Yale to teach course in Beyoncé
NewsCouldn’t make it up?
From Yale Daily News:
Daphne Brooks, professor of African American Studies and music, will teach a new class titled “Beyoncé Makes History: Black Radical Tradition History, Culture, Theory & Politics through Music.” In the class, students will examine Beyoncé’s artistic work from 2013 to 2024 as a lens to study Black history, intellectual thought and performance.
The course is a byproduct of Brooks’ previous class at Princeton University titled “Black Women in Popular Music Culture.” While at Princeton, Brooks served as a faculty member in the English and African American Studies Departments. Much of the content in her Yale course draws from the section in her Princeton course which focused on Beyoncé’s cultural impact.
“Those classes were always overenrolled,” Brooks said. “And there was so much energy around the focus on Beyoncé, even though it was a class that starts in the late 19th century and moves through the present day. I always thought I should come back to focusing on her and centering her work pedagogically at some point.”
Brooks believes that following the 2024 election and the events preceding it, it’s important to recognize Beyoncé’s unprecedented contributions to American culture, popular culture and global culture for the past two decades….
There’s more.
Can’t wait for the Cliff Richard course at Oxford.
This perfectly shows how social justice attempts politicise culture, and in this case even the cheapest entertainment culture. With music it has nothing to do, it is a social/political course, obviously.
Beyoncé isn’t music?
That is not the point – this lady’s entertainment is obviously not treated as music but as an instrument of social justice.
I wonder why not a course in misogyny in hip-hop? (I wonder if I wonder?)
The irony is that this course might very well visit the topic of ‘WAP’ while viewing WAP online can get someone fired over at Juilliard.
Of all the biasses this course will overlook, it’s Beyoncé’s preference for BBC that intrigues most of her fans.
Two female hip hop artists (neither of whom is Beyonce) rapping about a sex act is in no way equivalent to a university professor viewing that same sex act on his work computer while in his office.
The intersection of Beyoncé, Ben Shapiro, and Cardi B is worthy of discussion on censorship. It should be noted that our beloved Shapiro came to Beyoncé’s defense over her song “Heated.” Read more at Newsweek, 2022.
If you haven’t seen her perform, “Beyoncé Live at the BBC 2006” has many of her early hits.
Daphne Brooks is among the greatest scholars of her generation and this looks to be a fabulous course, delving into many dimensions of American history, culture, and politics. Yale students are lucky she married Prof. Matthew Frye Jacobson and moved to Yale from Princeton several years ago.
Are they really married or is this a joke?
well, so much for woke politics: once again, the (black) women following her (white) husband’s career and relocating to his city and place of employment, and never the other way around
Here, it especially boggles the mind, not only because Princeton is ranked higher than Yale in every meaningful measure, but who the hell would relocate to New Haven voluntarily? If you want to get shot at, there are plenty of cities in NJ near Princeton for that.
Meaningless pap. Never before thought of Beyoncé’s music as anything more than background accompaniment for shopping malls.Taylor Swift is another. They are not alone. In any case, better rush this through now while they can and before the new WH begins dismantling DEI/DEIB/JEDI edifices all over.
You know you don’t have to take this course, right? If it’s not for you, move along, and leave it to the others.
If Biden got his way, a student taking this course paying for it with federal student loans could stick the taxpayer with the tab.
DEI courses for a DEI professor. There’s your elite educational institution.
While the Russians are learning math, physics and chemistry, the Americans are immersing themselves in Beyoncé. Guess who wins on the battlefield?
Based on Russia’s performance in the Ukraine, I would not go where you went. 673,000 dead and a need to call in North Korea to cover your tuchus is not a statement of higher learning success in military engagement.
Uh-oh! Spreading misinformation here. The numbers are ~ 75,000 from the Putin side and ~500,000 on Zelensky side. (Source BBC).
US students can take a music/culture elective in addition to math, physics, and chemistry. Hope this helps.
