The Musicology of Judgment
The Musicology of Judgment
This chapter considers how Bikindi’s songs were understood by the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) on the way to judgment. It begins with the initial presentation of Bikindi and his songs by prosecution and defence, which it is suggested was invariably in one of two ways. As a matter of rhetoric, Bikindi’s songs were consistently treated as either seductive or civilizing. Bikindi himself was either a Siren or Orpheus. The chapter then shows how, in spite of this rhetoric, by the time it came to judgment, music had nevertheless become irrelevant as far as the Trial Chamber was concerned. Doctrinally, all that mattered was the songs’ ‘meaning and interpretation’, and this was taken to be discernible entirely at the level of their lyrics, quite apart from their sound, setting, or performance. The final section of the chapter argues that both approaches involve a profound misunderstanding of how song works.
Keywords: genocide, incitement to genocide, freedom of expression, ICTR, Rwanda, song, musicology, music, lyrics
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