Contextualization of Theology

These are the transcriptions of a few of the lectures from the course taught by John A. Gration,

Ph.D., at Wheaton Graduate School, 1991.

Used by permission of Wheaton College.

Gration Chapter 8

Contextualization and Ethnomusicology

Gration: We are all aware that translationwork is a prime example of contextualization,really in its most basic form. And we’re familiarwith Wycliffe Bible Translators and the SummerInstitute of Linguistics (SIL), a group that doesa fabulous job literally around the world, ingiving people the Word of God in their ownlanguage. Most of us take it for granted thatthis is a must, if the church is to be rooted andestablished and to grow, so we spare no effortsto learn a language, reduce it to writing, trans-late the Scriptures, and start literacy classes.We recognize that people everywhere have alanguage for communicating with each other,and the Bible must, consequently, be translatedinto this language. Less realized, however, is thefact that all people have music for communicat-ing their deepest feelings. Here at Wheaton we

are trying to do justice to this second reality.As part of our Missions Intercultural programwe have a specialization in Ethnomusicology.

With me to talk about this exciting conceptand important aspect of missions is Dr. VidaChenoweth. Dr. Chenoweth is professor ofethnomusicology in Wheaton’s Conservatoryof Music. I wish we had time to hear her per-sonal testimony, for it’s very moving. But wemust turn to the topic at hand. Dr. Chenowethis a veteran Wycliffe missionary, having livedfor 13 years in New Guinea among the Usarufatribe. A few years ago she had the joy of return-ing there with the completed New Testament.

Vida, as a Bible translator, how did you getinvolved in the language of music?

Chenoweth: I am a musician. I was a musicianbefore I was a Bible translator or linguist. Infact, I was a professional musician for years,centered in New York, and had performed onevery continent before I met the Lord. And onthat occasion—I suppose it was really a processof several months—I became interested in thespread of the gospel among peoples who hadnever heard, and I went to the Summer Instituteof Linguistics summer school at the Universityof Oklahoma. It was there as I heard linguistics

theories being proposed that my mind kept

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thinking music. So, in a way, I translated thelinguistic principles into music analysis, becausewe had in Western music theory no tools forunderstanding music systems of other peoples.

Gration: Had Wycliffe done much in the areaof ethnomusicology before that time?

Chenoweth: No, it hadn’t, really. It’s new.Gration: So the Lord brought along someone

with a gift in music and married it to the wholelinguistic concept, and out of that has come avery fruitful field of ministry, hasn’t it?

Chenoweth: That’s right. In the evenings, whenwe were sitting in our little thatched roof hutin the village, that was a hobby, to experimentwith analysis of the Usarufa people’s music.

Gration: We all recognize that historicallymissions (and other factors) have introduced a foreign music to many people. Let’s think

together why it’s so very important for us,especially in the life of the church, to encouragethe development of indigenous music.

Chenoweth: I like to parallel it with thoughtsabout prayer, that worship needs self-expressionof the innermost depths, which is only possiblein the language that you understand; and thatmusically it is only possible through the lan-guage that’s local, that’s your own idiom. Whenthis is impeded, if another people’s music issuperimposed on worship, intentionally orunintentionally, it inadvertently conveys theidea that that’s the real way to do things, andthat we must use the musical language of theWestern tradition in order to worship JehovahGod. In reality, this is just conveying the ideathat this is a Western God, too.

Gration: That’s true; it carries along that otherimplication. What you are saying, then, is thatwhat we are really telling these people is thattheir music is second-class.

Chenoweth: That’s what it implies when some-body else’s music is introduced. It implies thatthey’re replacing the local idiom, which is lessworthy.

Gration: What do you feel this does to thepeople in terms of their own self-image? Does

it have any effect on that?

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Chenoweth: Very much so. It does a couple ofthings. One is that their self-worth, their self-image, goes down. They are overwhelmed bythe foreigners, and they think it is more worthyto imitate them than to be themselves. Anotherthing it might do is to set up an elitist class,

where those who first are conversant in the for-eign modes become the leaders in the church.Pushed to its extreme over a couple of genera-tions, they may not even be communicatingwith their people any more.