ARE Russians learning math, physics, and chemistry?
Most fighting-age men have fled, those who couldn’t are dying in Ukraine, the younger generation is being indoctrinated in Orthodox religion…
Definitely not the Russians – they can’t even handle Ukraine
Because clearly this is the one and only academic course being offered at Yale University. All math, science and chemistry courses have been cancelled to make room for it…
I see. It’s much worse than I had imagined.
Playing the stuff of these ladies very loudly would demoralize any Russian soldier, or else be a strong motivation to join the enemy.
Forward! Twerking all the way to Moscow.
🙂
We’ll have to get back to you!!!!!!!!
In today’s primitive and atavistic society, it cannot be denied that despite prodigious effort over the centuries and a plethora of civilizing influences, we are fast losing our precious love of the arts, much to the corruptive preference of jungle drums and whatever else is guaranteed to bring out the savage in all of us; to manifest all the negative aspects of our fallen nature, bequeathed to us by our First Parents, Adam and Eve, thereby carrying on as though we lived in a tree!
guest1848
Jungle drums! I am a Baby Boomer; my parents belonged to The Greatest Generation. When I was a teenager, my mother referred to rock ‘n roll as Jungle Music, whereas I thought the label more nearly applied to Big Band drummer Gene Krupa and his ilk. Beyoncé? Not even close.
As far as I know, these two people were characters in a religious myth and had nothing to do with our real ancestors. Humanity does not need such myths to fall back to earlier stages of evolution.
People regress when life requires some effort. The infantilisation of modern Western life does the rest.
Didn’t Professor Higgins sing something like ‘as if her home were in a tree’?? Alan Lerner was onto something.
Yes, Professor Brooks, please explain why Beyoncé failed to influence Black women to vote for Harris who got less Black women votes than Biden did, or to influence the Black man vote, or Latino or even Puerto Rican vote, or that of Indian-Americans or Arab-Americans, before you even need to explain Beyoncé’s irrelevance for the White women vote, much less the White men vote.
Preach, sistah!
And people wonder why Trump won
I really can’t see the problem with this.
A large proportion of a university’s aim is to teach critical thinking. Research. analysis, and evaluation are the core skills, and the subject matter serves merely as a means to teaching these.
A small minority may rail against the teaching of Cultural Studies, but as a former Programme Mananger at the US-UK Fulbright Commission, I welcome any addition to a curriculum that increases student engagement.
The question is, how much would a social justice course on pop music contribute to young people’s critical thinking? if such extremely primitive material is deemed necessary, how would that help?
Imagine a course in high cuisine cooking taking as practicing material the worst BigMac.
Actually I think the BigMac is a perfect metaphor for much popular culture and lefty ideology; high on calories and very low on taste and nutrition.
To dismiss ‘pop music’ as ‘extremely primitive’ is merely a display of ignorance and prejudice, I’m sorry to say. Reminiscent of the way uninformed people used to dismiss jazz as ‘jungle music’.
There is room for examination of popular music in an academic context, and perhaps Professor Brooks will approach her subject with due seriousness. But it does seem rather trivial. Michael Jackson, Prince and Whitney Houston, three dead-too-young artists from the black community, all of whom achieved massive popular success comparable to that of Beyonce, have not left much behind.
All I know of Beyonce is that she has stayed married for more than 15 years, no mean feat in show business. She may indeed be the best of her lot, but whether there is “intellectual thought” to be gleaned from her work remains to be proven. And how much “Black history” can a pop singer of 43 have contributed?
The Beatles had much more societal significance than many pop stars before or since. Yet in the 80s, I heard a young person in a record store ask a companion “Did you know Pal McCartney was in a band before Wings?” Sic transit gloria mundi.
My university studies were on material that had stood the test of time. It had “charted” century upon century.
Yale used to set standards, But so did Oxbridge, and in a recent Spectator article Philip Womack says he cannot get his Russell Group students through Harry Potter.
