Various topics are offered.
Decolonizing/Indigenizing Popular Music in the Americas
In this course, we will examine how Indigenous musicians perform popular music idioms in ways that critique settler colonial systems and practices (decolonization) while centering Indigenous ways of knowing and being in the contemporary world (Indigenization). Specifically, we will discuss the work of Indigenous musicians who circulate and transform such genres as hip hop, country, folk, EDM, pop, trap, rock n’ roll, as well as traditional Indigenous musical idioms. Beginning with an overview of pre-conquest musical practices, we will be engaging with recent academic literature on decoloniality and Indigenous movements in the Americas to contextualize these musicians’s critiques of the continued impacts of settler colonialism on Indigenous life in songs that call attention to such issues as land degradation and seizure, resource extraction, missing and murdered Indigenous women, police violence, and inequality in housing and education. We will also consider the important work of language and cultural revitalization enacted in this repertoire that above all asserts the sovereignty of Indigenous communities in the Americas. Additional Core Requirement Met: Global Connections.
History of Electronic Dance Music
In this course we will examine the historical and stylistic evolution of electronic dance music as a global phenomenon emerging from mid-twentieth-century pop and soul to present. Through critical listening and analysis of scholarly literature, we will consider theories rhythm and groove; form and technique; the influence of party culture and technology on music production and consumption; race, class, and sexuality; and the historical evolution of a range of musical genres including house, disco, eurodance, jungle, trance, and dubstep.
Brazilian Popular Music
In this class we will survey Brazilian popular music from the colonial period to the present, examining such genres as lundu, modinha, samba, bossa nova, MPB, jazz, tropical rock, baile funk, axe, música caipira, and sertanejo. Examining these genres in their socio-historical contexts, we will think about how music has been central to the Brazilian nation-building processes while voicing the interests and concerns of the underclasses. Additional Core Requirement Met: Regional Focus.