Gration: That’s a point I’ve never reallythought about. That’s a crucial one, indeed.

What about the whole matter of diversity ofculture? When we introduce our music, are we

thereby denying that there’s real value in eachculture, and that maybe diversity is not divinelyordained? Where does that fit into the picture?

Chenoweth: We are made in the image of God.God is a God of creation, and he intends thatcreativity, that he puts in man, to come back tohim. That’s why music’s ultimate purpose is toglorify God. And each culture has a uniquecontribution to make in that praise.

Gration: Obviously, as a musician and as amissionary, you feel that music has a vital partin worship. How important is it to have, in ourworship, music that really belongs to the people?

Chenoweth: Probably the best way to envisionits importance—and I say envision because itsomehow doesn’t just happen to us—is to sitthrough a worship service that is in somebody

else’s language and somebody else’s music.Whereas we can vicariously appreciate whatthey’re doing, because they understand, we areleft out. Worship for the Christian is not anoption. It’s in Scripture, all the way through thePsalms and all the way to Revelation, to sing anew song unto the Lord and to praise him insong.

Gration: You said that when we sit through

a worship service in another culture, we canappreciate what they’re doing. I guess maybethat’s the heart of the problem: it is they. So yousay that when we’re introducing foreign music,in a sense there is always that they. In this casethey would probably be the missionaries. Thepeople say, maybe unconsciously, We’re wor-shipping in their way; it isn’t our worship andour music.

Chenoweth: That’s right. When we promotewhat is vernacular, we run the risk of being leftout a bit. But that’s not our purpose, to give thegospel to them for our own benefit. It’s not self-serving; it’s so that it will be self-propagating.

Gration: Right. This may be jumping ahead,but you’ve doubtless been in situations whereyou’ve seen people worship in their own lan-guage of the heart, and I dare say you’ve been,as a visitor, in situations where you’ve heardpeople singing non-indigenous music, such as

hymns. Have you really honestly seen the differ-ence?

Chenoweth: Oh, my, yes! I’ll give you twoexamples. One is a village in New Guinea that’svery near an English-speaking center; it wasthe first so-called New Guinea church that Ivisited when I went there in 1966. All the oldpeople were asleep. The youngsters had a very,very slight attention span. They were learning

English and so they were used to the peoplewho were standing there before them. Theyhad no music except what they tried to imitatefrom Western culture. I can’t see that anybodycould get anything out of it.

By contrast, on a visit to Irian Jaya in 1983 or1984, I went to a Dani church where the NewTestament had been translated. The entire wor-ship service was in the Dani language, and all

of the singing had come from members of thatcongregation themselves. They must have beenespecially blessed with more than one composer,because their singing was magnificent and theywere prolific in their oral production of Scrip-ture songs.

Gration: Obviously, then, each culture, in theworship of God, has its own special, unique

contribution to make. It is doubtless a joy tothe heart of God and to the heart of his peopleto be able to use a medium that is really theirs,that is literally the voice of the heart.

This is what ethnomusicology is all about.We’ve been using this term, but maybe weshould pause for a moment for a somewhatmore formal definition, lest somebody thinkthat we’re just talking about putting the words

of a hymn in the language of a people. We’reobviously talking about something more thanthat. What are we talking about?

Chenoweth: Our program here is an analysisprogram, really: trying to get to the actualworkings, actual structurings, of that musicsystem. It’s done with a good deal of rigor. Theperson undertaking such a program has toalready have had enough ear training that he

can literally transcribe to paper whatever hehears, from whatever music system. Then thereis analyzing what you’ve transcribed. The wayto understand it is to reconstruct it from youranalysis. If you can reconstruct the system, to

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the extent, say, that you yourself can composea melody in that system that’s acceptable bythe people—and this can’t be done apart fromthe people—then you have a pretty good ideaof how they structure their music system.

Gration: It sounds as though what physicists

are trying to do in understanding the basicbuilding blocks of the universe and reality, andall that that implies, you also are doing: gettingdown to the very basic generic building blocksof a music system, to analyze it and then buildwith it, and beyond that, to help people under-stand their own music system. That’s all part ofthe whole scope of ethnomusicology.

