SOCIUN3207_001_2018_3 - MUSIC, RACE &

IDENTITY
 Edit  
Settings
SOCIUN3207                                            332cMilbank
Fall 2018                                                   Office Hours: Th, 1.30-3
T, Th: 10.10-11.25                                    jrieder@barnard.edu
  
Teaching Assistant: Lindsey Castellano
Hours: Th, 12:00-2:00 PM (Horace Mann 525C, 120th & Broadway)
 
Music, Race and Identity 
 
         Music, Race and Identity explores the complex relationships among race, art, organization,
economics, social movements, and identity. The three sections of the course each examines a
major stage in American race relations: slavery and segregation, the period leading up to and
through the civil rights revolution, and the post-civil rights era. Emphasis is on the shifting
conceptions of identity and the changing role of race and racism in the spirituals, gospel music,
minstrelsy, rhythm and blues, rock ‘n’ roll, crossover soul, Hip Hop, and contemporary popular
music. As we make our way toward the current moment, one critical question will loom
increasingly large: to what extent can we say that we are moving toward a “postethnic”
sensibility in the musical realm, in which displays of ethnic identity coexist with trading places,
the severing of racial ownership from aesthetic genre, and the blurring of racial boundaries. 
 
Student Outcomes. The course has several key objectives: a) to enhance students’
understanding of the embeddedness of music in the social networks, power dynamics, and race
relations prevailing at different stages of American history and to appreciate the entangled yet
somewhat autonomous developments of music, race relations, and socio-economic life; b) to
acquaint students with key concepts and interpretive methods in the sociology of culture that are
relevant to understanding any art form in any time or place; c) to develop students’ skill in
applying those theories and methods to historical materials; d) to expand students’ ability to
rigorously interpret a wide array of aspects of performance (not just the sonic elements, but
bodily movement and presentations of racial selves more broadly) and  to fathom the racial
meanings embodied in those performances; 
 
Requirements: midterm (40% of the grade),  final examination (40%),  and a 12 page paper
( 20%). Participation is neither a requirement nor a condition of getting a superior grade. But
students who make discerning and creative contributions to class discussion will receive up to a
2/3 of a grade bump-up in the final grade. 
 
Reading. Starred items on the syllabus are under Resources on Course-works. The following are
available at Book Culture and at Barnard Reserves. 
 

1. Nelson George, The Death of Rhythm and Blues.

2. Suzanne Smith, Dancing in the Streets: Motown and the Cultural Politics of Detroit.
3. Russell Simmons, Life and Defe: Sex, Drugs, Money = God.

 
The Columbia Faculty Statement on Academic Integrity: All students are responsible for
reading this: The intellectual venture in which we are all engaged requires of faculty and
students alike the highest level of personal and academic integrity. As members of an academic
community, each one of us bears the responsibility to participate in scholarly discourse and
research in a manner characterized by intellectual honesty and scholarly integrity. Scholarship,
by its very nature, is an iterative process, with ideas and insights building one upon the other.
Collaborative scholarship requires the study of other scholars' work, the free discussion of such
work, and the explicit acknowledgement of those ideas in any work that inform our own. This
exchange of ideas relies upon a mutual trust that sources, opinions, facts, and insights will be
properly noted and carefully credited.
In practical terms, this means that, as students, you must be responsible for the full citations of
others' ideas in all of your research papers and projects; you must be scrupulously honest when
taking your examinations; you must always submit your own work and not that of another
student, scholar, or internet agent. Any breach of this intellectual responsibility is a breach of
faith with the rest of our academic community. It undermines our shared intellectual culture, and
it cannot be tolerated. Students failing to meet these responsibilities should anticipate being
asked to leave Columbia.
For more information on academic integrity at Columbia, students may refer to the Columbia
University Undergraduate Guide to Academic Integrity.
 
For Student Information at the Barnard College Office of Disability Services,
see:  http://barnard.edu/disabilityservices/students (Links to an external site.). For 
For Student Information at the Columbia University Disability Services,
see:  http://www.college.columbia.edu/rightsandresponsibilities Links to an external site..
 
