The academic study of music in its cultural context, examining how different ethnic groups and cultures create, perform, and use music.
From ethno- (Greek ethnos) + musicology (from music + Greek -logia, 'study'). The term was formally established in the 1950s, though earlier ethnographers had collected music.
Ethnomusicology revealed something profound: there's no universal 'music'—what counts as pleasant, in-tune, emotional, or beautiful varies wildly, meaning your musical taste is cultural training, not natural preference.
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