The editor on tour in America

Abstract

Where then did African music fit into this picture? How could it make sense in this far country, except in the light of the current anti-colonialism, anti-segregation and anti-communism? Here was one of my problems in lecturing on this subject at the kind invitation of over twenty American universities which had been placed on the schedule of appointments by the State Department agency, the Conference Board of Associated Research Councils. At each of the major Universities which had an African studies section there was little need for long explanations. Both the Faculty and students connected with this division had already a sound grounding in the physical and political realities of Africa and several of my general observations do not apply to these alert groups of well informed men and women. My task, as I understood it, was to suggest a new approach to the study of African people and personality in the present day, through the recording of their indigenous aural arts, and the careful study of the data obtained in this way.