David Novak
Position
Associate Professor, Ethnomusicology Program
Office Location

Music Building 1133

On-site Hours

By appointment

Specialization

  • Popular Music
  • Globalization
  • Media Circulation
  • Japan
  • Southeast Asia
  • Sound Studies
  • Ethnomusicology Program

Bio

Curriculum Vitae

My work examines transcultural relationships of media circulation, which I explore through multi-sited ethnographic research. My interests include remediation, sonic intersubjectivity, social practices of listening, and the creative politics of music technology. My current book project, Diggers: A Counterhistory of Global Popular Music, theorizes musical globalization through contemporary histories of digital and analog sound media, particularly among networks of record and cassette collectors, informal sound archives, reissue labels and sound recording digitization projects in Southeast Asia.

Director, Center for the Interdisciplinary Study of Music

Affiliate, East Asian Languages and Cultural Studies

Affiliate, Anthropology

Affiliate, Film and Media Studies

Related links to David Novak's research:

Publications

Books

  • 2015   Keywords in SoundCo-edited with Matthew Sakakeeny. Durham, NC: Duke University Press.

Keywords in Sound book cover

Japanoise book cover

Selected Articles, Chapters and Online Publications

Courses

  • Anthropology of Music

  • Music as Media

  • Sound Studies

  • Ethnographic Writing

  • Globalization and Popular Music

  • Music and Documentary Film

  • Independent Music 

  • History and Practice of the Recording Studio

  • Music in Modern Japan

  • Global Screens, Global Sounds

  • Music Cultures of Java and Bali

  • Ethnomusicology Forum

  • Dissertation Writing Workshop

Education

  • PhD 2006 (with Distinction) Columbia University, Ethnomusicology
  • MA 1999 Wesleyan University, Ethnomusicology
  • BA 1992 Oberlin College, East Asian Studies