Systematic, cognitive and historical approaches in musicology

Abstract

The aim of this paper is to discuss the relationship between systematic, cognitive and historical musicology. This will be done by outlining the historical and epistemological backgrounds, and comparing the methods and objects. It is argued that systematic and cognitive musicology have a common methodological background with a focus on the systematic way of conducting research. However, quite a lot of studies in cognitive musicology apply nonsystematic methods as well; even a historical approach to cognition is needed. The main tenet of this paper is that the backgrounds of cognitive and systematic musicology are sufficiently similar for a close and fruitful cooperation. However, because the object of the research in cognitive musicology is the human mind, also soft methods such as field work, interviews and observations have to be applied as well. In that sense, cognitive musicology may broaden the research field of systematic musicology. Cognitive musicology, especially simulations with artificial neural networks, may give new possibilities to apply systematic methods in the study of some aspects of the history of music.