Chenoweth: Right. It can be simply said that

ethnomusicology is the study of the music of a particular people. The music analysis doesn’t existjust by itself. It’s a composite with the cultureof the people—how they view music, what itsfunction is in a society, and that sort of thing.We intend to have field experience, wherebywe actually confront the musicians whose musicwe have been writing down and studying. Andwe attempt a rather exhaustive collection of their

songs and song styles, all kinds of song styles.This also acts as a repository for them. It helpsthem in that it preserves the musical history oftheir culture. They will have access to this filein years to come.

Gration: So it is very natural that ethnomusi-cology here in the grad school be rooted in theMissions Intercultural program, because it’s not

just music; it’s music carried on in a definitecultural context, and also there is a real theo-logical dimension to it.

Chenoweth: That’s right. Being Christiansand ethnomusicologists we realize the morehow important it is for the indigenous church,when it comes into being. Or else how will theyworship? In whose musical language will theyworship meaningfully?

Gration: Exactly! I sense that there are manylevels of involvement that one can have as amissionary in the music life of a people. I sup-pose one limiting factor is the missionary’s ownmusical gifts and ability. For a full-fledged ethno-musicologist you’ve already indicated what isnecessary. Let’s again just pick up on what rolean ethnomusicologist, one who is well-trained,would take in fulfilling his task.

Chenoweth: The most essential thing is tofoster the creativity of the people themselves. Ourintent isn’t to make a hymnal for them. We wantthem to develop their own worship materials.We can be a catalyst, or we can be a source of

rejection. This is done, sometimes inadvertently,but it’s our purpose to encourage the creativitywhich will aid the developing church by avoid-ing the use of a foreign music system, and alsoin being discreet in listening to music from home.We live now in the age of earphones, and we canenjoy our own without imposing it on anybodyelse. So, by and large, we adopt the attitude ofbeing a learner, rather than a teacher.

Gration: What are the steps that an ethno-musicologist would go through? Here he orshe goes into an area, and what are the steps

that they go through in this process? I’ve pickedup that they preserve music and they analyze.Are there any steps that you go through as anethnomusicologist? Where do you begin?

Chenoweth: You begin phonetically, and ithelps to have a pair of well-trained ears. Butmaybe even before that, it is an attitude; yourealize that there’s going to be a music barrier,just as there’s going to be a speech barrier, andyou have several choices of how to deal withthat. For many past generations, the thoughtwas that you could overcome it by supplantingit with the music of a more prestigious group.This has not proven to be a good idea, becausein the end, they are left as imitators, and notproducers, not creators, of worship music. So

when an ethnomusicologist decides that hewants to learn how it is that the music process,the creative process, is functioning, then he sitsdown to his laborious task of transcribing andanalyzing.

Gration: Doing for music what his Wycliffecounterpart is doing for language.

Chenoweth: That’s an excellent analog. It’s verysimilar to what a linguist does. I did both jobs.I was working with the music in the evening. Itwas more a hobby. After the New Testamentwas finished, then I felt I could devote full timeto the music, and by that time, I had had quitea lot of experience with indigenous music.

Gration: Out of that experience has comewhat is recognized as a standard text in ethno-musicology. That’s great, Vida, for you who are

well-trained and highly gifted! Certainly theaspect of musical gifts is a vital part of this. It’sgreat for you who are full-time ethnomusicolo-gists, but is there any role that the rest of us asordinary, not especially gifted musically, mis-sionaries can play in this important aspect ofthe life and worship of a people?

Chenoweth: Oh yes! Remember, the attitude isprimary. The attitude of accepting what theydo in the way of making music will help to

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foster their creativity, which will be needed bythe church. Another thing is to record what theydo musically. We have an archive at WheatonCollege that is reserved for the music of indige-nous peoples in oral tradition. The very act ofrecording their music says something to them

that’s positive. We, as outsiders, place somevalue on it, or we wouldn’t go through theaction of recording their music. In addition toacting as a repository for them and as trainingmaterials for our budding ethnomusicologists,those archives are very useful.

Gration: Would you actually be interested inwhat the amateur, nonprofessional ethnomusi-cologist would record?

