The general conceptual framework –drawing from a variety of theoretical schools, from the Frankfurt School investigation of the culture industry to British Cultural Studies’ valorization of audience activity--will be accompanied by specific investigations of the workings of particular aspects of the field --the music press and the role of criticism, the impact of music videos, the workings of the industry, songs and genres, public performance and participation, fans and subcultures and the nature of the ‘pop star’. Even though the course will necessarily concentrate on Western produced music –specifically that produced in the US and the UK— a variety of non-Western popular music forms such as Jamaican reggae, Algerian rai, Brazilian bossa nova and MPB, Puerto Rican salsa and Nigerian afrobeat among others will be specifically looked at.

This is a general survey course exploring and analyzing the history and meaning of popular recorded music within mass culture and society. It focuses on the historical, aesthetic, social, political-economic and technological developments that have shaped the very definition of the popular, while at the same time encompassing a variety of aspects of recorded music from the history of the record industry to the concept of the recorded, from rock and other nationally specific styles to MTV and MP3.

Various historically determined techniques and styles of production, performance, dissemination and re-production are also investigated. Other topics covered are the use of recorded music as a tool of ideological production and as a site of resistance, the idea of commodification and reification of musical experience in the recorded object, the cross-cultural determinations of specific musical forms, the implications for creativity and politics of a global and highly concentrated industry, cultural negotiations, issues of copyright and questions relating to gender, ethnicity and race.

By the end of the course students will be able to approach popular recorded music through a highly nuanced and complex set of theoretical frameworks while at the same time be in the position of placing historically –both within the musical field and the wider cultural and social arena—the musical artifacts that they encounter as listeners.

The mid-term and final exams will be indicative of the level of engagement with the raw materials of the course while the short papers and the final paper will demonstrate how those raw materials –the theoretical and historical notions discussed in class—will have been put to use. The student will have achieved the course objectives if their understanding (and appreciation) of popular recorded music will be theoretically and historically based and their research and/or critical methods will convincingly be demonstrated through their analytic practice.

Week 1: Introduction to Popular Culture and Popular Music

Week 2: Theories of Popular and Mass Culture

Week 3: Histories of Popular Recorded Music I

Week 4: Histories of Popular Recorded Music II

Week 5:  Histories of Popular Recorded Music III

Week 6: Identities and Popular Music: Authenticity and Simulacra

            -Case Study: Jamaican Soundsystems: Ska, Rocksteady and Reggae

Week 7: Race, Communities and Subcultures

-Case Study: Disco Dancing, Vogueing and Rave Culture

Week 8: Girl Groups, Cock Rock and Riot Girrrrrls: Gender and Sexuality in Popular Music

Week 9: Text and Contexts/Texts and Meanings  

-Case Study: Genres of R’n’R Criticism

Week 10: The Aural and the Visual: Record Sleeves, Image, and Music Videos

Week 11: Cultural Imperialism/Cultural Antropophagy

-Case Study: Brazilian Bossa, Nigerian AfroBeat and Algerian Rai

Week 12: Technology and Liberation: Electricity, Electronics and MP3’s

Week 13: Copyright and Copywrong

                -Case Study: Hip-Hop Culture and Plunderphonics

Week 14: Bringing It All Back Home: Conclusions