Phonographic Memories:
Popular Music and the Contemporary Caribbean Novel
by Njelle W. Hamilton
About This Book
Phonographic Memories
is the first book to perform a sustained analysis of the narrative and thematic
influence of Caribbean popular music on the Caribbean novel. Tracing a
region-wide attention to the deep connections between music and memory in the
work of Lawrence Scott, Oscar Hijuelos, Colin Channer, Daniel Maximin, and
Ramabai Espinet, Njelle Hamilton tunes in to each novel’s soundtrack while
considering the broader listening cultures that sustain collective memory and
situate Caribbean subjects in specific localities. These “musical fictions”
depict Caribbean people turning to calypso, bolero, reggae, gwoka, and dub to
record, retrieve, and replay personal and cultural memories. Offering a fresh
perspective on musical nationalism and nostalgic memory in the era of
globalization, Phonographic Memories affirms the continued importance of
Caribbean music in providing contemporary novelists ethical narrative models
for sounding marginalized memories and voices.
Njelle W. Hamilton's Spotify playlist to accompany Phonographic Memories:
https://spoti.fi/2tCQRm8
Reviews
“Njelle Hamilton’s Phonographic
Memories explores how a set of Caribbean novelists has foregrounded music
as a locus for memory, nostalgia, and selfhood. Her study attests to the
importance of music in the region in both personal and national senses of
identity and suggests original ways of interpreting its representation in
fiction.”
~Peter Manuel, author of Caribbean Currents: Caribbean Music from Rumba to Reggae.
“Njelle W. Hamilton’s Phonographic
Memories is a resonant and remarkable contribution to the fields of
Caribbean studies and literary sound studies. Her substantive interdisciplinary
work interweaves critical insights from neuropsychology, ethnomusicology, and
literary studies with meticulous close-reading and close-listening analyses of
musical styles, performance genres, and recording technologies in a
multiplicity of Caribbean contexts. In harmony with the practice of liyannaj that Hamilton relates in her
analysis, this important and impactful work will appeal to audiophiles and
bibliophiles alike."
~Julie Huntington, author of Sounding Off: Rhythm, Music, and Identity in West African and Caribbean
Francophone Novels.
Here's the link for Phonographic Memories @ Rutgers University Press: https://www.rutgersuniversitypress.org/phonographic-memories/9780813596594
