MUS 525SEM - Popular Music Studies

This course addresses topics and concepts of recent development in the multi-disciplinary area of popular music studies in order to consider how popular music offers unique historical and contemporary perspectives on subjectivity, politics, and aesthetics. It draws on a wide range of discourses, disciplines, and theoretical perspectives from musicology, performance studies, cultural studies, critical theory, ethnomusicology, and music theory. Topics for consideration include embodied performance, the intersection of genre, the role of media, transnational exchanges, and the dynamic role of the popular music industry in the transmission and reception of various genres of popular music. Credits: 4