Syllabus

RHE 309k: The Rhetoric of Country Music

Course Description

In 1922, the fiddlers Eck Robertson and Henry Gilliland traveled from Texas to New York City, where they recorded the series of folk tunes that would give birth to the country music industry. At the time, the music they and their followers were playing wasn’t called country. It was called old time, white folk, white blues, and hillbilly—terms that conveyed the production companies’ confusion about how to market this traditional sound and what to make of the mostly poor and mostly uneducated country bumpkins who knew how to perform it. Today, country music is one of the United States’ most iconic and lucrative industries, and singers like Dolly Parton, Garth Brooks, Blake Shelton, and Taylor Swift are international celebrities. But the popularity these country performers have enjoyed does not mean that country music, as a genre, has “found” its identity, and Dolly, Garth, Blake, and Taylor (among others) have all faced criticism for either “abandoning” their country roots or for churning out music that isn’t “country enough.”

All this begs the question What is country music? Acknowledging that this question is too complex to answer in just one semester, this course will explore a related question—What does country music do?—by focusing on how country songs have intervened in political debates and responded to moments of national crisis. In the class readings and discussion, we will attend to country music that arose in response to the Civil Rights, feminist, and LGBTQ rights movements, and in the aftermath of the 9/11/2001 attacks on the World Trade Center. In your essays you are invited to write about the artists and the social issues that interest you the most. Overall, the class aims to increase your appreciation for how artists construct country music, and how artists and other people use country music to transmit arguments to specific communities. Since the class is housed in the Department of Rhetoric & Writing and carries the Writing Flag, it also aims to help you improve your ability to write in a clear and compelling way. In particular, the course offers opportunities for writing in digital contexts such as blogging and collaborating on a website. The majority of the essays that you write this semester will appear on the class website, the Country Music Project, which you can access at http://sites.dwrl.utexas.edu/countrymusic.

The course is roughly divided into four units, each culminating in a final writing project. In Unit 1, you will learn some of the skills and history that we will put to use in the later units, and you will develop a strong working relationship with your peers. In the first two weeks, you will practice writing a blog post and uploading it to the class website, and you will attend a presentation by the local blogger Christine Warren. In Weeks 3-5, you will work with a group of classmates to research, write, and publish a webpage detailing one of the various “subgenres” of country music (cowboy music, the Nashville Sound, etc.). In Units 2 and 3, you will dig deeper into particular artists, albums, and songs. In Unit 2, you will place an album in its historical and rhetorical context, and in Unit 3, you will analyze the structure and style of one song from that album. Like the subgenres project, these essays will be published on the Country Music Project. Lastly, in Unit 4, you will apply what you have learned about how country music has engaged and even shaped the communities in which it is embedded by either writing a new country song or compiling a playlist of existing country songs that respond to a topic of controversy in our present historical moment. Over the course of Units 1-4, you will complete the Country Music Experiences Project, which invites you to engage country music in the local Austin community in a variety of ways, and you will compose an additional 3 blog posts and at least 15 comments to posts that your peers have written. You will also complete at least 10 Homework Quizzes to prepare you for class discussions and to undertake the course’s major writing assignments.

Over the course of the semester, you will learn to:

  • Write and speak more authoritatively about country music;
  • Distinguish some of country music’s most prominent performers and subgenres;
  • Conduct extensive research utilizing databases of print and electronic materials;
  • Identify and fairly summarize the main arguments of texts in a variety of genres;
  • Identify and analyze a text’s relation to its historical and rhetorical context;
  • Analyze the structural and stylistic mechanisms through which a text makes an argument;
  • Compose lengthy, college-level writings in a variety of print and digital formats, including research summaries, annotated bibliographies, analysis papers, and blog posts and comments;
  • Contribute to an ongoing social conversation using the conventions of country music;
  • Revise ideas and compositions in response to feedback from the instructor and peers; and
  • Practice the conventions of grammar and punctuation with more fluency and confidence.

Writing Flag

This class is designed to give you extensive experience writing in an academic discipline. Writing Flag courses meet the Core Communications objectives of Critical Thinking, Communication, Teamwork, and Personal Responsibility, as established by the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board.

Required Texts

In this course, you will read a number of texts introducing rhetorical concepts and discussing the history and development of country music. As indicated on the course calendar, you will also be responsible for listening to occasional albums/playlists and screening related films.

1. Textbooks you should purchase (from the University Co-Op or elsewhere):

  • Mark G. Longaker & Jeffrey Walker. Rhetorical Analysis. Pearson. 2010.
  • Andrea Lunsford. Easy Writer. 4th ed. Bedford/St. Martin’s. 2010.
  • Optional: Paul Kingsbury & Alanna Nash. Will the Circle Be Unbroken: Country Music in America. DK Publishing/Country Music Hall of Fame. 2006.

2. Readings available for download from the class’s secure Canvas site:

  • Rick Clark. “Texas Music.” The Oxford American Southern Music Issue, 2014.
  • Gerald Graff & Cathy Birkenstein. Selections from They Say/I Say. 2nd Norton. 2009.
  • Adam Gussow. “Playing Chicken with the Train: Cowboy Troy’s Hick-Hop and the Transracial Country West.” Hidden in the Mix. Duke University. 2013.
  • Bill C. Malone. Selections from Country Music, U.S.A. 3rd University of Texas, 2010.
  • Jocelyn Neal. Selections from Country Music. Oxford University, 2013.
  • Graeme Thomson. “Country Music’s Gay Stars.” The Guardian, 2014.
  • Christine Warren. Selections from Honky Tonk Debutante. Bottle Shock, 2014.

Course Websites

You will interact with the following websites at various points throughout the semester. Please bookmark them in advance to save you the trouble of finding them later.

  • Canvas. Canvas is the official course management site and where you will be able to access grades, download course files, and email the instructor.
  • Country Music Project. The CMP is a public site that we will build collaboratively over the course of the semester. Your blog posts, your blog comments, and the majority of your final essay assignments will be published here.
  • University of Texas Libraries. Use this link to conduct searches through the Library’s print catalog and online databases. You may also request scans of articles and chapters.
  • Digital Writing and Research Lab (DWRL). As a student in this course, you have access to the DWRL’s Open Lab (PAR 102), a variety of software programs, and other resources that are restricted to other students. Use this link to learn more.
  • Undergraduate Writing Center (UWC). The UWC provides free writing assistance for any undergraduate student. At the UWC website, you can schedule appointments and download handouts related to a number of grammar and composition issues.

Coursework & Grades

In addition to reading/listening/screening the texts listed above, you will compose a number of short and long writing assignments. The previous page indicates how these scores will be calculated into your final course grade.

Final Exam

There will be no final exam for this class. Final projects will be due Wednesday, May 13, at 2:00 PM.

Attendance and Tardiness

You are expected to attend every class and to arrive before the official start time. Students who arrive after the official start time will be marked tardy, and three tardies will become one absence. Following the Dept. of Rhetoric and Writing’s policies, students are permitted four absences but will fail the course upon the fifth absence. For details about what constitutes an “excused” absence or tardy, see below.

Submitting Assignments and Late Work

The Course Calendar, which you should consult daily, indicates the date and time that your major writing assignments are due. Late work that is submitted within 24 hours of the deadline will be docked 10% (one letter grade). Late work that is submitted more than 24 hours after the deadline will receive half credit, with a maximum potential score of 50%. If an emergency situation prevents you from being able to finish your work on time, you should let your instructor know as soon as possible.