The Bagpipe Society

Talking about Pipes, Part 2

Previously on…

In the previous part, we discussed how semiotics can be applied to musicology and bagpipe studies and we outlined the basic concepts and ideas we can derive from the bagpipe lexicon. We tried to trace some points of the instrument’s history and possible intercultural connections based on lexical similarities. Lexics is a robust field of study as you have direct linguistic data and elaborated analysis methodologies. But the second part of the study can seem a little trickier and impractical. Why would one care for such a thing as myths about musical instruments, which at first glance barely can be considered as an important part of cultural heritage but just a lack of knowledge, or education, even just simple superstitions?

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