creating ever finer distinctions and attendant identities and rituals. Likewise, there is no recognition of the different contexts in which music is produced/consumed or the fact that tastes may extend beyond genre to cover such contexts: e.g. a preference for
small sweaty clubs over big halls, live over recorded music, participatory over non-participatory events, etc. This raises the question of how well, if at all, the abovementioned ideas regarding tastes and ties apply to grassroots music worlds? In this chapter we address this question, drawing upon research which has approached the relationship between tastes, ties and socio-demographics through a case study of a grassroots music world: the local folk-singing world in Sheffield (UK). Through a detailed investigation of this world we aim to capture details and explore complexities which, we believe, elude the large sample surveys. We have various sources of data. As an insider with 30 years of experience of active engagement, the first-named author brings an autoethnographic perspective to bear (on autoethnographic method see Maréchal 2010). In addition, she conducted extensive ethnographic research over four years between 2006 and 2010 (Hield 2010). This involved participant-observation at ten events in Sheffield; participant diaries completed by 27 singers; a focus group with 16 participants; and interviews with seven professional folk singers living in the area. Further to this, both authors conducted a survey of participants, which, alongside basic demographic information, asked about their participation in 77 folkrelated events in the Sheffield area between April and June 2012 inclusive, allowing them to add further local events attended during the specified period. Respondents were approached, initially, via the owners of 40 Sheffield-based, folk-related e-mail lists. They were invited to participate and provided with a (SurveyMonkey) link to the questionnaire. The sample generated by this strategy was boosted by a number of targeted e-mails to key figures in the Sheffield folk world, by the first-named author, with a request to pass on details of, and a link to, the survey. Overall, 188 usable responses were generated, and 101 events, with at least one attendee, were identified. All survey respondents were anonymous. Following ethnomusicological convention, however, we use real names when describing the world and when drawing upon qualitative sources. The rationale for this is twofold. Performers often like to be credited for their work and maintaining anonymity within a localised community, where roles and voices could easily be identified, despite the use of pseudonyms, is all but impossible in any case. As this suggests, we adopt a mixed-methods approach to analysis, combining formal social network analysis (SNA) both with more conventional quantitative methods and with qualitative, ethnographic methods. SNA allows us to capture the networked nature of the Sheffield folk world and the existence of distinct ‘blocks’ of both participants and events within it. The more conventional quantitative approach allows us to demographically profile the network, testing out the abovementioned ideas regarding associations between taste and social position. The qualitative material adds depth and detail to both and also allows us to capture the agency of individual participants who, within a context of relational influence, carve their own ‘pathways’ (Finnegan 1989) through the folk world.
