A Million Years of Music: The Emergence of Human Modernity

367 Pages·2.511 MB·English

by  Gary Tomlinson

A Million Years of Music
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A Million Years of Music
The Emergence of Human Modernity
Gary Tomlinson
Z O N E B O O K S • N E W Y O R K
2015
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© 2015 Gary Tomlinson
zone books
633 Vanderbilt Street
Brooklyn, NY 11218
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a
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means, including electronic, mechanical, photocopying,
microfi lming, recording, or otherwise (except for that
copying permitted by Sections 107 and 108 of the U.S.
Copyright Law and except by reviewers for the public
press), without written permission from the Publisher.
Printed in the United States of America.
Distributed by The MIT Press,
Cambridge, Massachusetts, and London, England
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Tomlinson, Gary.
A Million years of music : the emergence of human
modernity / by Gary Tomlinson. — First edition.
pages cm
Includes bibliographical references and index.
isbn 978-1-935408-65-9
1. Music — History and criticism. 2. Musicology.
i. Title. ii. Title: A million years of music.
ml160.t635 2015
780.9’01 — dc23
2014024072
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For Juliet
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Contents
Preface: Concepts, Models, Machines 11
i
Some First Principles 23
Listening Back 23
Incrementalism 26
Perils of Adaptationism 31
Coevolution, Sociality, and Culture 34
The Biocultural Coevolution of Hominins 41
Looking Forward 48
ii 1,000,000
Years Ago: Acheulean Performances 51
Marteau sans maître 51
Acheulean Industries 52
Embodied Symmetries 57
The Chaîne Opératoire and Taskscape 63
Mimetic Traditions 69
Entrainment 76
The Acheulean Increment 81
Poiesis 84
iii 500,000
Years Ago: Lower Paleolithic Voices 89
The Vocalized Taskscape 89
Copresence 91
Mindreading and Shared Attention 97
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Protolanguage 101
Protodiscourse and Gesture-Calls 106
Myths about Musical Protolanguage 112
Prosody and Melodic Contour 119
The Negotiated Voicescape 123
Excursus: Social Intelligence, Baboon Minds,
and Connectionist Cognition 129
iv 250,000
Years Ago: Neandertal Digitalization 139
Protodiscourse as Protomusical Structure 139
Middle Paleolithic Heuristics 145
Neandertal Lithics 152
Further Protomusical Structure 163
Discrete Neandertals 169
v 100,000
Years Ago: Symbolic et non 173
An Archaeological Conundrum 173
Regressive Symbolism 177
Peirce, Deacon, and Emergent Symbolism 185
Symbolocentrism and the Indexical Challenge 193
System without Symbol: A Phylogeny of Discrete Pitch 197
Glimpses of Modernity 206
vi 100,000 20,000
– Years Ago, I: Homo sapiens
and the Falling Out of Modern Culture 209
The Fine Grain 209
Migrations and Climates 214
Population and Innovation 219
Repeating Epicycles: Engravings and Beads out of Africa 225
Trackless Paths 233
vii 100,000 20,000
– Years Ago, II: Musicking 237
How the Hunters Returned 237
Differences over Aurignacian Difference 240
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What Aurignacian Musical Pipes Tell Us 250
Musicking 260
Musicking on the Transcendental Taskscape 269
viii
Afterward 279
Evolution, Emergence, and History: A Final Note 293
Notes 299
Acknowledgments 345
Index 349
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