Yating, Tang; Dreyfus, “Reconstructing the vanished musical life of the Shanghai Jewish diaspora: a report” (2004)

Title : “Reconstructing the vanished musical life of the Shanghai Jewish diaspora: a report”

Author(s) : Yating, Tang; Dreyfus

Year : 2004

Type : Journal article

Subject : History

Keywords : culture

Journal : Ethnomusicology forum

Volume : 13

Number : 1

Start page : 101

End page : 118

Language:Name : English

Support : Print

Abstract : In the 100+ years between 1840 and 1945, Shanghai was home to a number of Jewish diaspora communities, not all of whom came, but all of whom left as refugees. Each of these communities maintained its own traditions and practices; in modern Shanghai only a few historic buildings and sites remain. in this report of my ethnomusicological 'study at home', I use rare ephemera and other documents to reconstruct a now vanished musical world, assembling evidence of actual musical events, their purposes, participants and repertoire. I observe the many and varied ways in which music functioned as a (subjective) marker of cultural identity within a self-enclosed cultural enclave that was characterized more by its heterogeneity than by the commonality suggested by its Jewishness.