Write a 200-250 word mini-essay to accompany it. (Do not repeat concepts, i.e., your playlist should be ten different songs for ten different concepts.) Each of these entries should include a reflection on why you chose this particular song—how you found it, what you find compelling about it, etc.
Assignment Question
Doing American Studies: An Annotated Playlist Periodically throughout the semester we have listened to musical recordings to help guide us through ideas and topics that we’ve encountered in lecture and in the readings. For your final project, your task is to assemble a 10-song playlist that would serve as a “soundtrack” of sorts to this class. Do not include songs that we have already listened to and/or discussed in class—the selections should come entirely from your own choosing. Each one of your ten songs should be chosen to illustrate one of the “key concepts” that we’ve encountered in this course, which are listed below, and for each song you should write a 200-250 word mini-essay to accompany it. (Do not repeat concepts, i.e., your playlist should be ten different songs for ten different concepts.) Each of these entries should include a reflection on why you chose this particular song—how you found it, what you find compelling about it, etc.—and how you see it relating to the concept as we encountered it in class. In doing so, each entry should include at least one specific reference to a reading from the syllabus. For each entry please give the name of the song, the name of the artist, the year the song was released, and a link to the song in question. (Assembling a Spotify is great, or you can include YouTube links, or if you’d like you can send actual music files like mp3s.) There are no chronological or stylistic constraints for this project: the songs can come from any genres or time periods that you’d like, and we encourage you to be wide-ranging and expansive in your selections. Ultimately you will be graded on the cogency of your annotated essays, i.e. how well you articulate your selection criteria for each entry and how convincingly and thoughtfully you tie it to the course readings. Key concepts: Race Slavery South Performance Class Gender Nation Violence American Exceptionalism Transnationalism Protest Art Politics Authenticity Media Visibility Race Freedom Internment Beauty Capitalism Dispossession Conspicuous Consumption Wealth Opportunity Property Inequality Sports The attach files are the references for sources.
