Today’s conversation is with Maya Cunningham, who teaches in the School of Performing Arts at American University in Washington, D.C. Along with scholarly articles, she is the author of the forthcoming book Jazz Malungaje: Understanding the Cultural Identity Implications in African American Jazz from the South African Jazz Tradition. She is also a trained and practicing jazz vocalist with extensive performance history. In this conversation, we discuss African American musical history, Black study and community work, and the place of ethnography and enthomusicology in the field of Black Studies.