The Artworlds Approach: Music as Collective Action

Though Sociology of music has become a vibrant field today, its relevance has to be demonstrated to both, the broader sociological community and the practitioners of music as well. Seminal sociological works have enlarged the possibility of looking at music as a mode of social interaction governed by socio-cultural context. The study of music in turn has offered important insights into a range of general sociological concerns such as social interaction, social organization and social stratification. Using Howard Becker’s framework, this paper looks at music as collective action and seeks to throw light on how musical meanings are socially constructed rather than being inherent in the music itself. By tracing the artworld of music, the paper looks at music as a socially embedded phenomenon, shaped by historical contingencies and collective interactions. Drawing from the account of Gandharv Mahavidyalaya in Pune, the paper attempts to trace how music is meaningfully produced and consumed in a context of collective social organization. By exploring the Artworld of Gandharva Mahavidyalaya, the paper seeks to investigate how peculiar musical meanings are constructed and contested, how music is configured through the ways in which it is performed and heard.