**Abstract**

The present investigation seeks to analyze the problem of access to knowledge about the other, through the study of music as a representative medium of alterity in a selection of animated short films. The original contribution of the academic dissertation is based on generating a sound approach to the phenomenon of otherness, through a programmatic analysis of music within a selection of animated films with nonvococentric characteristics. The research starts from a different approach of the conceptual language that names and appropriates the other, making it lose its specificity and idiosyncrasy as an alternative. In this sense, music emerges as an opportunity to meet with the notions of otherness, because it does not appropriate the other by not having the ability to name; on the contrary, music requires the other to be heard, to be performed, and it is said, music is a phenomenon that always tends to manifest itself from otherness. The visual and sound narrative analysis of cinematic works will be based on the theoretical framework of authors such as Jacques Derrida, Emmanuel Levinas, and Michel Chion, as a starting point to define the concepts of otherness, foreignness, alterity, totality, infinity, music, and leitmotiv.

**Keywords:** animation, films, leitmotiv, music, narrative, otherness

### **1. Introduction**

Who is the other? Is this perhaps the fundamental question to answer when we refer to everything that is outside of my own person, essence, or limits; or otherness is an inaccessible philosophical problem because every methodological and epistemic approach to the other is always conditioned by the subjectivity of the self. "The other … He invented a face. Behind her she lived died and rose again many times. Your face today has the wrinkles of that face. Their wrinkles have no face" [1]. As the brilliant poetry of Octavio Paz presents it, the phenomenon of the other is intervened by a mask, by a face alien to his ego, which, in the manner of an oxymoron, makes us more impossible, a more intimate approach with his exteriority. The mask is shown as a phenomenon, which we can observe, study, and analyze, but, nevertheless, the face of the other remains hidden in an unintelligible space. Paz's prose makes us wonder how can we access and know the other? He invented a face, however, does not specify who has invented that mask. Has the other put it on his own will, or was it invented and imposed on his behalf? Derrida mentions, when speaking of the act of the invention of the other, that every act of invention focuses on the search for a rhetorical element or construct, but fundamentally presupposes certain notions of illegality and ruptures with what he calls the implicit contract, establishing a distortion on the peaceful order of things ([2], pp. 1).

**97**

**2. Methodology**

*Music as a Medium of Encounter of Otherness in Animated Cinema*

In this same way, the other bursts into the naturalness or normality of the order of the self, presenting a mask that is imposed rhetorically from my own existence to be able to understand its nature from my ego. On the other hand, Levinas recognizes the primordial role of the face, because the face allows us a first encounter with the human. It focuses on the recognition of a being similar to the self in each of its features, that is, it allows to recognize another similar to my individuality [3]. However, it also exhibits the other from its own singularity in the notion of a different and unique face in its essence. "Totality and infinity describes the epiphany of the face as a disenchantment of the world. But the face as a face is the nakedness -and the stripping 'of the poor, of the widow, of the orphan, of the foreigner' and its expression indicates 'you will not kill'" [3]. The alterity is shown to us as a phenomenon that seems to have an oxymoron principle, so that the face is what allows us both to recognize ourselves as a simile, and also makes it possible to distinguish it as an alien to myself, with its own nature, limits, and singularities. This apparently contradictory condition is one that raises the complexity of knowing the other; however, it is possible to visualize different perspectives and methods to try to understand the uniqueness of the external. It is fundamental to emphasize that the construction of the vision of the face is not limited merely to the sphere of the pictorial; clearly presents a representation in function of effigy, but, nevertheless, the notion of the face is also present as an allegory of everything that arises from an exteriority exhibited in any sense and form, from which we will rescue primarily the expression and representation of the sonorous. The access to knowledge with the other is considered as a complex and paradoxical relationship between the self and the alternative. The notion of otherness is outlined from the exteriority and infinity, that is, from the notion of the foreigner, the stranger, the unknown, and the alien to my totality. The encounter with the other requires a process of appointment that can end up constructing it and delimiting it under my subjectivity, causing it to lose all its specific and individual qualities as another. That is why more abstract and programmatic codes such as music emerge as an opportunity to access knowledge about the alternative. In the particular case of music, the voice it emerges as the immaterial face of the other, as Levinas affirms with the role of the face as a form of encounter with the human and with the outside, now, music is presented as an exteriority to the infinite, that is, it is shown as the encounter with the face of otherness from the immaterial and ideal sound abstraction. "The face stops

the totalization" [3], the appropriation of the other finds a brake when encountering the face, because it poses a first encounter with the external; in addition, the face presents the approach with an unrepeatable individual with your own unique traits. The present research project focuses on conducting a study on the constitution of the various representations of the other, from the immateriality of sound in a series of animated short films. Notions like the enemy, the foreigner, and infinity will be addressed throughout a narrative analysis of a selection of nonvococentric films, where the role of music and image acquires a fundamental role in the con-

The research method is of a qualitative nature and is structured mainly in two stages: an exploratory phase and a propositive phase. This procedure is constituted in the structure of the grounded theory method, where it is not possible to have a precondition of the object studied, until initially and iteratively acquire a collection and interpretation of the data. The first stage is designed to carry out an extensive bibliographic and audiovisual review of the phenomenon of alterity, from the critical framework of authors such as Emmanuel Levinas, Jacques Derrida, and Michel Chion. The selected case studies in this stage of the investigation will focus on three

struction of the sonorous effigy of the other.

