Introduction.
CULTURAL STUDIES AND URBAN ANALYSIS
September 10
Michael Ian Borer, "The Location of Culture: The Urban Culturalist Perspective," City & Community 5 (2006): 173-197. [Read especially pp. 180-192.]
Dick Hebdidge, "The Function of Subculture," in The Cultural Studies Reader, 2nd ed., edited by S. During (Routledge, 1999), 441-50.
Will Straw, "Characterizing Rock Music Culture: The Case of Heavy Metal," in The Cultural Studies Reader, 2nd ed., edited by S. During (Routledge, 1999), 451-61.
Rey Chow, "Listening Otherwise, Music Miniaturized: A Different Type of Question about Revolution," in The Cultural Studies Reader, 2nd ed., edited by S. During (Routledge, 1999), 462-76.
Giacomo Bottà, "Popular Music and Manchester: Representation, Materiality, and Branding," in Research and Activism: 4th Urban Studies Days Conference Proceedings (Estonian Academy of Arts, 2007), 63-8. [Download here and read only pp. 63-68.]
Krims, Music and Urban Geography, chap. 1.
"HIGH CULTURE": SCHOENBERG, ADORNO, AND THE SECOND VIENNESE SCHOOL
September 17
Alex Ross, "Doctor Faust: Schoenberg, Debussy, and Atonality," in The Rest is Noise: Listening to the Twentieth Century (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2007), 33-73.
Theodor Adorno, "A Social Critique of Radio Music," Kenyon Review 7 (1945): 208-17.
Theodor Adorno, "Toward an Understanding of Schoenberg [1955/1967]," in Theodor Adorno: Essays on Music, edited by R. Leppert (University of California Press, 2002), 627-643.
Krims, Music and Urban Geography, chap. 4.
Recommended reading:
Re-read Rey Chow chapter from last week.
Alex Ross, "Ghost Sonata: Adorno and German Music" (New Yorker, March 24, 2003).
Suggested listenings and viewings.
"LOW CULTURE": DISCO IN GAY SAN FRANCISCO
September 24
Gamson, The Fabulous Sylvester, especially chaps. 2-3, 7-13.
Recommended reading:
"Gay Enclaves Face Prospect of Being Passé" (New York Times, October 30, 2007).
Suggested listenings and viewings.
For Sara's presentation:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=su_zrW9WBVk
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rDdPcYaFH3k
THIRD-WORLD CULTURE: REGGAE IN JAMAICA
October 1
Essay questions due.
Lloyd Bradley, This is Reggae Music, chaps. 1-10, 12-15.
Suggested listenings and viewings.
Special event on Thursday, October 2, 7 pm
A Night of Cabaret @ Loeb Art Center.
Bass-baritone Robert Osborne and pianist Richard Gordon will present a Berlin-inspired cabaret: songs of decadence, exile, corruption, revolution, crime, and experiment. Their program, which they recently presented as part of the Carnegie Hall Berlin in Lights Festival, will feature songs in both German and English by Kurt Weill, Hanns Eisler, Franz Waxman, Friedrich Hollander, Paul Lincke, Mischa Spoliansky, Arnold Schoenberg, Jean Wiener, and Cole Porter.
Robert Osborne is Adjunct Artist in Music, Vassar College.Berlin: The Politics of Music (Vassar College, German Dept.)
DIASPORIC CULTURE: REGGAE IN ENGLAND
October 8
Lloyd Bradley, This is Reggae Music (cont.), chaps. 11, 16-23.
Suggested listenings and viewings.
MUSIC CRITICISM | MUSIC INDUSTRIES
Special event on Monday, October 13, 6:30 pm in Rockefeller Hall 200
"Music Criticism Today": panel featuring Rob Sheffield, Jon Caramanica and Hua Hsu.
October 15
Lester Bangs, "Of Pop and Pies and Fun," in Psychotic Reactions and Carburetor Dung (Vintage, 1988), 31-52.
Greil Marcus, "Free Speech #1" and "Judgment Day," in Ranters & Crowd Pleasers: Punk in Pop Music 1977-92 (Doubleday, 1994), 253-7, 351-4.
Keith Negus, "Cultural Production and the Corporation: Musical Genres and the Strategic Management of Creativity in the US Recording Industry," Media, Culture & Society 20 (1998): 259-79.
Krims, Music and Urban Geography, chaps. 2-3.
Suggested listenings and viewings.
October 19-25: FALL BREAK
THE URBAN IDIOM: JAZZ, BROADWAY AND THE BIG APPLE
October 29
Music criticism essay due.
Pp. 1-77 in Wilfrid Sheed, The House that George Built: With a Little Help from Irving, Cole, and a Crew of about Fifty (Random House, 2007).
William R. Taylor, "A Place That Words Built: Broadway, Damon Runyon, and the Slanguage of Lobster Alley," in In Pursuit of Gotham: Culture and Commerce in New York (Oxford University Press, 1992), 163-182.
James Lincoln Collier, "The Inevitability of Jazz in America." In Jazz: The American Theme Song (Oxford University Press, 1993), 3-23.
Amiri Baraka, "Somebody Blew Up America" (2001).
Jayne Cortez, "I Am New York City."
See also these two poems by Jayne Cortez,
the essay "On Cortez's Poetry," and
Recommended reading:
"At the Cabaret Convention, Saviors of the American Songbook" (New York Times, October 24, 2008).
Suggested listenings and viewings.
Special event on Thursday, October 30, 6:30 pm in Sanders Classroom 212
Urban Talk by Richard Lloyd, Vanderbilt College: "On the Barstools of Giants: Place, Aura, and Cultural Production."
BOURGEOIS URBANISM: THE L.A. SINGER-SONGWRITERS
November 5
Final project topics and team selections due.
Hoskyns, Hotel California, especially chaps. 1-8.
Listen to Joni Mitchell's "Ladies of the Canyon" CD.
Suggested listenings and viewings.
MEDIATED URBANISM, PT. 1: RECORDINGS IN CALI'S SALSA SCENE
November 12
Cultural analysis paper due.
Waxer, The City of Musical Memory, especially Introduction and chaps. 2-4.
Suggested listenings and viewings.
MEDIATED URBANISM, PT. 2: SOUNDSCAPES, NIGHTLIFE, BRANDS
November 19
Michael Bull, chaps. 1-5 and 9 in Sound Moves: iPod Culture and Urban Experience (Routledge, 2007), 1-65 and 121-133.
Paul Chatterton and Robert Hollands, "Producing Nightlife," in Urban Nightscapes (Routledge, 2003), 19-44.
Krims, Music and Urban Geography, chap. 5.
November 26
Media Cloisters session on preparing media installations: more info TBA.
Special extended class (until 4:30): student presentations of final projects.
December 12
Media installations due.
December 17
Individual papers on final projects due.
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