Roy Cape's labour of love: theorising work ethics through musical biography

Abstract

AbstractWhile the recent scholarship on labour in cultural industries has drawn attention to the conditions and experiences of ‘creative’ workers, few publications have addressed the ethical values informing their work. In contrast to the widespread assumption that the commercialisation of culture in this era has led to the curtailing of moral values, this article argues that artistic work has never ceased to be informed by moral values, albeit not universal ones. I draw on recent theoretical considerations raised by Mark Banks concerning Alasdair MacIntyre's and Pierre Bourdieu's theories on work ethics within the problematics of creative and cultural industries. I provide an ethnographically grounded case study that extends the presentation of Roy Cape: A Life on the Calypso and Soca Bandstand. The analysis offered suggests how the relationship between what MacIntyre calls the ‘internal and external goods' of a practice requires considerable historical and ethnographic contextualisation. I argue for a pragmatic and experience-centred approach to work ethics in the context of the broader discussion of creative labour.