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.83691*

#### *Music as a Medium of Encounter of Otherness in Animated Cinema DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.83691*

In this same way, the other bursts into the naturalness or normality of the order of the self, presenting a mask that is imposed rhetorically from my own existence to be able to understand its nature from my ego. On the other hand, Levinas recognizes the primordial role of the face, because the face allows us a first encounter with the human. It focuses on the recognition of a being similar to the self in each of its features, that is, it allows to recognize another similar to my individuality [3]. However, it also exhibits the other from its own singularity in the notion of a different and unique face in its essence. "Totality and infinity describes the epiphany of the face as a disenchantment of the world. But the face as a face is the nakedness -and the stripping 'of the poor, of the widow, of the orphan, of the foreigner' and its expression indicates 'you will not kill'" [3]. The alterity is shown to us as a phenomenon that seems to have an oxymoron principle, so that the face is what allows us both to recognize ourselves as a simile, and also makes it possible to distinguish it as an alien to myself, with its own nature, limits, and singularities. This apparently contradictory condition is one that raises the complexity of knowing the other; however, it is possible to visualize different perspectives and methods to try to understand the uniqueness of the external. It is fundamental to emphasize that the construction of the vision of the face is not limited merely to the sphere of the pictorial; clearly presents a representation in function of effigy, but, nevertheless, the notion of the face is also present as an allegory of everything that arises from an exteriority exhibited in any sense and form, from which we will rescue primarily the expression and representation of the sonorous.

The access to knowledge with the other is considered as a complex and paradoxical relationship between the self and the alternative. The notion of otherness is outlined from the exteriority and infinity, that is, from the notion of the foreigner, the stranger, the unknown, and the alien to my totality. The encounter with the other requires a process of appointment that can end up constructing it and delimiting it under my subjectivity, causing it to lose all its specific and individual qualities as another. That is why more abstract and programmatic codes such as music emerge as an opportunity to access knowledge about the alternative. In the particular case of music, the voice it emerges as the immaterial face of the other, as Levinas affirms with the role of the face as a form of encounter with the human and with the outside, now, music is presented as an exteriority to the infinite, that is, it is shown as the encounter with the face of otherness from the immaterial and ideal sound abstraction. "The face stops the totalization" [3], the appropriation of the other finds a brake when encountering the face, because it poses a first encounter with the external; in addition, the face presents the approach with an unrepeatable individual with your own unique traits.

The present research project focuses on conducting a study on the constitution of the various representations of the other, from the immateriality of sound in a series of animated short films. Notions like the enemy, the foreigner, and infinity will be addressed throughout a narrative analysis of a selection of nonvococentric films, where the role of music and image acquires a fundamental role in the construction of the sonorous effigy of the other.

### **2. Methodology**

The research method is of a qualitative nature and is structured mainly in two stages: an exploratory phase and a propositive phase. This procedure is constituted in the structure of the grounded theory method, where it is not possible to have a precondition of the object studied, until initially and iteratively acquire a collection and interpretation of the data. The first stage is designed to carry out an extensive bibliographic and audiovisual review of the phenomenon of alterity, from the critical framework of authors such as Emmanuel Levinas, Jacques Derrida, and Michel Chion. The selected case studies in this stage of the investigation will focus on three

**96**

**Chapter**

**Abstract**

**1. Introduction**

*Luis Daniel Martínez Álvarez*

Music as a Medium of Encounter

of Otherness in Animated Cinema

The present investigation seeks to analyze the problem of access to knowledge about the other, through the study of music as a representative medium of alterity in a selection of animated short films. The original contribution of the academic dissertation is based on generating a sound approach to the phenomenon of otherness, through a programmatic analysis of music within a selection of animated films with nonvococentric characteristics. The research starts from a different approach of the conceptual language that names and appropriates the other, making it lose its specificity and idiosyncrasy as an alternative. In this sense, music emerges as an opportunity to meet with the notions of otherness, because it does not appropriate the other by not having the ability to name; on the contrary, music requires the other to be heard, to be performed, and it is said, music is a phenomenon that always tends to manifest itself from otherness. The visual and sound narrative analysis of cinematic works will be based on the theoretical framework of authors such as Jacques Derrida, Emmanuel Levinas, and Michel Chion, as a starting point to define the concepts of otherness, foreignness, alterity, totality, infinity, music, and leitmotiv.

Who is the other? Is this perhaps the fundamental question to answer when we refer to everything that is outside of my own person, essence, or limits; or otherness is an inaccessible philosophical problem because every methodological and epistemic approach to the other is always conditioned by the subjectivity of the self. "The other … He invented a face. Behind her she lived died and rose again many times. Your face today has the wrinkles of that face. Their wrinkles have no face" [1]. As the brilliant poetry of Octavio Paz presents it, the phenomenon of the other is intervened by a mask, by a face alien to his ego, which, in the manner of an oxymoron, makes us more impossible, a more intimate approach with his exteriority. The mask is shown as a phenomenon, which we can observe, study, and analyze, but, nevertheless, the face of the other remains hidden in an unintelligible space. Paz's prose makes us wonder how can we access and know the other? He invented a face, however, does not specify who has invented that mask. Has the other put it on his own will, or was it invented and imposed on his behalf? Derrida mentions, when speaking of the act of the invention of the other, that every act of invention focuses on the search for a rhetorical element or construct, but fundamentally presupposes certain notions of illegality and ruptures with what he calls the implicit contract,

**Keywords:** animation, films, leitmotiv, music, narrative, otherness

establishing a distortion on the peaceful order of things ([2], pp. 1).

fundamental criteria. The first refers to the format of the short film, because, thanks to its short extension, it constitutes an exercise of symbolic synthesis, as well as it is possible to access more study cases. The second criterion refers to the animated film product that today there is still a large fertile field for critical investigations of the role of music from animated cinema [4]. The third criterion is structured on the principle of selection of nonvococentric film narratives, because in this type of stories, music acquires a more active role within the cinematic narratives.
