One of the excuses that seems to be levied at the female gender for why women aren't DJs is that they're not focused enough. Frank Owen mentioned this in his 1997 article in the Village Voice, that women aren't as singularly focused as men. This thought was really troubling to me, not only as a researcher, but also as a woman. I mean, I'm doing two masters degrees myself, and can't decide what I want to do with my life... I've always had a "problem" being singularly focused, and I've beat myself up over it before.
I think this idea that people have to only be good at one thing is a holdover from the fascination with virtuosity during the nineteenth century. I think that's why the guilt about liking to do a lot of different things has really hit home for me; especially as a flute player, I'm worried that I'll never "make it" as a musician if I'm not focused enough.
This doesn't seem to be the case. We had a masterclass last night, and I was noticing how well-rounded the guest artist was. Not only was she a fantastic flute player, but she also plays racquetball, has a good voice, and is a professional artist (read: painter). She has commissioned a lot of new music, and it's obviously her passion. This caused something really obvious to click in my head; Sylvia said that she felt like she had to be versatile as a woman in the field. I wonder if part of the idea that women are "less focused" is because women must be more versatile to get jobs, whether in flute performance or as DJs? I'm not really sure if I'm on to anything here, but it was a sort of uncomfortable click for me.
About Me
- women.in.the.house
- I have masters degrees in performance and ethnomusicology, and am working on my yoga teacher training.
1 comment:
I've always had that same problem with "focus." Specialization can be good, but over specialization seems crippling, especially when not paired with collaboration.
Saying that women in general aren't as interested in blind specialization and focus sounds like a good thing. Saying that men lose touch with the wideness of the world sometimes, closing off and accepting large parts of life as not part of theirs sounds about right, and lame.
The question is whether being so singularly focused can give you a leg up, having more time put in on that one thing. Most of my favorite things I've learned about writing music I've learned from talking to people that aren't musicians, doing things that aren't playing or writing or reading about music, so most of my musicianship comes from being so poorly focused. Of course, I try to get good at other things too, so this usage of "unfocused" as a negative term seems bogus on multiple levels, especially for young people like me. : )
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