PRODUCTION PERSPECTIVES IN THE SOCIOLOGY OF MUSIC Timothy J. Dowd This article appeared in the following publication: Dowd, Timothy J. 2004. “Production perspectives in the sociology of music.” Poetics 32: 235-246. Abstract The emergence of the Production of Culture and Art Worlds perspectives in the 1970s was a pivotal moment in the study of musical production. In subsequent years, the musical production literature experienced a notable growth – both in the number of works and theoretical perspectives. This paper surveys these recent works and, by attending to specific examples, provides some indication of the various perspectives now employed in the literature. It proceeds by attending to the six constraints that shape the creation, performance, and dissemination of music. 1. Introduction Despite its potential contribution, sociology has historically devoted little attention to music – with a smattering of works addressing musical production in the early and mid 1900s (Dowd, 2002). In recent times, however, a burgeoning literature shows, in Becker's (1986: 276) words, the "utility of studying music as the result of the collective activity of people involved in the musical process." This burgeoning owes much to developments in the 1970s and early 1980s, when the “Art Worlds" and "Production of Culture" perspectives emerged from the works of Becker (1974, 1982), Hirsch (1972, 1975), Peterson and Berger (1975), and Peterson (1976, 1978). From their respective beginnings, both perspectives focused on similar concerns, and both