MUSC2700 Semester 1, 2024

Assessment Task Criteria: Final Essay

Length: 2000 words Weighting: 60%

Due Date: Fri, May 31st, 2024, 5pm, via Turnitin (Learn.UQ Assessment section)

Examine a post-1975 popular music text—e.g. album (vinyl, CD, mp3 or streaming release) or band/performer or music video collection—within one or more of the following contexts:

•   gender/sexuality/identity

•    race/ethnicity/nation

•   industry/economy

•   technology/new media

•   culture/society/politics

•    musicology/genre

•    postmodernism/hauntology

(Initial preparation for this task will be untaken for the Research Proposal/Annotated Bibliography assessment.)

The basic job is to contextualisean aspect of popular music. The components needed are:

1. A scholarly context.

2. A facet of popular music.

3. A connection between the two.

4. An argument.

5. Evidence (research/analysis) supporting the argument.

Using the late 1970s as the historical starting point, you may examine any aspect of popular music up until the present, assuming you have found a connection to one of the nominated contexts. To get started, think of an ‘issue’, then try to think of some aspect of popular music that touches on or reflects that issue; or, viceversa, think of an aspect of popular music, and then try to locate an ‘issue’ that it reflects or alludes to.

Marking Categories

a)   Research (20): quality, quantity, and use of sources

b)   Argument/analysis (20): plausibility of hypothesis and credibility of supporting evidence

c)   Comprehension (10): grasp of connection between music and context

d)   Style/structure (10): quality of writing and effectiveness of structure

Note that these categories do not function in isolation; they overlap and depend on the

other categories. For example, the strength of your argument will in large part rely on your choice of sources,the appropriateness of your context, the logic of your structure, and the quality of your communication skills.

Research —the number, quality, and application of references.

You will be marked according to the quality (peer-reviewed academic publications are the standard), quantity (at least ten scholarly sources for a 2000-word essay), and use of your sources (synthesis of ideas into an argument).

This assessment is first and foremost a research project. As suggested above, there are two basic research approaches available to you: one,start with the context (race, gender,

technology etc.), or two, start with the music. In both cases, most of the key research will involve constructing your relevant context or contexts, as this is where the scholarly

credibility of the argument will stand or fall. Don’t make the mistake of thinking you can present a biography of a performer or a ‘critical’ review of an album: the essay must be  about something ‘bigger’ .

The weekly course readings can help get you started on your research (make sure to check the bibliographies of the readings most suited to your topic for other potential sources) .

Several of the course readings provide templates that might be suitable for your own

research and analysis, for example Marquita R. Smith on Beyoncé and feminism, Adam  Trainer on Perth punk bands, etc. You may also wish to consult the Further Reading and

Research document in Learning Resources. A common mistake that students make is

attempting to find specific academic material on the music they intend to write about;

chances are there are no peer-reviewed books or journal articles about a particular album or performer, particularly if it is relatively recent. Fortunately, you are not researching the  music itself (other than necessary facts); you are researching the context within which you are placing the music.

There will most likely be less need for biographical material than theoretical discussion: the reader doesn’t need to know the birthdates of each band member (unless it is somehow

relevant to the context). If your argument requires specific biographical information about a performer, or details on more contemporary or obscure music styles, start with periodicals   and sources accessible via the library, such as Billboard, Rolling Stone, Rock’s Back Pages or Grove, etc. If you can’t find what you need there, next you could move on to official

websites and CD liner notes, or reasonably reliable music websites such as All Music Guide (perhaps check with me first if you wander further afield). Wikipedia-style sites are not

acceptable sources, as there is noonus on them to verify their information (feel free to use any proper resources they may cite, however).

