Courses

This course explores the ways music and musicians affect social change and peace. It is a laboratory for both study and action and intellectual and experiential learning that operates on four levels: (1) studying conflict and peacemaking from the interdisciplinary perspectives of international relations, political science, psychology, religion and spirituality, and the arts; (2) learning from artists, activists, and academics who will visit the course to share their projects and perspectives; (3) researching the ways music and peace intersect in history and society; and (4) creating a music and peace project individually and/or as a group. Contemporary music can be a powerful vehicle for expressing and transcending pain caused by violence, racism, poverty, war, and injustice. The course deepens understanding of political, ethnic, racial, national, and religious differences in our own lives and society, while experimenting with ways to respond.

Music and Society Topics allow students to choose from a variety of course themes that change each semester. In Music and Society Topics courses, students explore racial, ethnic, or collective identities, narratives, history, and/or cultural expression as expressed by artists and society. Students are presented with key terminology in the disciplines represented in music and society, such as gender and global studies. Individual course descriptions for each semester are available on the Liberal Arts department webpage.

In this course, students will explore the history of the American music industry from 1790 to the present day. Students will study the role of instrument manufacturers, sheet music publishers, and record labels in transforming a basic human activity—music making—into a commodity. Students will also examine the race, class, and gender stereotypes that shaped the creation and marketing of popular music in different eras. Additionally, the course will examine the complex relationship between technological innovation and intellectual property law, studying the industry’s efforts to combat piracy and control how consumers use its products. By focusing on such key moments in the industry’s history as the birth of sound recording and the invention of the electric guitar, students will finish the course with a deeper understanding of the legal, technological, and social structures that inform the creation and consumption of popular music. 

This course focuses on musical analysis, contextual cultural explorations, and study of the sociohistorical circumstances fundamental to the emergence of Cuban music and its subsequent evolution as part of the larger cultural and social history of the Americas and the Caribbean, from about the 18th to the 21st century. In addition to an introduction to key figures in the development of Cuban music, we will analyze African-derived musical traditions rooted in ritual and religious practices (e.g. bembé, abakuá, palo) and their affects on the birth of characteristic secular urban and rural genres like contradanza, son, son montuno, comparsa, and rumba. The continuing influence of these major genres on contemporary Cuban music styles such as timba, as well as their longstanding international reach, will be investigated from the perspectives of artistic innovation and aesthetic synthesis, ongoing processes of musical hybridization, and the implicit social struggles of both musicians and cultural carriers at the core of many of these musical expressions.

In this course, students will explore the development of radio and television in the United States. The first half of the course will provide a technological, legal, and commercial framework for understanding radio and television’s origins. Particular emphasis will be given to the formation of networks, the creation of the Federal Communications Commission, and the fraught relationship between major broadcast corporations and musicians’ unions (e.g. American Federation of Musicians) and performance rights organizations (e.g. ASCAP and BMI). The second half of the course will focus specifically on the role of music in shaping our experience of radio and television. Through a series of case studies, students will explore the use of music in a variety of contexts: in sitcoms, dramas and crime procedurals; in educational programs and concert broadcasts; on MTV, American Bandstand, and Soul Train; and in cartoons such as South Park. Students will finish the course with a deeper understanding of how radio and television mirror social, political, and musical currents in the popular culture. 

This course explores the concepts of transformational power in music using musical examples from several different cultures. The desire to connect spiritually through music has been found to be virtually universal, but music can communicate that which is beyond language in both sacred and secular settings. Western culture's 21st-century influence has shown that the pervasiveness of music and emphasis on entertainment can cause us not to always recognize its power. How do we define power and music in current cultural trends? Through guided listening to recordings of music from around the world, viewing films, interviews with guest speakers and musicians, and class discussions, students explore the forms and context of music from different places around the world and make connections between music, transformation, and spirituality. 

This course encompasses the study of musicians who lived in Laurel Canyon, in Los Angeles, California, between the years 1964--1970, including Joni Mitchell; Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young; Mama Cass; Frank Zappa, Jim Morrison; and many others. Students explore the evolution of popular music in this particular place and time. Students also examine the ways that the events and culture of the time contributed to this musical evolution, and the ways that the musical response affected culture. By exploring these connections, students come to see how songwriters engage with their environment as they attempt to write music that reaches and influences a large audience. The class emphasizes the importance of artists considering the world around them, and their place in it, as they create work that feels fulfilling to them, and also inspirational to others.