History of Rock n Roll - HIST 371

Fall 2024, Senior Year §

Professor Atkinson §

atkinsod@purdue.edu

Link Hub

• The Origins of Rock and Roll
  • Rock & Roll Origins
  • R&B Becomes Rock & Roll
  • Backlash, 1950’s
  • The Fall & Rise of Rock & Roll
  • The British Invasion of America
  • The American Response, 1963-1970
  • Cold War Rock & Roll Part 1, 1950s-1960s
• Popular Music & The Counterculture - The 1960s-70s
  • Motown, Soul, and Civil Rights, 1959-1972
  • Folk Revival, Folk Rock, & Protest, 1930s-1969
  • Rock & Roll and the Counterculture, Part 1, 1960-1967
  • Rock & Roll and the Counterculture, Part 2, 1967-1969
  • The Rise of Hard Rock & Heavy Metal
  • Woodstock, Altamont, & The Rest, 1969-1972
• Consolidation and Fragmentation, 1970s-1990s
  • Consolidation & Fragmentation, 1968-1980
  • Prog, Glam, Funk, & Disco, 1968-1980
  • Punk Rock & New Wave, 1966-1980
  • Hair Metal & the New Wave of British Heavy Metal, 1980s
  • Satirizing Hair Metal & Corporate Rock & Roll
  • MTV & The Return of Corporate Rock & Roll
  • Rock & Roll Activism, 1970s-1980s
  • Hip Hop & Rap, 1970s-1980s
  • The PMRC & Another Backlash, 1980s
  • Cold War Rock and Roll Part 2, 1970s-1980s
  • Indie, Grunge, & Britpop

Course Description §

This class will survey the social, cultural, political, and economic history of the post-
World War II United States through the prism of music – rock and roll music. At one
level the class will survey trends and styles in rock, focusing first on the artists and
groups who gave rise to this hybrid form of music from its country and blues roots. It
will then track the rise of rock and roll in the 1950s and the corporate, political, and
social backlash against it. The focus on the 1960s will be on music as an expression
and extension of the social, cultural, and political changes of that decade. Finally, the
class will examine the paradoxical developments of the evolution of “corporate rock
and roll” with the emergence of an abrasive, often angry music (punk/grunge/rap) by
the end of the 1970s and into the 1980s. In the end, this class will examine and
explain the technological, business, and social forces that helped cement rock’s
position in Western popular culture

Overall §

General Class Info §

• Books
  • The Pop, Rock, and Soul Reader: Histories and Debates Fourth Edition, David Brackett (Oxford University Press, 2020)
  • What’s That Sound? An Introduction to Rock and It’s History Sixth Edition, John Covach and Andrew Flory (Norton, 2022)
• Grade breakdown
  • 15% Reading Responses (3 of them)
  • 25% Exam one
  • 25% Exam two
  • 35% final
• Attendance required, no recordings. If you’re sick you can ask for video
• 3 exams, consist of short identification questions reflecting upon the significance of specific individuals or events from readings
• There will be 3 informal essays responding to questions throughout the semester
  • You will select one option from each of the three major sections of the course