Beverley Diamond (Professor of Music and the Canada Research Chair in Ethnomusicology at Memorial University of Newfoundland) established and directs the Research Centre for the Study of Music, Media, and Place (MMaP) at MU. The MMaP Centre works as an intermediary between university researchers and communities, often undertaking collaborative research production projects. The Centre runs an annual lecture series as well as symposia and conferences, and produces the Back on Track archival recording series as well as other print and AV material on relevant cultural issues in the province and beyond. Diamond is known for her research on gender issues, Canadian historiography, and indigenous music cultures. Her research on indigenous music has ranged from studies of traditional Inuit and First Nations song traditions and Saami joik, to indigenous audio recording, traditional protocols for access and ownership, and, most recently, expressive culture in relation to the Truth and Reconciliation Commission on residential schools in Canada. Most recently she co-edited Aboriginal Music in Contemporary Canada. Echoes and Exchanges (McGill-Queen’s UP, 2012) which received a Choice Academic Book award.

Active in the development of ethnomusicology in Canada at Queen’s University, York University as well as Memorial University, she has been recognized for moving Canadian music studies in new directions and mentoring a generation of scholars who have greatly expanded the histories of cultural diversity. Diamond currently serves as the President of the Society for Ethnomusicology (2013–15). She was elected to the Royal Society of Canada in 2008, named a Trudeau Fellow (2009–12), and a Member of the Order of Canada (2013). 

Diamond will give the keynote lecture at the Arctic Symposium at UC Davis in March 2015, which revisits her highly influential article, “The Music of Modern Indigeneity: From Identity to Alliance Studies.” European Meetings in Ethnomusicology [Volume 12, no. 22 (2007): 169–190].