»... however, it is necessary to cultivate our garden« Regarding Domestic Musicology

Abstract

This paper presents a kind of quasi-phenomenology of domestic musicology. In this case the notion domestic musicology stands for a particular kind of musicology that has its own presuppositions, preferences, procedures and results. Domestic musicology, for example, focuses on the music itself rather than on the scientific method, deals with domestic rather than foreign music, prefers an immediate approach towards its object, and in general maintains that it knows beforehand what the object of musicology is. The phenomenon of domestic musicology is analysed in relation to a report by a certain musicologist from Croatia at the congress of the International Musicological Society held in 1997 in London. The phenomenon is multilaterally reconsidered, starting from different theoretical conceptions: from the possibility of viewing domestic musicology in the context of the enlightenment tradition of empiricism, from the psychoanalytic concept of trauma, from the functionalist method as developed in the sociological theory of autopoetic systems, and from responsive phenomenology.