This past May, the Department of Music celebrated the retirement of two cherished faculty, each of whom have been with the University for more than two decades: Jocelyne Guilbault, Professor of Ethnomusicology; and Cindy Cox, Professor of Composition. We published a post on Cindy’s distinguished career earlier this month, and today we recognize Jocelyne Guilbault, Ethnomusicology Professor in the Department of Music.
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Jocelyne Guilbault joined Berkeley’s Department of Music as a Professor of Ethnomusicology in 1998, while also lending her expertise to Berkeley’s Theater, Dance, and Performance Studies department as well as the African American Studies department. Over this time, Jocelyne helped cultivate one of the best Ethnomusicology programs in the country, with her expertise in research and remarkable mentorship abilities enriching the Berkeley student population.
Since 1980, Jocelyne has done extensive fieldwork in the French Creole- and English-speaking islands of the Caribbean on both traditional and popular music. Informed by a postcolonial perspective, she published several articles on issues of representation, aesthetics, West Indian music industries, multiculturalism, world music, and the politics of musical bonding.
Jocelyne is the author of Zouk: World Music in the West Indies (U of Chicago Press, 1993), a study that maps the complex musical network among the French-Creole speaking islands, and the vexed relations that are articulated through music between the West Indian French Departments and the Metropole, France. Her book, Governing Sound: the Cultural Politics of Trinidad’s Carnival Musics (U of Chicago Press, 2007), explores the ways the calypso music scene became audibly entangled with projects of governing, audience demands, and market incentives. In Roy Cape: A Lifetime on the Calypso and Soca Bandstand (Duke U Press, 2014), an experiment in dialogic co-authorship with a reputed Trinidadian calypso and soca band leader, she engages the audible entanglements of circulation, reputation and sound. She is the co-editor of Border Crossings: New Directions in Music Studies (Repercussion, 1999-2000) and of Sounds of Vacation: Political Economies of Caribbean Tourism (Duke U Press, 2019).
In addition to her academic work and research, Professor Guilbault served on several editorial boards in addition to being a board member of the Canadian Music Society, the Society for Ethnomusicology, the Caribbean Studies Association, and the Board of Governors of the University of California Humanities. She is the co-founder of the interdisciplinary journal, Music Research Annual.
While she has been deeply engaged in research in her academic life, she has viewed her work with graduate and undergraduate students at UC Berkeley over the past twenty-five years as most rewarding. For her, mentoring students has been not only a continual learning and inspiring experience, but also a privilege to have been in the position to help some of them find their own paths during their journey at Berkeley. This devotion is seen when speaking with Jocelyne’s former students, such as this quote from Carla Brunet:
“I consider myself privileged to have been able to work with Jocelyne Guilbault since she arrived at Berkeley. In fact, we began together in 1998 - I was the first graduate student Jocelyne served as a Dissertation Chair for at UC Berkeley. Jocelyne has always been dedicated in her support of students pursuing their research interests, seeing them through any obstacles to their completion. She has been a continuing advocate for the importance of and value of my research and teaching and I owe her a great deal. “ - Carla Brunet, Lecturer, Department of Music
Speaking on the occasion of Jocelyne’s retirement, Department of Music Chair David Milnes–her colleague of more than 20 years–had similarly glowing remarks for Professor Guilbault:
"Jocelyne’s passion for her subject lit a fire inside her students, nurturing a love of Ethnomusicology for generations of Berkeley graduates. Her diligent and insightful research was a perfect representation of our department, reflecting the breadth, depth, and rigor of the academic subjects we pursue.
On a personal level, Jocelyne’s warmth and kindness will be sincerely missed, as she cultivated deep and meaningful friendships with many students, faculty, and staff. For more than 20 years we were honored to count Jocelyne among our ranks, but will be heartened to see her lasting influence through the many, many talented academics she brought to the field of Ethnomusicology." - David Milnes, Chair, Department of Music
The Department of Music thanks Jocelyne for her outstanding work, with wishes for many happy and relaxing years in retirement.