[JFKI-News] Invitation: Workshop, “Disconnect: When Music Excludes and Divides”

[History-ZI JfKi <history@jfki.fu-berlin.de>]

Dear students, instructors, employees, and members of Freie Universität Berlin,

On behalf of the History Department of the John F. Kennedy Institute for North American Studies, we are pleased to invite you to the workshop “Disconnect: When Music Excludes and Divides” on Friday, November 21, 2025, 9:30–16:30, at JFKI, Room 319 (Lansstraße 7–9, 14195 Berlin).

This workshop questions the widespread assumption that music inherently brings people together. From concert halls to international festivals, music is often framed as a universal language. Yet these narratives can obscure music’s disruptive potential: its capacity to challenge norms, create friction, and complicate narratives of harmony and cooperation. As a case in point, the workshop will spotlight avant‑garde music: an experimental, often abstract, and deliberately individualistic approach to composition. For many intellectuals, the avant‑garde has served as a marker of liberal values such as freedom of _expression_, nonconformity, and artistic risk. At the same time, it has frequently operated as an excluding force, drawing sharp boundaries and alienating listeners who seek familiarity or shared musical conventions.

This workshop explores that paradox: can music unite and divide at the same time – and under what conditions?

Some of the questions we’ll discuss include:
• Under what conditions does music foster cohesion, and when does it sharpen boundaries?
• How do institutions of cultural diplomacy mobilize music’s unifying vs. disruptive functions?
• Which methods help us study exclusion and friction in musical practices across places and periods?

Registration: https://forms.gle/kQ7Q3RKyihrWZBRg7

Program: available here

We look forward to seeing you there.

 

Sincerely,
The Organizing Team
John F. Kennedy Institute for North American Studies
Freie Universität Berlin