Another university shuts down musicology
NewsTaking its cue from Brandeis, Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand, is proposing to abolish musicology.
An appeal from Death Row:
Dear Colleagues, I write on behalf of musicology at Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand. Currently, the university has a proposal to remove Musicology as an area of research and teaching.
Musicology is integral to research and teaching at Victoria University of Wellington, both within the New Zealand School of Music and within the broader Humanities. The area is known for research in New Zealand music, women and music, historical performance practice, early modern and nineteenth-century music. As part of the Music Studies Programme, Musicology sits alongside Ethnomusicology, Theory and Analysis, and Jazz Studies.
The university’s current plan of widespread cost savings across the university would cut a third of music staff and eliminate musicology completely by disestablishing the roles of Professor of Musicology and Associate Professor of Musicology. This will result in the closing of teaching and research in Musicology in Wellington and would greatly diminish the future of music research and teaching in New Zealand.
On behalf of my colleagues, I am organizing a petition to Save Musicology at Victoria University of Wellington, to be submitted to the university, and I would like to invite those interested in supporting this to add their name to our petition by 3 September 2023, collated here: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1LbBMVXXXqbtHtB8duePKkCID7HhSMg-9maL8CCQKeKw/edit?usp=sharing. We feel that international support for our musicology area would greatly help our case.
With our thanks for considering support for Musicology in New Zealand,
Brian
Dr. Brian Diettrich | Senior Lecturer in Ethnomusicology
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