 
 
 
Part One:Oppression, Race and Culture
 

1. (Sept. 4, 6)Introduction: Civic Culture, Race & American Community

 
**Leroi Jones, “African Slaves, American Slaves,” pp. 17-31, in Blues People: Negro Music in
White America(Library, Electronic Version).
**Jonathan  Rieder, “Songs of the Slaves,” The New Yorker, Aug. 23,
2013: http://www.newyorker.com/books/page-turner/songs-of-the-slaves-the-music-of-m-l-k-s-i-
have-a-dream (Links to an external site.)
 
Playlist:
 
Bruce Springsteen, “Erie Canal.”
“Kanye West-Jesus Walks ft. John Legend on Dave Chappelle’s block Party.”
Marion Anderson, “The Star Spangled Banner.”
Bob Dylan, “Saved.”
Jimmy Page and Robert Plant, “Crossroads.”
Punjabi MC (with Jay Z),  “Beware of the Boys.”
Whitney Houston Sings the National Anthem, Superbowl 1991:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N_lCmBvYMRs
St. Paul and the Broken Bones, “Call Me.”
 

2. (Sept. 11, 13) The Vagaries of Musical Resistance:From the Spirituals to Gospel

Music 

 
**Lawrence Levine, “The Sacred World of Black Slaves,” in Black Culture and Black
Consciousness.  
**James Scott, “Domination, Acting, and Fantasy,” chap. 2 in Domination and the Art of
Resistance.
**Assorted Spirituals.
 
Playlist:
 
Dorothy Love Coates, “I’m Just Holding On.”
Inez Andrews and the Caravans, “Lord, Don’t Move My Mountains.”
Mahallia Jackson, “How I Got Over” & “Buked and Scorned.”
Marian Anderson, “Sometimes I Feel Like a Motherless Child.”
Aretha Franklin, “Mary Don’t You Weep.”
Regina McCrary and Chicago Mass Choir, “Pressing On.”
Sam Cooke and the Soul Stirrers, “Wade in the Water.”
“Woke Up This Morning With My Mind Stayed on Freedom.” 
 “We Shall Overcome.”
 “I’m On My Way to Canaan Land.”
 

3. (Sept. 18, 20) Minstrelsy: The Ambiguities of Cultural Appropriation

 
**Ann Douglas, “Black Manhattan,” pp. 73-79 in A Terrible Honesty. 
**David Roedinger, “White Skins, Black Masks: Minstrelsy and White Working Class
Formation before the Civil War.”
 
Playlist
 
“Jump Jim Crow,”  Jump Jim Crow (Links to an external site.)
2nd South Carolina String Band, “Ol’ Dan Tucker.”
“Happy are We Darkies so Gay.Eddie Cantor, 1929 “A Ziegfeld Midnight Frolic.”
Al Jolson, “Mammy” and “Camptown Races.”
Stephen Foster, “Camptown Races.”
Kate Smith, “That’s Why Darkies Were Born.”
 

4. (Sept. 25, 27) Fashioning the Color Line: Black Blues and White Country

 
Nelson George,  “Philosophy, Money, and Music (1900-1930),” pp. 3-14 in The Death of
Rhythm and Blues. 
Karl Hagstrom Miller, “RaceRecords and Old-Time Music” & “Black Folk and Hillbilly Pop,
”Segregating Sound: Inventing Folk and Pop Music in the Age of Jim Crow.
**Albert Murray, “The Blues as Such” and “Blues Music As Such,” pp. 1-6, 55-76 in Stomping
the Blues.
 
Playlist:
 
The Carter Family, “Will the Circle be Unbroken.”
Hank Williams, “Lovesick Blues, ” “Lost Highway,”
& “I’m So Lonesome I could Cry.” 
Shelby Lynn, “Leavin.’”
Dolly Parton, “Coat of Many Colors.”
Bessie Smith, “Nobody Knows You When You’re Down and Out.”
Ma Rainey, “See See Rider Blues” & “Deep Moaning Blues.”
Mamie Smith, “Crazy Blues.”
Robert Johnson, “Crossroad” & “Me and the Devil Blues.”
Lightning Hopkins or John Lee Hooker,  “Trouble in Mind.”
Bob Wills & His Texas Playboys, “Trouble in Mind” (1936).
Beyonce and The Dixie Chicks, “Daddy Lessons,” Country Music Awards 2016.
 
