Deborah Anne Wong (born 1959) is an American academic, educator, and

ethnomusicologist Ethnomusicology is the study of music from the cultural and social aspects of the people who make it. It encompasses distinct theoretical and methodical approaches that emphasize cultural, social, material, cognitive, biological, and other dim ...

. She is known for her studies of

Asian-American Asian Americans are Americans of Asian ancestry (including naturalized Americans who are immigrants from specific regions in Asia and descendants of such immigrants). Although this term had historically been used for all the indigenous people ...

and Thai music.

Early life and education

Wong was born on the

east coast of the United States The East Coast of the United States, also known as the Eastern Seaboard, the Atlantic Coast, and the Atlantic Seaboard, is the coastline along which the Eastern United States meets the North Atlantic Ocean. The eastern seaboard contains the ...

and now lives in

California California is a state in the Western United States, located along the Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the most populous U.S. state and the 3rd largest by area. It is also the ...

. She received a Bachelor of Arts in anthropology and music from the

University of Pennsylvania The University of Pennsylvania (also known as Penn or UPenn) is a private research university in Philadelphia. It is the fourth-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and is ranked among the highest-regarded universit ...

in 1982. Wong later attended the

University of Michigan , mottoeng = "Arts, Knowledge, Truth" , former_names = Catholepistemiad, or University of Michigania (1817–1821) , budget = $10.3 billion (2021) , endowment = $17 billion (2021)As o ...

, from which she earned her master's degree and then her

PhD PHD or PhD may refer to: * Doctor of Philosophy (PhD), an academic qualification Entertainment * '' PhD: Phantasy Degree'', a Korean comic series * ''Piled Higher and Deeper ''Piled Higher and Deeper'' (also known as ''PhD Comics''), is a newsp ...

in 1991. She identifies as

Chinese-American Chinese Americans are Americans of Han Chinese ancestry. Chinese Americans constitute a subgroup of East Asian Americans which also constitute a subgroup of Asian Americans. Many Chinese Americans along with their ancestors trace lineage fro ...

, and multi-ethnic.

Scholarship

Wong has been a professor of music at the

University of California, Riverside The University of California, Riverside (UCR or UC Riverside) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Riverside, California. It is one of the ten campuses of the University of California system. Th ...

since 1996. She previously served as president of the

Society for Ethnomusicology The Society for Ethnomusicology is, with the International Council for Traditional Music and thBritish Forum for Ethnomusicology one of three major international associations for ethnomusicology. Its mission is "to promote the research, study, an ...

, and founded the Committee on the Status of Women with Elizabeth Tolbert in 1996. Wong is also the president of the Board of Directors for the Alliance for California Traditional Arts. She has served on the advisory council for the Smithsonian

Center for Folklife and Cultural Heritage The Center for Folklife & Cultural Heritage (CFCH) is one of three cultural centers within the Smithsonian Institution in the United States. Its motto is "culture of, by, and for the people", and it aims to encourage understanding and cultural sust ...

since 2011. Wong was nominated to be a member of the

National Council on the Humanities The National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) is an independent federal agency of the U.S. government, established by thNational Foundation on the Arts and the Humanities Act of 1965(), dedicated to supporting research, education, preserv ...

President Barack Obama Barack Hussein Obama II ( ; born August 4, 1961) is an American politician who served as the 44th president of the United States from 2009 to 2017. A member of the Democratic Party, Obama was the first African-American president of the U ...

in December 2015.

Asian-American studies

Wong focuses on Asian-American performance and the way it intersects with the racial imagination in America. She says, "race is very much a part of our lives, America has racist structures that drive it, and looking at race when studying music is a different approach". She used a $10,000 grant from the California Council for the Humanities to help fund the research for the site, www.asianamericanriverside.ucr.edu. She wanted to spread the word about the little-known story of the city's lively Asian community. "Asian American Riverside" is a resource for local schools and the community. The project will help support interethnic understanding and strengthen the community in

Riverside Riverside may refer to: Places Australia * Riverside, Tasmania, a suburb of Launceston, Tasmania Canada * Riverside (electoral district), in the Yukon * Riverside, Calgary, a neighbourhood in Alberta * Riverside, Manitoba, a former rural mu ...

. Wong has studied

taiko are a broad range of Japanese percussion instruments. In Japanese, the term refers to any kind of drum, but outside Japan, it is used specifically to refer to any of the various Japanese drums called and to the form of ensemble drumming ...

and is part of Satori Daiko, a performing group in Los Angeles.

Selected bibliography

* Wong's first book is about ritual performance and its implications for the cultural politics of Thai court music and dance in

Bangkok Bangkok, officially known in Thai as Krung Thep Maha Nakhon and colloquially as Krung Thep, is the capital and most populous city of Thailand. The city occupies in the Chao Phraya River delta in central Thailand and has an estimated populatio ...

in the late twentieth-century. * This book focuses on music and identity by looking at case studies. Wong has also published on Chinese-American and Japanese-American jazz, Asian-American hip-hop, and Southeast-Asian immigrant music.

Research collectives

Wong has been a part of the oral history collective project Women Who Rock: Making Scenes, Building Communities.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Wong, Deborah American ethnomusicologists Women ethnomusicologists University of Michigan alumni University of California, Riverside faculty Place of birth missing (living people) American academics of Chinese descent Living people 1959 births American women academics University of Pennsylvania School of Arts and Sciences alumni American women anthropologists 21st-century American women