FYRS -- First Year Research Seminar (Winter 2025): Ramsey

This course will examine the history and cultural impact of country music in the twentieth century. We will consider country music primarily as an art form, but also as a lens to consider race, class, gender, religion, identity, and region. We are defined in part, after all, by the songs we sing. We will investigate the stories of major icons of country music-Hank Williams, Loretta Lynn, Johnny Cash, Merle Haggard, Dolly Parton, and so on-as well as uncovering lesser known masterpieces, from scratchy recordings of old-time music to 1970s honky-tonk to Black trailblazers like Stoney Edwards. Among the avenues for exploration and discussion: the fusion between folk cultures in migration; rural folk music's encounter with mass media; American populism as an aesthetic and affect; mythos and mythmaking; movies and the West; the Southern storytelling tradition; melodrama and lonesomeness; labor and longing; God and dirt. We will read history, analysis, and journalism alongside listening to podcasts (like "Cocaine & Rhinestones") and watching films (like "Coal Miner's Daughter"). And, of course, we will listen to country music, from the earliest recordings of "hillbilly records" to the pop country of the 1990s.

Try these sample searches on your class topic in the library catalog:

Use broad reference materials to find background information about your topic. This will help you narrow your topic and will also give you keywords to find the most relevant sources. Credo can be a good place to start for that first step in research.

Below are suggested databases for finding articles on topics relating to your course.

Need more options -- Databases A-Z

Below are some journals that contain scholarly articles on topics relating to your course. Click on a journal and type keywords into the search box to find articles on your topic.

• American Music

• The Journal of American Folklore

• Journal of Musicological Research

• Journal of Popular Music Studies
• The Music Quarterly

• Popular Music & Society

• Southern Cultures
• Southern Quarterly

 A few scholarly articles on the topics relating to your course are below.