We are about to enter a very scary new world, in which the incoming leader of the free world looks like having a completely untrammeled hand to run a kleptocracy — or a dangerously vain and uninformed tyranny that will sack enemies within and without, unchecked by Congress or a sober and professional cabinet. And out in the country, rather than learning about history, philosophy, science and law, students are studying Beyonce and resisting having to read “all of” Harry Potter or any of Moby Dick. Heaven help us all.
The current “leader of the free world” is himself the titular head of a kleptocracy. His brother, son, daughter and niece all enriched themselves with overseas money by using the Biden name. Twenty million dollars made their way to the Bidens via twenty-one shell corporations.
Perhaps if you audited Professor Brooks’ course at Yale you would get some answers to the questions in your second paragraph. Meantime, see if you can find a copy of her book, Bodies in Dissent: Spectacular Performances of Race and Freedom, 1850–1910 (Duke UP, 2006) for preliminary course reading.
Or you could just look at the Wikipedia page on Beyoncé to get an idea of her cultural significance.
I could see a course in Beyonce and Taylor Swift, or pop music in general, as part of the business school curriculum. Both have become fabulously wealthy, so why not explore what made them successful?
Would that need a university course at Yale? Anybody can see, or rather hear, why these people got so wealthy.
Universities are supposed to be places of higher learning. That means that not all material can be considered as good as any other.
When do they cover her relationship with Diddy? I’m sure that will be fascinating!
Yale leaked the 1st exam to me:
1. Beyoncé’s first solo album, which helped her transition from Destiny’s Child to a solo artist, was released in what year?
A) 2000
B) 2001
C) 2003
D) 2005
2. Which song did Beyoncé famously lip-sync at the 2013 Presidential Inauguration?
A) “Halo”
B) “Run the World (Girls)”
C) “At Last”
D) “The Star-Spangled Banner”
3. Beyoncé was involved in a controversial Photoshop incident in 2015. What did she allegedly photoshop in her Instagram photo?
A) Her facial features
B) Her waist
C) Her thick thighs
D) Her hair color
4. Which of the following is a notable 2020 release by Beyoncé, blending elements of Afrobeat and Western pop music?
A) Lemonade
B) Homecoming
C) Black Is King
D) Renaissance
5. In 2024, Beyoncé campaigned for which presidential candidate, who ultimately lost to President Donald Trump in a re-election bid?
A) Joe Biden
B ) Kamala Harris
C) Bernie Sanders
D) Hillary Clinton
6. Beyoncé was part of a legendary group before going solo. What was the name of the group?
A) TLC
B ) En Vogue
C) Destiny’s Child
D) 3LW
7. Beyoncé’s alter ego, famously used to express a more confident and bold side of her personality, is named:
A) Sasha Fierce
B ) Queen Bey
C) Honey B
D) Sasha Fierce-Beyoncé
8. Which of Beyoncé’s music videos broke the internet when it was released in 2016 and was inspired by feminist themes and messages of empowerment?
A) “Formation”
B )”Irreplaceable”
C) “Crazy in Love”
D) “Single Ladies (Put a Ring on It)”
9. What major event was Beyoncé’s “Lemonade” album largely inspired by?
A) Her pregnancy with Blue Ivy
B ) The racial injustice protests
C) Alleged infidelity in her marriage to Jay-Z
D) Her friendship with Michelle Obama
10. Beyoncé’s 2023 album “Renaissance” explores themes of:
A) Space exploration and futuristic love
B )Black joy and queer culture
C) The struggles of motherhood
D) Personal growth and reconciliation
They will first have an introduction course with simple questions, to filter-out the real dummies:
Who was Beyoncé?
A) Yes
B) No
C) No opinion
Why are you here?
A) Maybe
B) It’s my mother
C) Of course
A lot of snobbery here.
I’m currently perfecting my technique in preparing beans on toast at Le Cordon Bleu in Paris.
We cannot, we must not, we will not