Module Catalogue 2024/25

Pre Requisite Comment

N/A

Co Requisite Comment

N/A

Aims

1. To develop a broad knowledge of European colonialism and its legacies in relation to music, c. 1500 to the present.
2.To explore how colonial epistemologies have informed methods of musical study, and to introduce students to postcolonial, decolonial, and indigenous modes of music historiography.
3. To provide students with the tools to critically appraise recent initiatives to “decolonise the curriculum” in music studies.

Outline Of Syllabus

The course will comprise several individual sections, each one unpacking specific elements of the topic, including key concepts, events, and musical case studies. Indicative examples of these topics include:
-The roots of colonialism
-Music within and under colonialism
-Music against colonialism
-Music and decoloniality.

Intended Knowledge Outcomes

By the end of the course, students should be able to:
- identify and contrast the ways that music has served to build, enforce, and celebrate colonialism.
- identify and contrast the ways that music has served to resist colonialism and to imagine decolonial and postcolonial alternatives.
- explain basic definitions of key terms and concepts in relation to the study of colonialism, and identify the key colonial powers from the early modern period to the present.
- evaluate colonialism’s role in shaping the global circulation of musical sounds, commodities, knowledge, and people, both within colonial and postcolonial contexts.
- assess the extent of colonialism’s continued impact on present day musical activity, and on our understanding of the aesthetic, political, and economic value of music.
- identify and contrast pre- and para-colonial approaches to music-making and musical knowledge in colonial contexts.

Intended Skill Outcomes

By the end of the course, students should have developed their ability to:
- formulate a response to an essay brief using assigned texts and further reading, recommended listening and other primary source material
- reflect critically on the relationship between the history of colonialism and their own engagement with listening, performing, and studying music.
- apply theoretical and conceptual frameworks relating to the social, economic, and political dimensions of colonialism – and particularly those drawn from outside of musicology – to the study of music.

Teaching Rationale And Relationship

The course will be taught using a combination of lectures and seminars. Lectures will review weekly topics, outlining key terms, concepts, debates, historical figures, and musical works in relation to the assigned weekly reading(s) and listening. Seminars will develop students’ comprehension of key concepts and debates by working with primary source materials, and through class discussion and structured group tasks. Student independent learning will involve guided reading, listening, and the completion of a weekly reflective commentary on the virtual learning environment; these tasks will allow students to participate fully in seminar sessions.

Assessment Rationale And Relationship

The portfolio assessment will consist of three case studies and an introduction, which must draw out connections between the case studies. At least one of the three case studies must be formulated through students' independent research; the other two may draw on lecture materials and the weekly preparatory seminar tasks.

The portfolio will test students’ understanding of the conceptual content of the module and examine their ability to critique ideas from scholarly literature. It will also create opportunities for independent research and for applying the knowledge and skills gained from the module.

Students will receive verbal formative feedback during the seminars on the weekly preparatory tasks. This formative feedback will help them to shape their ideas for the portfolio. Students will have the opportunity to submit a plan for their portfolio on which they will receive written feedback.

General Notes

N/A