ASRC 1821

Last Updated

  • Schedule of Classes - September 22, 2025 1:06PM EDT

ASRC 1821
FWS: Listen to Understand: Writing Black Performance & Black Lives

Course information provided by the 2025-2026 Catalog.

Blues and jazz music are central to American culture and will be a major focus of our writing in this course. We will explore the work of iconic artists such as Billie Holiday, Nina Simone and Janelle Monae, whose transmission of the Black experience collapses the distinctions between art, philosophy, the erotic, and the struggle for liberation. We will also read key philosophers and intellectuals such as Angela Davis and Fred Moten, combining the pleasure of appreciating music with rigorous intellectual exploration in our seminar discussion that presents higher-order thinking and university level writing. Writing projects will include critical essays, research-based papers, and a video essay as we develop our understanding of Black experience and performance in our capacities as writers.


Writing and Languages (FWS)

Last 4 Terms Offered 2025SP

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Syllabi: none

  •   FWS Session. 

  • 3 Credits Graded

  • 18270 ASRC 1821   SEM 101

  •  
    • MW

    • Douglas, A

  • Instruction Mode: In Person

    For more information about First-Year Writing Seminars, see the Knight Institute website at http://knight.as.cornell.edu/.