Various topics are offered. Each may be used by Music Majors to fulfill the College-wide Second-Stage Writing Requirement.
From Instagram to Digital Music Archive: Popular music and public memory in Latinx Los Angeles
In this class you will explore the role of social media in archiving popular music. In particular, you will work with an Instagram-based archive that documents several decades of Latinx rock n’ roll in Los Angeles. Questions you will consider include:
· In the post-digital age, how does one “read” ephemera such as flyers and photographs posted on social media? How can they be re-articulated in scholarly contexts?
· How are community and/or social media archives different from institutional archives and what role can they play in supporting and sustaining local communities, particularly Latinx communities in Los Angeles?
· What are the specific challenges associated with archiving in Latinx and settler colonial contexts?
Participating in this hybrid, arts and technology course that will combine both conceptual and practical methods, you will develop production skills in digital liberal arts as you interrogate social networks as scholarly and activist texts. Specifically, you will learn to create and access databases, and to develop archive-oriented websites using HTML, CSS, and the web-centered programming language, PHP. While no previous knowledge of computer coding or web design is required, students with specialized knowledge in these areas will be offered opportunities for more advanced project work. Additional Core Requirement Met: U.S. Diversity.
Music and Social Protest
Over the past century, music has played a central role in political and social movements that seek to shift the balance of power in local, national, and transnational contexts. From the songs of the African American freedom struggle to the music of the nueva cancion movement in Chile, from the live performance practice of the Occupy and immigrant rights movements to the raucous sounds of Russia's Pussy Riot, music has been an important mode of circulating alternative political messages and inspiring rebellion against the status quo. How can music be used to convey political messages and extend the reach of social movements? Why does music enhance cohesion and solidarity among movement participants and/or sway or destabilize oppositional forces? Are there differences between mass-mediated modes of political protest and live, grassroots political performances? When voices raised in song become powerful, what protocols are established to censor and repress them? We will examine these questions in the context of social movements which have inspired mass participation, comparing and contrasting case studies from Europe, Asia, Africa, and the Americas. Additional Core Requirement Met: Global Connections.