Chenoweth: Yes, we are very interested. Thereis a methodical way to do it, to actually speakonto the tape what each song is about, and givea literal translation and explain the context outof which it arises.

When I first got to New Guinea in 1966, some-one presented to me a trunk full of recordedtapes that were taped on an early expedition inNew Guinea, and there was absolutely no doc-

umentation with it. We had no idea who thepeople were, or the geographic region, or when,or what it was about. It was useless information.It was a terrible waste; but there was no wayto catalog or to understand the music with nodocumentation.

Gration: That would be like an historian find-ing a lot of letters with no date on them, nor

was it known to whom they were written norby whom. It could be some incredibly valuablehistorical data, but totally of no value becausethere is no context. So then, any missionaryinterested in doing this should record when andwhere, and try to get from the people the occa-sion, whether it was a song relative to harvestor the birth of a baby or whatever it might be.

Chenoweth: The people really enjoy explain-

ing to you what their songs are about. They arevitally interested in it.

Gration: So there could be a real secondarybenefit to the missionary himself or herself interms of that person getting to know the culture,simply by taking an interest in their music.They wouldn’t know how to do the analysis,but they wouldn’t have to, would they? Theywould telling these people something, almost

a para-message, very loudly: “I’m interested inyour music!” They’d be also saying to them,“I’m interested in you!” And who knows whatthat could do for the ministry of that missionary!

Chenoweth: Another byproduct is that people

sing about what’s important to them, and oftenI would say our most important anthropologicalmaterial came through an investigation of whatthe people sing about. This included materialsthat were essential to making an idiomatictranslation of the New Testament, becausetheir worldview is expressed in their songs.

Gration: I suppose that’s true to a measure inour own Western songs, although not as much,probably. But our songs do reflect our culture,which would make an interesting study forthose of you who are not in an overseas context:

analyze our popular music! I know as I lookback to the 1960s and early 1970s, certainly ourmusic then reflected a lot of the very heart andessence of our culture. This is especially true insome of these indigenous cultures that we’vebeen talking about today.

We’ve talked about the value, and hopefullyestablished the fact that it’s very important tohelp people develop their own indigenous music.What are some of the alternatives if we don’tplay this role in ethnomusicology? What aresome of the dangers if we cut people off fromtheir own indigenous music, or even permitthem to be cut off?

Chenoweth: We’ve seen evidences of that, too,around the world. It can encourage syncretism.

Gration: That is something to avoid. How doesthis encourage syncretism—just by permittingtheir own beliefs to get mixed in, in a way thatthey shouldn’t?

Chenoweth: Let me give you another examplefrom a region of New Guinea where I wasn’tresident, but this is well documented. Westernhymn singing was regarded by the local cult asthe means of getting material wealth. This is ina book by Peter Lawrence called Road BelongCargo: A Study of the Cargo Movement in theSouthern Madang District, New Guinea. That wasone means of obtaining the cargo magically—tosing Western hymns.

Gration: Is that right! That I had never heard.That’s a powerful warning, isn’t it? Here was asupposedly harmless Western hymn that was

introduced to be a blessing to the people, andyet it became an avenue of extreme syncretismand an unbiblical position.

Chenoweth: Another thing that I noticed—thiswas on an expedition to some off-shore islandsin the Pacific close to New Guinea, where mis-sions had been located for over a hundred years.I think I was about the third party that was thereto try to collect any remnant of what might havebeen indigenous music. Everybody said there

John A. Gration 8 – 5

wasn’t any, because these people had learned toparticipate even in anthem contests, and weresinging in harmony and with English words,which they thought was right. A hundred yearsago, when missionaries came there, they weretold that their music was not suitable for wor-

ship, and in fact that it was evil. This was saidwithout any investigation of the music.

I was only able to find out through a linguistwho knew the language of the people—and ittook days and days and days to make it clearthat we truly were interested in the songs thattheir forefathers sang—these people retained agreat deal of their oral tradition, but it was allsecret. It was all underground, so that it was

hidden from the missionaries.Gration: So we are not able to help them deal

with some of the issues that they may need todeal with in their own culture as the gospelcomes face to face with their culture. In otherwords, these things almost remain insulatedand isolated from the impact of the gospel.Instead of being transformed by the gospel, theyremained as they were. We’re almost building

a barrier between ourselves and where peoplereally live, in the very depths of their hearts.

