Essay One Criteria

This essay is first and foremost a research project. Most of the research will involve constructing your relevant context or contexts; the other key aspect of research is, of course, choosing and analyzing your musical text (song, or song and video). I would suggest that it might be simpler to choose one of the contexts covered in weeks two to five: postmodernism, gender, technology, industry or video. Several of the readings thus far have suggested templates suitable for your own research and analysis: Alper on postmodernism, Walser on gender, Katz on technology, and Vernallis on video. Also, please consult the list of further reading below for additional research avenues.

Obviously there are two basic methodologies available: one, choose a song/video, analyze it carefully via repeated listening, and see if relevant contexts emerge. This is the type of work we have been attempting in the workshops, on Christina Aguilera, Pavement, Kylie, Sonic Youth, Ronan Keating, Smashing Pumpkins and Guided By Voices. Most likely, all of the above contexts may appear relevant, but as this is only a 1000 word essay, choose the one around which you feel you can construct the most convincing argument

The second methodology—and the one, I would argue, that could lead to a more substantial essay—would be to thoroughly research one of the contexts, and then analyze a song accordingly. This may involve listening to several songs until you find one that adequately reveals its connections to the chosen context.

For those who intend to incorporate the analysis of the video associated with your track, I must stress again the importance of remembering that it is best to think of the video as a supporting text for your song (unless you think you have located a track that you believe was custom-designed to suit visual representation, as many argued about 1980s music). So, in short, you must effectively link the video back to the song and the context you have chosen—a textual film studies analysis of a video is not enough.

Things to remember: you are not writing a street press review or any other type of magazine-style article. This is a properly researched and referenced analytical essay. Lazy internet research is not acceptable, other than for unearthing some necessary facts (names, dates etc.) from official record company or performer websites. Also, you may feel you already know a lot of information about your song and its writer/performer etc, but please remember that you don’t get marks in essays for having a good memory (that’s what exams are for); a good essay displays intelligent research as well as the ability to synthesize that research into a cohesive and well-structured argument.