Part Two.Art and Identity, Organization and Environment: The Era of Competitive Race
Relations
 

5. (Oct. 2, 4) The Social Organization of a Segregated Genre: Race Music and the
Rise of Rhythm and Blues

 
Nelson George,  “Dark Voices in the Night (1930-50)” &  “The New Negro (1950-65),” pp. 15-
82in The Death of Rhythm and Blues. 
**Richard Peterson and David Berger, “Cycles of Symbol Production: The Case of Popular
Music.” 
**Jerry Wexler, The Rhythm and the Blues,  pp. 3-42, skim 43-58, 59-65, skim 65-85, 86-112.  
 
Playlist:
 
Bing Crosby, “White Christmas.”
Doris Day, “A Sentimental Journey.”
Wynonie Harris, “Good Rockin’ Tonight.”
Louis Jordan, “Let the Good Times Roll” & “Honey Hush.”
Laverne Baker, “Jim Dandy.” 
Big Joe Turner, “Shake, Rattle and Roll” & “Honey Hush.”
Etta James, “Dance With Me Henry” (1958 version).
Dina Washington, “Baby Get Lost.”
Ivory Joe Hunter, “Since I Met You Baby.”
Big Mama Thornton, “Hound Dog.”
Fats Domino, “Walkin’ to New Orleans.”
Percy Mayfield, “Please Send Me Someone to Love.”
Huey Piano Smith,  “High Blood Pressure.” 
The Five Royales,  “Baby Don’t Do It.” 
Clyde McPhatter with the Dominoes, “Have Mercy Baby.” 
The Spaniels, “Goodnight, Sweetheart.” 
Orioles, “It’s Too Soon to Know.”
 

6. (Oct. 11, 13) Intimations of Integration;Borrowing or Stealing? The Rise of Rock

N Roll

 
Peter Guralnick, Last Train to Memphis: The Rise of Elvis Presley, prologue (3-8),  pp. 23-29;
38-52; 57-65;81; 86-87; 88-125; 127-142; 146-7. 
“Interracial Teens Dance on Alan Freed’s Big Beat Show, 1959” 
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=er-Dv-tvcd8
**Helen Kolawole, “He Wasn’t My King.”
**Kenan Malik, “In Defense of Cultural Appropriation.”
 
Playlist:
 
Hank Snow, “I'm Moving' On.”
Bill Monroe, “Blue Moon of Kentucky.”
Bob Wills and the Texas Playboys, “I Hear Ya Talkin'.”
Bill Haley & the Comets, “Shake, Rattle & Roll.”
Elvis, “That's All Right Mama” (1954 version).
Elvis: Blue Moon of Kentuckey Live 10-16-54.
Elvis,  “Good Rockin’ Tonight.”
Elvis, “Trying to Get To You.”
Elvis, “Blue Suede Shoes” (78rpm 1956).
Elvis, “Don’t be Cruel” (on the Ed Sullivan show).
Elvis, “Hound Dog” (on the Ed Sullivan show).
Elvis, “Heartbreak Hotel.”
Carl Perkins, “Turn Around” (1954 Flip Records version).
Carl Perkins, “Blue Suede Shoes.”
Buddy Holly, “Oh Boy” &  “Rave On.”
Jerry Lee Lewis, Whole Lot of Shaking Going On.”
Little Richard, “Tutti Frutti.”
Pat Boone, “Tutti Fruitti.” 
Chuck Berry, “Little Queenie,” “Sweet Little Sixteen,”  “Johnny B Good.”
Little Richard, “The Girl Can’t Help It” & “Good Golly, Miss Molly.”
 
7.(Oct. 16, 18) The Blurring of Genres and the Battle for Distinction: Secular and Sacred,
Raw and Refined,  Male and Female Taste Communities   
**Peter Guralnick, “Soul Serenade” and pp. 97-176, in Sweet Soul Music: Rhythm and Blues
and the Southern Dream of Freedom.
**Patricia Hill Collins, Black Feminist Thought, 114-116.
**Ann Powers, “Aretha Franklin,” in Barbara O’Dair, The Rolling Stone Book of Women in
Rock.  
 
