Course Description
This interdisciplinary music history course is built around a few basic questions: What is Country Music? Is it a genre? Is it American? If so, why? In this class we’ll explore the complex construction of country music as a 20th-century modern American musical practice.
Additional Requirements for Graduate Students:
Graduate students will be required to lead a discussion at least twice during the term, and complete a longer, more substantive final project.
Athena Title
Country Music, Race, America
Semester Course Offered
Offered fall
Grading System
A - F (Traditional)
Course Objectives
Students who successfully complete this course will be able to: • Describe the social, cultural, and political histories of what qualifies as “country music” in the United States. • Summarize the contributions of significant performers, creators, and influencers in the history of commercial country music in the United States. • Discuss how various understandings of identity map onto, influence, and find expression in performance practices. • Communicate an understanding of these outcomes in a research paper.
Topical Outline
1) Origins of “Southern” Culture 2) How folk music became folk, how commercial music became commercial 3) How the blues became the blues 4) A critical history of bluegrass 5) That Memphis sound and Elvis 6) The Nashville “hit” machine and cultural nostalgia