Themes of Signification: Representions of Aboriginality in Australian Film Music, 1931 - 1971

Abstract

Cultural theorist and ethnomusicologist Mark Slobin has reflected that “every film is ethnographic, and every soundtrack acts like an ethnomusicologist.” If this is so, what can a study of the music of historical intercultural films reveal about the spectator culture? Can cross-cultural engagement be compared between settler nations by comparing the narrative film music of different countries? Slobin asserts that it can. Facilitated through a focus on the music of films that feature Australian Indigenous people and culture, this study reveals the depth of cross-cultural understanding and engagement between the wider settler society and Australian Indigenous people over the period from 1930 to 1970 as evidenced in the musical representations of culture in film. Changes of representation over the period of the study are analysed, particular individuals involved in the filmmaking are identified, and influential organisations and the critical works interrogated and compared. Analysing feature and documentary films within the period, the survey highlights commonalities and differences of approach by different practitioners within the sample set, evidence of the influence of practices inherited from larger film markets, and the extent to which actual Indigenous musical materials have been incorporated into the musical underscore of these films.