I was very happy to receive this award, not least because of the name it bears. Having encountered me briefly at a conference in Italy – Bruno Nettl (1930-2020) ushered me through the doors of the Society for Ethnomusicology, the major North American academic body in our field, back in the 1990s, and never failed to make me feel welcome on my visits to its annual conferences. He was a generous supporter of so very many young scholars. He was also one of the founding figures in our field, whose thinking had deep roots in the work of the pre-war comparative musicologists in Europe. I feel very honoured.
Professor Martin Stokes, King Edward Professor of Music
29 October 2024
Professor Martin Stokes awarded the Bruno Nettl Prize
Professor Martin Stokes received the Bruno Nettl Prize at the Society for Ethnomusicology Annual Meeting on 26 October.
Professor Martin Stokes received the 2024 Bruno Nettl Prize for his monograph Music and Citizenship.
Published in 2023 by Oxford University Press, Music and Citizenship offers the first comprehensive review of the relationship between citizenship and ethnomusicology. Featuring case studies from across Latin America, Africa, Asia, and Europe, the book offers a new understanding of music and politics in the context of modern debate about political belonging. Professor Martin explores the idea of citizenship and music from a perspective informed by postcolonialism and today’s debates around decolonisation.
The Nettl Prize is awarded annually by the Society for Ethnomusicology ‘to recognise an outstanding publication contributing to or dealing with the history of the field of ethnomusicology, broadly defined, or with the general character, problems, and methods of ethnomusicology.’ The winner is selected by The Bruno Nettl Prize Committee, which consists of a Chair (the previous year’s winner), and two other members appointed by the President of the Society for Ethnomusicology. The Prize is named after Bruno Nettl (1930-2020), a Czech-born American ethnomusicologist and anthropologist.
Professor Martin Stokes is a King Edward Professor of Music at King’s College London and a Fellow of the British Academy. As an ethnomusicologist, he specialises in the music of Europe and the Middle East, with an emphasis on Turkey and Egypt. He taught at The Queen's University of Belfast (1989-1997), The University of Chicago (1997-2007) and Oxford University (2007-2012). Professor Martin Stokes’ most recent publications include: "On the Beach: Musicology’s Migrant Crisis" (Representations 154 no. 1, 2021; "De l’ethnographie, à l’heure où nous sommes "tous (ethno)musicologues" (Volumes 19 no. 2, 2023); “Searching for a Voice: An Anatolian Tale" in Ethnomusicologies and its Intimacies, eds. S. Cotrell, D. S. Wilford, 2023.
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King Edward Professor of Music