Playlist:
 
Sam and Dave, “Hold On, I’m a Comin’,” “Soul Man,” 
Otis Redding, “These Arms of Mine” & “Pain in My Heart.”
Otis Redding, “I Been Loving You Too Long,” Live at Monterey.
Ray Charles, “Hard Times,” “Drown in My Own Tears,” “What’d I Say,” “ “Midnight Hour.”
Sam Cooke and the Soul Stirrers, “Jesus Be a Fence Around Me.”
Sam Cooke, “A Change is Gonna Come.”
Clyde McPhatter and the Drifters, “I Should Have Done Right.”
Aretha Franklin, “I Never Met a Man.”
Aretha Franklin, “(You Make Me Feel Like ) A Natural Woman.”
Aretha Franklin, “Respect.’”
Aretha Franklin, “Do Right Woman.”
Aretha Franklin, “Dr. Feel Good.”
Dan Penn and Spooner Oldham , “Do Right Woman.” 
 
Week. 8. (Oct. 23, 25)  Integration and the Presentation of Racial Self: The Politics and
Performance  of Respectability
Suzanne Smith, Dancing in the Streets: Motown and the Cultural Politics of Detroit, pages 21-
40, 45-53, 54-79, 99-107, 117-135, 139-147, 164-172, 205-208,  215-241.
“How Funk Brothers, Berry Gordy & Motown’s Hitsville Operated.”
Maisha Johnson, “5 Ways ‘Respectability Politics’ Blame Black Women for Their Own
Oppression.”
Randall Kennedy, “Lifting as We Climb: A Progressive Defense of Respectability Politics.”
 
 
Playlist:
 
Jackie Wilson, “Lonely Teardrops.”
Smokey Robinson and the Miracles, “You Can Depend on Me” & “Shop Around.”
Smokey Robinson and the Miracles, “Ooo Baby Baby” & “Fork in Love’s Road.”
Mary Wells, “Two Lovers."
Martha and the Vandellas, "Jimmy Mack." 
The Marvelettes, “Beachwood 4-5789”
Tammi Terrell and Marvin Gaye, “If I Could Build My Whole World.”
The Temptations, “My Girl.”
Kim Weston, “Take Me in Your Arms and Rock Me.”
Four Tops, "I Can’t Help Myself.”
The Supremes, "Where Did Our Love Go."
The Supremes on Broadway:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gi0jDSozbCU
 
Midterm: October 25
 
Part Three.  Identity, Art and Inequality in the Post-Civil Rights Era
 

9. (Oct. 30, Nov. 1) The Rise of a Post-Civil Rights Identity Regime

 
Nelson George, "Redemption Songs in the Age of Corporations (1971-1975)" & “Crossover:
The Death of Rhythm and Blues (1975-79)”: pages 121-170 in The Death of Rhythm and Blues.
**William J. Wilson, The Declining Significance of Race, chap. 7-8.
**Karyn R. Lacy, “Status Based Identities: Protecting and Reproducing Middle-Class Status,”
chap. 4 in Blue-Chip Black: Race, Class , and Status in the New Black Middle Class. 
 
Playlist: 

Harold Melvin and the Bluenotes, “The Love I Lost” & “Wake Up Everybody.”
The Delphonics, “Didn’t I (Blow Your Mind This Time).”
”Earth, Wind and Fire, “Getaway” and “Reasons.”
James Brown, “There was a Time.”
George Clinton and the Funkadelics, “One Nation Under a Groove.”
Parliament, “Give Up the Funk.”
Billy Paul, “Me and Mrs. Jones.”
Trammps, “Disco Inferno.”
The Ojays, “Back Stabbers”  & “Love Train.” 
Kevin Costner speech at Whitney Houston Funeral
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2wjh0N1EzPI
Whitney Houston, “I Will Always Love You,” “Run to You,” “Didn’t We Almost Have it All”
& “Greatest Love of it All.”
DeBarge, “A Dream.”
 

10. (Nov. 8) Color Blindness and the Aesthetics of Pop

 
**Leon Wynter, American Skin: Pop Culture, Big Business & The End of White America, 1-10,
131-176. 
**Hazel Carby, “Lethal Weapons and City Games.”
**Jonathan Rieder, “Color Vision,” New York Times Sunday Book Review.
Lisa Lewis, “Four Female Musicians” (just brief section on Madonna) & “Female Address
Video” (chap. 6) in Lewis, Gender Politics and MTV; Voicing the Difference.
**Daphne Brooks, “I’m Every Woman: Whitney Houston, the Voice of the Post-Civil Rights
Era.”
Playlist:
 
Marvin Gaye, “What’s Going On.”
Stevie Wonder, “Love’s in Need of Love Today” and “Pastime Paradise.”
The Temptations, “Papa Was a Rolling Stone” and “Cloud Nine.”
Prince, “Purple Rain,”  “When Doves Cry,” “1999,” “I Wanna Be Your Lover” &   “I Would Die
4 You.”
Michael Jackson, “Don’t Stop,” Superbowl XXVII,  “You Rock My World,” and “Thriller.”
Madonna, “Papa Don’t Preach.”
 