This must be a properly researched and referenced analytical study. Without references, anything you offer is mere conjecture: don’t tell the reader what you think, tell them what you know—and for a university level essay, what you know is what credible sources have already stated. You may feel you already know a lot of information about a song or its

writer/performer, etc., but you won’t get marks in this assessment for having a good memory,a strong opinion, or ‘good taste’; a suitable essay will be the product of

appropriate research and will exhibit the ability to objectively synthesize that research into  a cohesive and well-structured argument. How to tell if your research is not up to standard: does your bibliography consist entirely of non-academic online sources? Are there any

journal articles or books listed? If not, go and find some.

Argument/analysis —the strength of the essay’s argument and the quality of analysis used to support that argument.

Your argument maybe something as straightforward as ‘This paper will argue that the production of To Pimp a Butterfly by Kendrick Lamar marks it as a postmodern cultural

product’, or ‘Changes in copyright law in the early 1990s shaped the recording of the album Check Your Head by the Beastie Boys’ . An argument in an academic essay is not a matter of being ‘right’ or ‘wrong’; it is about offering a plausible hypothesis and a requisite amount of credible supporting evidence, within the framework of the criteria. You are certainly not

expected to ‘prove’ anything, and nor should you try. You are at most offering a credible explanation as to how the music connects to the chosen context.

The essay will be severely undermined if you do not exhibit objectivity. Your personal

evaluation of popular music (whether you recognize it as such or not) will not make for a

strong argument. If aesthetic evaluation or value judgement is necessary for your argument, you will need to find credible sources that already perform that function. The strength of an  argument comes down to the credibility of the sources backing it up. For example, if the

majority—or worse, all—of  the citations in the first few paragraphs of your essay’s body are not legitimate academic sources, you are already on the path to a weak argument.

Comprehension—the insight and relevance of the chosen context to the subject material

Your context is the ‘big picture’; your subject is an aspect of popular music since 1975; your

argument is the intervention you are making between context and subject; and your

methodology is how you go about making that intervention. Comprehension comes down to how well you communicate a perception of possible relationships between the context and the music via evidence, in the form. of research and analysis. Choose your contexts wisely:

you won’t be able to write about every relevant environment, especially as this invariably means that you end up not covering any of them adequately.

It is necessary to establish the context before you begin the analysis (see Structure): the

reader needs to know why you are writing about this music. Reviewing some key literature first establishes a credible framework through which your arguments analysis can be

understood. Provide clear, well-researched definitions: don’t assume that the reader

already knows the contexts, genres, performers etc. that you are writing about. Explain

exactly what your key terms mean via relevant scholarly literature. Vague definitions based on assumptions or quotes from dictionaries are not acceptable. It’s not enough to say

something is ‘like hiphop’. What is hiphop, and what specific aspects of your text connect it to that genre? Some students simply jump into musical analysis and began throwing around

terms like ‘postmodernism or ‘music industry production standards’ or ‘Iberian dubstep

trap’ without explaining what the terms mean or why they might be relevant (that’s where the research comes in).

Style/structure —the scholarly appropriateness of style, formatting, structural logic, flow and readability.

In short, outline your context(s); place your subject (album, band etc.) within that context; then bring the two together with examples of musical/textual analysis. It’s that simple.

Here is a suggested structure:

1.     Introduction: preview your context, subject, argument and methodology (approx. 150 words)

2.     Body:

a)    Outline your context via a review of relevant literature. (approx. 450 words)

b)    Introduce your subject into the established context via relevant information. (approx. 400 words)

c)    Analyse the relevant aspects of your subject within the established context. (approx. 450 words)

d)    Present your findings as they relate to the argument you stated in the introduction. (approx. 400 words)

3.    Conclusion: restate your context, restate your findings and summarise your argument. (approx. 150 words)

[Note: word amounts are recommendations only, and a) tod) are sections, not paragraphs.]

Write the body first (and the introduction and conclusion last). Clearly establish the relevant context at the beginning of the body using credible sources (two per paragraph is a good

average). This section is sometimes known as a literature review. A clear establishment of

your context will also help with essay structure: knowing what the key elements of a context are (good research will identify them for you) will help you outline and organize them.

