Framing the field of popular music history and heritage studies

Popular music plays a significant role in individual, community and national identity. Subsequently, there is a growing international trend of incorporating popular music into discourses and practices of history and heritage. Taking the recent launch of the Australian Music Vault as an example, this chapter explores some of the implications and debates arising from the global surge in community- and government-driven popular music preservation activities, and how this is shaping the fields of popular music studies and critical heritage studies. We outline how this volume, with its diverse contributions from scholars and practitioners from around the world, offers insight into popular music in relation to its history, historiography, memory, heritage and institutions