Popular Musics of the World, Spring 2005

Abstract:: This course focuses on popular music, i.e. music created for and transmitted by mass media. Various popular music genres from around the world will be studied through listening, reading and written assignments, with an emphasis on class discussion. In particular, we will consider issues of musical change, syncretism, Westernization, globalization, the impact of recording industries, and the post-colonial era. Case studies will include Afro-pop, reggae, bhangra, rave, and global hip-hop.

Topics in Culture and Globalization: Reggae as Transnational Culture, Fall 2010

Abstract:: This course considers reggae, or Jamaican popular music more generally—in its various forms (ska, rocksteady, roots, dancehall)—as constituted by international movements and exchanges and as a product that circulates globally in complex ways. By reading across the reggae literature, as well as considering reggae texts themselves (songs, films, videos, and images), students will scrutinize the different interpretations of reggae's significance and the implications of different interpretations of the story of Jamaica and its music. Beginning with a consideration of how Jamaica's popular music industry emerged out of transnational exchanges, the course will proceed to focus on reggae's circulation outside of Jamaica via diasporic networks and commercial mediascapes. Among other sites, we will consider reggae's resonance and impact elsewhere in the Anglo Caribbean (e.g., Trinidad, Barbados), the United Kingdom (including British reggae styles but also such progeny as jungle, grime, and dubstep), the United States (both as reggae per se and in hip-hop), Panama and Puerto Rico and other Latin American locales (e.g., Brazil), Japan and Australia, as well as West, South, and East Africa (Cte d'Ivoire, Tanzania, Uganda).