 
 

11. (Nov. 13, 15) Class Differentiation and Aesthetic Innovation: The Birth of Rap 

Nelson George, The Death of Rhythm and Blues, 188-194.

Russell Simmons,  Life and Defe: Sex, Drugs, Money + God, 1-165.
**Tricia Rose, “Prophets of Rage,” chap. 4 in Black Noise: Rap Music and Black Culture in
Contemporary America.
**Lawrence A. Stanley, Rap, The Lyrics: The Words to Rap’s Greatest Hits.
 
Playlist: 
The Sugar Hill Gang, "Rapper's Delight."
Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five, "The Message."
Run-DMC, "It's Like That" (Original, not with Aerosmith).
Run-DMC, "My Adidas."
Kurtis Blow, "The Breaks."
N.W.A., "Straight Outta Compton."
N.W.A., "Fuck the Police.”

12. (Nov. 20) Trajectories of “Whiteness” l: Southern Pride and Heavy Metallurgy,

Punk Rockers and Caucasian MCs  

 
**John Hartigan, Racial Situations: Class Predicaments of Whiteness in Detroit, chap. 2-3.
**Eminem, “The Way I Am.” 
**Carl Hancock Rux, “Eminem: The New White Negro,” in Greg Tate, ed., Everything but the
Burden: What White People are Taking from Black Culture. 
**Stanley Greenberg, “Back to Macomb; Reagan Democrats and Barack Obama.”

Playlist: 
 
Eminem, “My Name is,” “The Real Slim Shady,” “White America,” and 8 Mile-Ending Rap
Battles (Best Quality, 1080p),
8 Mile - Ending Rap Battles (BEST QUALITY, 1080p) (Links to an external site.)

 
13.(Nov. 27,  29)Trajectories of “Whiteness” ll 
 
Nadine Hobbs,  Intro, Part One (“Rednecks and Country Music”) & “Gender Deviance and Class
Rebellion in ‘Redneck Woman’” in Hobbs, Rednecks, Queers and Country Music. 
Charles Hughes, “Pride and Prejudice; Race and Country Music in the Era of Backlash” & “The
South’s Gonna Do It Again; The Racial Politics of the New Southern Music of the 1970s” in
Hughes, Country Soul, Making Music and Making Race in the American South.
 
Playlist:
 
The Allman Brothers, “Stormy Monday.”
Charlie Daniels, “The South’s Gonna Do it Again.”
Merle Haggard, “Okie from Muskogee.”
Lynyrd Skynyrd, “Free Bird” and “Sweet Home Alabama.”
The Dixie Chicks, “Not Ready to Make Nice.”
Drive By Tuckers, Southern Rock Opera (“Ronnie and Neil,” “Southern Thing,” and “The Three
Great Alabama Icons”).
Jason Isbell and the 400 Unit, “White

14. (Dec. 4, 6)  Who Owns a Genre: Patrolling the Borders of Race 

 
**David Hollinger, Postethnic America: Beyond Multiculturalism, 105-130.
**Salim Muwakkil, “Aaron the Wigger.”
**Toure, “In the Hip-Hop Nation, Black Men Must Lead.”
**Neil Strauss, “A Land With Rhythm and Beats for All.”
**Jon Caramanica, "Finding a Place in the Hip Hop Eco-System 
**Azalea Banks, Iggy Azalea, and T.I.  Debate Authenticity. 
**Drake’s Advice to Macklemore.
**Charlamagne tha God Reflects on J. Cole.

Playlist: Provisional
 
The Drive by Truckers, American Band.
Beyonce, Lemonade.
Kendrick Lamar, To Pimp a Butterfly.
Sammy Martin, “America is Great Again.”
 
Final Exam: Date To Be Announced
 
 
 
 
Faculty Statement on Academic Integrity: Make sure you read this statement  which
appears following week 14 on the sullabus. You are responsible for having read this.
 
http://www.college.columbia.edu/academics/academicintegrityLinks to an external site.