Next, tell the reader what they need to know about the music or the performer etc. (and

only what they need to know) to be able to follow the argument. Then come your findings as to the connections between the context and the chosen music, with appropriate analysis

as needed. Finally (in the writing process), clearly state your argument in the introduction, and sum up your findings in the conclusion.

Use this template to begin your essay plan, inserting the key ideas and relevant research

material where appropriate (note that the introduction is not really the place for quotes and citations; simply use it to explain briefly what the essay will be about and save the citations for the beginning of the body). Having a good essay plan will mean that you have essentially already begun writing the essay, as the first draft will simply be a matter of filling in the

spaces with your research; ‘writing’ the essay is then really the process of re-drafting and polishing it.

Never submit your first draft—'good writing’ is tenacious re-writing. Errors in writing

(misspelled words, grammatically awkward sentences, etc.) do not usually occur because a student doesn’t knowhow to write ‘properly’; they occur because the student did not re-

draft the essay multiple times and did not carefully proofread the final draft. Even high-

quality research, keen analysis and an air-tight argument will become meaningless to the

reader if there are significant problems in the writing and the reasoning becomes difficult to follow. Long, hard-to-read sentences or frequent errors in punctuation and spelling can

undermine otherwise excellent work. A tip: read your workout loud before you submit it, to make sure that your sentences make sense and say what you want them to say.

As you re-draft, ask yourself, are my paragraphs too long (over half a page or more),or too short (one or two sentences)? Do they contain concepts that contribute to the overall

argument? Do they flow into each other logically? Collect cohesive ideas into readable

paragraphs; work towards a flowing overall structure in which relevant points follow each other logically and accumulate into a convincing argument. The better essays will follow a strict structure like the one above and still achieve a flow between the sections that helps convince the reader of the relationship between the ideas (and not have the essay read like a report).

Other

•   Submit via the Turn It In linkin the Assessment section at Learn.UQ in Word format only (not as a PDF). You do not need to submit a printed copy.

•   Turn It In does not require a cover sheet, but do include a title page featuring your name, student number, course code, assessment item title, essay title (or topic or research question), and word count.

•    Format in double or 1.5 spacing and 12-point font.

•   Word limit: the “10% rule” applies,i.e. your essay must have between 1800 and

2200 words. Any essay outside that range will have marks deducted. Essays below

1800 words suggest that more research might be needed; anything above 2200

indicates that more drafts are required to edit it down (and not that you’revery

smart because you so much to say). In-text citations are included in the word count (that’s what the extra 10% is for).

•    Use in-text citations only, not footnotes or endnotes. See The Chicago Manual of Style, https://guides.library.uq.edu.au/referencing/chicago17-author-date

•    Bibliography entries are listed alphabetically, not in the order they appear in the essay, on a separate page at the end. Consult the style guide.

•   Quotations can’t just be dropped in; they must be smoothly incorporated into the paragraph with introductory phrases such ‘As Katz argues, …’,

‘According to Hughes…’,etc.

•    If you intend to include blockquotes, do so sparingly (paraphrase where possible). Indented quotes are single spaced but do not require italics, quote marks, or a different or smaller font.

•   Citations are not necessary in your introduction, the assumption being that all that material will eventually be appropriately cited in the essay body.

•    Never italicize quotations or use italics for emphasis. Italics are reserved for book, journal, film and album titles.

•    For decades, write 1980s, 1990s etc. —not 80s, 90s, or eighties, nineties.

•    How to format song and album titles: The Charli XCX track ‘Good Ones’ is from the album Crash.

•    Music genre names don’t need to be capitalized.

•    Either indent the beginning of a new paragraph, or leave a space between paragraphs.

•   You don’t need to include an in-text citation everytime you mention an album or song. Simply state clearly the first time the relevant details of the text you are examining.

•   You can format lyrics as if they were verse:

When you got the yams

The yamis the power that be

You can smell it when I'm walking down the street