MUET 5060 - African-American Music

3 hours

Exploration of the experiences of blacks in the Americas vis-à-vis music. In particular, critical examination of the long trajectory of “black music” in the United States, making reference first to its West African antecedents. Consideration of ways that the term “black music” is deployed politically and its appropriateness as a descriptive and analytical category. Exploring the permeability of the sacred and secular in African-American cultural experience, we will interrogate the musical, philosophical, and behavioral links between a Saturday night crowd and a Sunday morning people.

Prerequisite(s): None.