First-Year Seminars 110MM - Women and Music: Sounding Community

This course surveys music in a range of women's, and womxn's, communities and ensembles--from medieval convents and "all-girl" swing bands to Cuba's Ibbu Okun and the Transcendence Gospel Choir. While the focus will be on Western art music, we will also encounter music from Afghanistan and the First Nations, working songs and playground songs, and rock/pop groups and DJ collectives. Performers will visit the class, and we will learn about the history of music ensembles at Mount Holyoke College. You do not need to be a musician or know how to read music; listening across cultures and genres, we will contemplate the opportunities and challenges of womxn-only spaces for music in the twenty-first century.

Mount Holyoke first-year students only, by placement.