Cultural historian, writer, and curator Josh Kun will present new research on musical representations of contemporary migrant and refugee crises across the United States, Middle East, Africa, and Europe. Mixing work from migrant and refugee musicians with sonic experiments in contemporary art and literature, Kun listens for musical responses to a world of forced removals, expulsions, and detentions. In this century of mass displacement, is music a form that migration takes?

RSVP: kade@usc.edu

This lecture is a part of the Exile and Resistance lecture series that examines the overlapping trajectories of exile, migration, and statelessness over the last century, shedding light on experiences and representations of displacement, loss, and persecution, and highlighting sites of political and cultural resistance. The series brings together scholars, artists, and activists for ongoing interdisciplinary presentations and discussions around recent research, films/documentaries, and artistic pieces that focus on the subjects of exile and resistance in historical as well as contemporary contexts and in a multitude of geographical regions.

JOSH KUN is a Professor at the USC Annenberg School of Communication, where he holds the Chair in Cross-Cultural Communication. He is the author and editor of several books, including most recently The Tide Was Always High: The Music of Latin America in Los Angeles (UC Press), Double Vision: The Photography of George Rodriguez (Hat & Beard), and The Autograph Book of L.A.: Improvements on the Page of the City (Angel City Press). As a curator and artist, he has worked with SFMOMA, Getty Foundation, Grammy Museum, California African American Museum, and Vincent Price Art Museum, among others.

Image: “Cynthia’s CD Collection,” 2017, photograph by Tom Kiefer