Popular Music in the United States (Music 80P)

Instructor: Samuel Cushman 

Email: sbcushma@gmail.com

Course Description:

This is a survey of American popular music in cultural context, from the beginnings of mass media to the late twentieth century and beyond. Fields of inquiry will include the blues, minstrelsy, the social construction of "pure" Anglo-/Irish-American history through parlor song and "country" music, mixtures of Latin American and Afro-Caribbean cultures in the 1950s-70s, first "post-racial" musics of the post-war economic boom (when "race music" is refigured as "rhythm and blues"), musics of the civil rights eras, the Chicago roots of the 'British invasion,' the rise of funk and hip-hop as modes of community empowerment, the cultural meanings of "indy" and commercial pop in the late 20th century, and recent impacts of digital media and social networking on R&B and electronic dance music. The course moves chronologically and focuses in particular on narratives of race that inform our ways of valuing racial categories as they intersect with gender, sexuality, class, and evolving notions of culture and society in the United States.

Learning outcomes:

  • To understand concepts important in the production and history of popular music of the United States

  • Learn to hear, and interpret, basic elements of musical expression

  • Develop awareness of differences and similarities among popular music practices, in the context of struggles for social justice and quests for cultural belonging

  • Explore past and present relationships between musical communities, the music industry, and forms of mass media

 All course content (readings, listening, assignments) will be accessible through this Canvas site.

Coursework:

The course is divided into five units:  During Week 1 you are expected to complete all videos, listening examples, and readings for Units I and II. You will be assigned a listening response for Unit I and a quiz for Unit II. After that, you will be assigned a listening response and quiz for each weekly unit.

  • Week 1:  Unit I — Foundations: Diaspora, Folk Music, Audiences of Popular Music: 1800 –1920                                

    Unit II — The 'Jazz' Age' (1920-1948)

  • Week 2: Unit III — Ten Years Before Teenagers (1949–1959)

  • Week 3: Unit IV — Cultural Revolution (1960-1984) (Midterm Exam on Weds, 8/12)

  • Week 4:  Unit V — Globalized hip-hop, Consumer-producers, and the Remaking of Popular Culture (1985 - present)

  • Week 5: Review and Final Exam

Exams and Quizzes:

Each 2-week unit includes two quizzes — the first week in each unit covers only one week's materials and is worth a small portion of your grade. The second quiz in each unit is cumulative for that unit, including two week's lectures; it will include challenging "extra credit" questions involving listening, and an opportunity to apply what you know with (mostly) unfamiliar listening examples.

There will be a (90-minute) midterm exam due Wednesday, August 12 by 10 PM. This exam will covers Units I-III. Please ensure you have at least 90 minutes (preferably 2 hours) of available time in which to take the exam between 11:00 AM and 10 PM on Wednesday, August 12.

There will be a (120-minute) final exam due Wednesday, August 26 by 10 PM. This exam will be cumulative but will focus primarily on Units IV-V. Please ensure you have at least 2 hours of available time in which to take the exam between 11 am and 10 pm on Wednesday, August 26.

All quizzes and exams will consist of multiple-choice questions, some pertaining to information in the lectures and readings, and a smaller number with listening examples. Lecture outlines will be made available online, but these are only meant to help you organize the thoughts you've represented in your own note-taking. Students do not generally answer more than about 2/3 of the quiz questions correctly if they have relied on the outlines alone.

 

Listening:

In each of the units above, you will find anywhere from 3 to 12+ listening lists, increasing in number as we go along. In each listening list, I'll ask you to listen carefully to a few tracks, and to be familiar with them, as preparation for your other work in the course. The increasing number of lists reflects the increasing diversity of musical styles and audiences reached by popular media. (As the number of lists increases, the required listening from each list will diminish.)

Our listening lists in Units I & II are accompanied by specific listening guidelines: helpful hints on what to listen for, and how to take notes while listening. The first unit's guidelines focus on how to describe melody, accompaniment, a sense of pulse or beat, and your interpretation of lyrics. Unit II listening guidelines invite you to describe musical form and arrangement, and the relationship between a familiar melody and a spontaneous improvisation. In UNITS III-V, you will make use of the listening strategies learned in UNITS I & II, gaining more practice as you, and using the course terms in increasingly advanced ways.


Required Reading:

There is no printed textbook for this course. All required readings (approx. 50-70 pages per week) are linked to the Unit modules in the "Home" page [find the link at the top of the left menu from any page in the course site].

 

Other Class Activities:

The course activities include "attending" and note-taking with video lectures, weekly quizzes, critical listening discussions [see Coursework below], a mid-term, a final exam, and engagement with live office-hour sessions.

How to write the listening responses:

In each unit, following one of several prompts within the "Listening Responses" section, you will write a response related to your listening experiences. There will be several options in each unit, and you will choose only one. Your responses will typically compare two (or more) songs in greater detail, and will include references to the content of the course readings along with other sources online where appropriate. Write your post offline, so that you have your own copy in case of a website error. Your response should exclusively represent your original writing on the listening, except where you've clearly cited course readings.

Your four listening responses (one due each week starting in Week 2) will each be worth 8 points. To get full credit for the unit, after you submit your listening response, you will also need to promote deeper discussion by offering substantial thoughts and questions in response to teaching assistants' and peers' posts (4 additional points). Begin your discussion participation by clicking "Reply" on one of your classmates' or TAs' posts. To ensure full credit, make sure your replies make substantive points, and/or ask substantive questions (no "yes/no" questions!). Try to invite serious conversation!

Lateness:

Late listening responses are  marked down 1 point if submitted after the deadline but still on the same day, and 2 points are deducted for assignments submitted the following day or later. We do not grade late assignments until after the following unit's work has been graded. You will not receive feedback when you score is lower due to lateness, but you can seek feedback in office hours.

Academic Integrity:

Academic misconduct or dishonesty—including any activities meeting descriptions in the UCSC Student Policies and Regulations Handbook Section 102.01—will result in zero course credit for the work in question, and a report to your academic preceptor, which may lead to serious consequences, including suspension or expulsion, depending upon your current academic record. Serious, premeditated, or repeated instances of academic dishonesty may result in your removal from the course, or a course grade of F.

 

Accommodating individual learning differences in our classroom or in our coursework:

If you qualify for classroom accommodations because of a disability, please get an Accommodation Authorization from the Disability Resource Center (DRC) and feel free to send it to me via email or bring it to me in person. For more information, contact the DRC at 459-2089 (voice), 459-4806 (TTY), or visit them at http://drc.ucsc.edu.

Even if you don’t have a specific DRC qualification, please take the time to let me know if there is any aspect of our learning environment that could be improved to help you get the most out of the class.

Grading:

  • 4 short-essay listening responses: 20 %  (Due Weeks 2-5)

  • Participation in discussion sections: 15 % 

  • 4 unit quizzes: 20% (Units 2-5)

  • Mid-Term Exam: 20% (Wednesday, August 12)

  • Final Exam:   25 % (Wednesday, August 26)

Your TAs and I are committed to assigning grades based on what you do, not based on who you are (or what we think or hope your potential may be). Grading this many students is difficult, however, and demands careful and sensitive attention to issues of fairness. Please do not ask your TAs to consider special circumstances to excuse lateness or poor performance. By maintaining a gracious and humble approach to participation in the course assignments you will make it easier for us to be consistent and fair. Please assume the very best intentions from your TAs — their decisions are not to be taken personally. If you believe that based on the work that you accomplished, a grade has been incorrectly calculated; or if you feel uncertain about what was expected of you, we DO want to hear from you, and we look forward to the conversation!