On some methodological problems of terminology in modern music sinology

Abstract

This article raises very relevant issues related to terminological definitions characteristic of scientific works with an oriental orientation. A concrete example is the rapidly developing sphere of musical sinology in recent decades, in which there is a frequent inconsistency or inadequate mixing of terminological designations, in particular, numerous types and forms of national musical and stage art. Having a multi-year history of development, varieties of the traditional musical theater of China, often found in provinces far from the capital, are characterized by an established apparatus of ethnonyms, including the own name of each particular phenomenon. United by the general term shitsyu, they are characterized by canonicity and an integral connection with national art and traditional crafts. With the advent of the capital's jiaju theater, called the Beijing Opera, scientists of the PRC began to designate all types of national traditional theater in a similar way, which gradually led to a terminological collapse that had no place in Russian oriental studies before. The author proposes to carefully comprehend the parameters of the terminological apparatus of the modern musical sinology from the methodological standpoint of the national musical orientalism.