160063 PS Music, Race and Racism (2024W)

Ideas on the connection between music and race have historically been at the core of academic, public, and commercial understandings of musical difference in the Western world. Actors ranging from music scholars to political leaders to music industry entrepreneurs continue to use that connection to address national identities, ethnic diversity, different musical systems, and world music marketing. Nevertheless, those inquiries have been laced with racial prejudices that reproduced overarching racial hierarchies in the context of colonial systems. Overcoming those prejudices and hierarchies warrants critical musicological approaches that challenge existing racist ideas on music while acknowledging their impacts on the lives of their practitioners and associated musical communities. This seminar provides students with solid foundations for analyzing race and racism in musical research, focusing on how racializing ideas on music produce hierarchies and inequality and on how to support the anti-racist agendas of racialized musical communities. The proseminar introduces students to 1) critical reflections on historical racist ideas in musicology, 2) contemporary musicological approaches towards race and racism, and 3) global case studies on the connections between music, race, and racism.

The proseminar will be based on a combination of reading discussions and oral presentations in class. During the first four sessions, the instructor will assign core readings on music, race, and racism, which provide the foundations of the class. During the following sessions, students will do oral presentations on topics of their choice that address the relationship between music, race, and racism. Throughout the course, students will develop a circa 15-page final course paper on a topic they choose (which can be the same topic as their presentation). Students will be evaluated on their oral presentation, final paper, and continued participation in class (including reading discussions and debates after oral presentations).