Center for Southeast Asian Studies Friday Forum

Andy Hicken, a doctoral student in ethnomusicology, discusses the recent emergence of romantic love songs in the popular music of Toraja, a region in Eastern Indonesia where Hicken did long-term fieldwork. Hicken claims some Toraja people compose and listen to romantic love songs in part because the songs idealize love-marriage, critiquing traditional arranged marriage and, by implication, the economic obligations of children in the exchange-based local economy.