What does this do—our strong emphasis onintroducing Western music into these churches,albeit with the best of intentions—what doesthis do to the national composers?

Chenoweth: I’ve seen this so many times withmy own eyes; I almost expect it. When a for-

eigner takes over the teaching of music, his ownmusic, pretty soon you’ll see the composersturn around and eventually just vanish. Theyjust withdraw. It’s too overwhelming for them.Often the foreigner brings an instrument, aphonograph or something that’s overwhelmingtechnically, and the next time the local composerwon’t be there.

Gration: No, because he can’t compete with

the technology that apparently seems necessaryin order to worship. It sounds to me that thiswhole area of ethnomusicology is not just anicety, but really a necessity. It must have beena thrill for you to hear your own tribe worshipthe Lord in their own words and music.

Chenoweth: Oh, yes! They have never heardWestern music—at least, not from my partneror me, and we were very conscious of the fact

that if we had introduced that early, they mighteven have lost their oral tradition.

Gration: This brings up an interesting ques-tion. You’ve been in situations where Westernmusic has been introduced and used over a

number of years. We’ve talked about the origi-nal, national composers shriveling up and sortof disappearing, and obviously the music itself.Are there times when it’s almost like a seed hasdied? Is it possible that at times even when it’snot even being practiced, it lies dormant, as it

were? Can you sort of blow on the embers ofthe fire, or water that seed, and it springs up?

Chenoweth: Often that’s possible. I really don’taccept the statement that “We have no musicof our own,” until no stone is left unturned ininvestigating if that’s really true. Sometimes itrests with the old people still, or sometimes, asin the islands I mentioned, it’s gone under-ground. But if it’s retained by anybody, we

want to record it.Gration: So, for some of you who are in these

areas where Western music has been used inyour national church, and you think it is abso-lutely hopeless to begin to reintroduce and torekindle the fires of indigenous music, let thisbe a word of encouragement to you—that evenwithout all the expertise of an ethnomusicologist,you can do something, at least to keep the

embers burning until maybe someone can comealong and do even more in helping them todevelop their own indigenous music. Maybeyou’ll be at least the kind of person who cangive some first aid, and to keep the patient aliveuntil the doctor can come along.

Otherwise we’re going to see people, maybefifty or a hundred years from now, as we are

experiencing literally around the world todaya cultural renaissance, who are going to lamentand weep over their loss of their culture. And Ican well believe that in the generations to comethey may rise up and call us blessed for preserv-ing some of their own indigenous music.

To wind things up, Vida, how can we helppreserve indigenous music? Not only you ethno-musicologists—and we thank the Lord for your

training and expertise—but all of us who areinvolved in missionary work.

Chenoweth: All of us can develop a sensitivityto cultural expression, and refrain from beingpejorative; that is, to either subscribe to or rejectwhat we don’t fully understand. We can encour-age creativity to aid the developing church. Thismeans encouraging national composers andavoiding introducing a foreign music system.

We can be discreet in listening to music fromhome. You may say that you like my music,but if you go home and play your own, I knowwhose music you really like. Actions speaklouder than words.

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Lastly, we can adopt the attitude of a learner,rather than of a teacher of music.

Gration: This is good, because some of uscould never even begin to pose as teachers ofmusic, and wouldn’t, but we can all be learnersof music, even without a great deal of musicalability. At least show an interest in and anappreciation for their music. I’m sure peopleare experiencing what I’ve sensed in many partsof the world, especially Africa but other placesalso, with political independence: this growingsense of their own worth and the value of theirown cultures, this cultural renaissance. And

certainly the whole area of music is a vital part

of one’s culture.

I want to thank you for sharing these helpful

insights with us, and I’m sure they’ll help all of

us to have a more significant role in ministry and

in the music and worship of the churches that

we’re related to in various parts of the world.

So, thank you, Dr. Chenoweth, and may the

Lord bless you as you continue your ministry,

literally worldwide now, in this exciting and

crucial area of ethnomusicology.

Chenoweth: It’s my pleasure.