(FreedomBeacon.com)- Students at the University of Cambridge in the UK are asked to look at classical music through a “post-colonial lens.”
The past few years have seen a growing trend in academia to “decolonize” the curriculum. Usually, this means taking things apart and figuring out how they fit into a framework of power dynamics.
Classical music is the latest thing to be taken apart, as students at Cambridge University are asked to find connections between music and things like imperialism, colonialism, and class.
The class is called “Decolonizing the Ear.” The goal is to teach students how to interact with music using different academic frameworks, mainly those that deal with power dynamics.
In one part of the course, students look at how classical music might have been “complicit” in neoliberal power structures.
The course also talks about how Empire changed our ideas about what music is and how genres like opera seem especially prone to racialized representations.”
No musician, no matter how high up they are on the list of greats, is safe from being lumped in with others and accused of being products of imperialism or, in some cases, white supremacy.
Mozart and Verdi are just pawns in the imperial conquests of Europe. Their art is not appreciated, but it is broken down to show not what they were thinking but what society was going through at the time.
In the course materials, it is said that these and many other artists were part of a musical establishment that served patriarchy, class ambition, and imperial expansion.
Students asked for content warnings for all music courses to be ready for “potentially distressing” topics that might be discussed.
Cambridge isn’t the only university with a music department that offers these kinds of classes. After the Black Lives Matter protests, many schools and organizations tried to “decolonize” their arts and culture courses.
Are there trigger warnings for courses about modern-day hip hop and rap? Be warned. Many of the songs in those genres are about actual triggers.
