Taking a cognitive approach to musical meaning, Arnie Cox explores embodied experiences of hearing music as those that move us both consciously and unconsciously. In this pioneering study that draws on neuroscience and music theory, phenomenology and cognitive science, Cox advances his theory of the "mimetic hypothesis," the notion that a large part of our experience and understanding of music involves an embodied imitation in the listener of bodily motions and exertions that are involved in producing music. Through an often unconscious imitation of action and sound, we feel the music as it moves and grows. With applications to tonal and post-tonal Western classical music, to Western vernacular music, and to non-Western music, Cox's work stands to expand the range of phenomena that can be explained by the role of sensory, motor, and affective aspects of human experience and cognition.

About the Author

Arnie Cox is Associate Professor of Music Theory and Aural Skills at the Oberlin College Conservatory of Music. His writings and teaching focus on the relationship between embodiment, affect, metaphor, and musical experience. He has published essays on music and gesture, the role of embodiment in music analysis, and the nature of musical subjectivities. He has been an invited speaker at numerous universities and other venues.

Reviews

This is an impressive and invaluable book, and one I am sure scholars from numerous fields will be citing for years to come.

* Music Theory Spectrum *

Highly recommended.

* Choice *

This book puts forth a beautiful account of what it's like to listen to music.

-- Elizabeth Margulis

One of the best studies on the role of conceptual metaphor in music comprehension and theory I've ever read.

-- Mark Johnson * author (with George Lakoff) of Philosophy in the Flesh: The Embodied Mind and Its Challenge to Weste *



Book Information
ISBN 9780253032317
Author Arnie Cox
Format Paperback
Page Count 296
Imprint Indiana University Press
Publisher Indiana University Press