Tobias Pontara
About Tobias Pontara
Research
Two overarching themes have been central in my research over the past twenty years. The first can be described as a question of how depictions and representations of music influence people's ideas of what music is, how we should value music, and how we conceptualize and construct its meaning. The second question concerns the role of music itself (as well as sound) in shaping our perceptions of the world around us.
In my doctoral thesis "Letters From the World of Autonomous Music: The Discursive Construction of Musical Autonomy in the Contemporary Classical Record-Sleeve" from 2007, I examined how historically influential ideas about Western art music are reproduced in contemporary discourses linked to the international record industry. Since completing my thesis, my research has mainly revolved around three different areas: (1) film music and audiovisual world-making; (2) cultural and media-oriented studies focusing on discourses about music; and (3) music philosophy and aesthetics. In my research on film music, I have combined theoretical articles addressing fundamental concepts and issues in film music research and audiovisual studies with interpretations and analyses of specific films. The music philosophical research has focused on epistemological, methodological, and hermeneutic issues related both to musicological scholarship and to Anglo-American analytic music philosophy.
In the research project "Everyday Devices: Mediatization, Disciplining, and localization of music in Sweden 1900-1970" (funded by the Swedish Research Council 2016-2018), I studied how ideas about music listening are expressed and transformed in Swedish films between 1930 and 1970. In the research project "Tarkovsky's Soundtracks: The Significance of Music and Sound in Andrei Tarkovsky's Cinema" (funded by RJ Sabbatical 2018), I examined the role of music and sound in the films of the Russian director Andrei Tarkovsky. This project resulted in three scholarly articles and the monograph "Andrei Tarkovsky's Sounding Cinema: Music and Meaning from Solaris to The Sacrifice" (Routledge, 2020).
More recently, research focused on cultural and media theory has come to the forefront. Between 2018 and 2023 I was project leader for the research project "Classical Music for a Mediatized World: Visual and Audiovisual Representations of Western Art Music in Contemporary Media and Society" (funded by the Swedish Research Council) The project involved five researchers focusing on the representation of Western classical music in different types of contemporary media. The aim of the project was to deepen understanding of classical music as a cultural and mediatized contemporary phenomenon, with specific focus on the following research questions: (1) What are the predominant conceptions of classical music advanced by present-day mediatized discourses of the art form? (2) How, by what means, are these conceptions produced and communicated in contemporary media texts and representations? (3) How do media texts and representations of classical music relate to broader ongoing discourses on art, subjectivity, identity, gender, class, aesthetic experience, artistic value and cultural status? (4) How, and to what extent, are contemporary media representations of classical music implicated in a “politics of representation” by either reinforcing or challenging subject positions and regimes of representation traditionally accompanying the presentation and performance of classical music?
In the autumn of 2023, I initiated the research project "Conspiracy Soundtracks: The Role of Music and Sound in Audiovisually Mediated Conspiracy Theoretical Discourse" (funded by the Swedish Foundation for Humanities and Social Sciences 2023-2026/27). The project examines how soundtrack phenomena – sound, music, silence, and voice-over – are mobilized to convey conspiracy theoretical messages in a media society increasingly characterized by multimodal and audiovisual communication. The central research question is: how and to what extent are sound elements involved in the audiovisual communication of conspiracy theoretical truth claims and worldviews?
I am a member of the interdisciplinary research school "The Future of Democracy: Cultural Analyses of Illiberal Populism in Times of Crisis" (funded by the Swedish Research Council 2023-2027), where I am among other things the main supervisor for a doctoral student. The aim of the research school is to develop methods and theories from cultural studies perspectives to analyze the populist movements threatening democratic development in Sweden and around the world. The research school includes researchers and doctoral students from the University of Gothenburg, Uppsala University, Linköping University, Lund University, Södertörn University, and Linnaeus University. Among the represented subjects are gender studies, ethnology, cultural studies, and musicology.
Teaching
I have taught in most areas of musicology: music history, music theory and analysis, popular music studies, film music, contemporary composition techniques, music and cultural theory, music aesthetics and philosophy, feminist and gender perspectives in musicology, music and media theory, opera, and ethnomusicology. I have also supervised a large number of essays at all levels and have served as the main supervisor and assistant supervisor for several research projects at the doctoral level. In addition to this, I have also taught at the two bachelor's programs – the Bachelor's Program Culture and Media, aesthetics and cultural entrepreneurship (MEK) – at the Department of Cultural Sciences. I was also involved in the development of the latter program (MEK). I have also taught in the Master’s Program in Culture and Democracy. Both in my teaching and previously as the director of studies in musicology (2014-2017) at the University of Gothenburg, I have sought to develop pedagogical perspectives and teaching methods aimed at a more research-based, problem-oriented, and student-active teaching approach.
Other
Between 2018 and 2021, I was the Deputy Head of Research at the Department of Cultural Sciences.
Since spring 2023, I have been a member of the Academic Appointments Board (Lärarförslagsnämnden) at the Faculty of Humanities, University of Gothenburg.
As of January 1, 2024, I am a member of the Royal Swedish Academy of Music's research committee.
Together with Catharina Thörn (Professor of Cultural Studies at the Department of Cultural Sciences, University of Gothenburg), I ran the podcast "Film Worlds" between 2020 and 2022: https://play.gu.se/channel/Filmvärldar/365188