Read these instructions IN FULL before submitting your essay. You will lose marks for citation errors and if you miss parts of the instructions.
Choose one from the below set of questions/ prompts that address foundational material we have covered up to this point in the course. Draw on (cite) course readings to make and support a clear argument. You may, but are not required to, cite material outside of our required reading/ listening/ viewing to support your argument(s). Your essay should be approximately 2,000 words in length. Use the below formatting guidelines for your online midterm submission. Make sure to give your essay an original title.
Again, while the following prompts are intended to allow you flexibility in your choice of topic and approach, you must make a scholarly argument in your essay. One good way to make sure your method and your argument are both identifiable (both for you and for your reader) is to write, within the first few paragraphs, “Through/ by/ via […], I argue in this paper that/for/ against […]”
How are sound practices important to Sufi orders? Give detailed explanations and examples of the practices and politics of sound in Sufism, drawing on course materials.
Explain and compare two contexts (from our readings) where music generated contention and controversy. How and why was music a problem in each of these times/ places/ communities/ instances?
What is Islamic music? Argue for or against this phrase as a useful analytical category and framework for research.
Why have narratives of al-Andalus been important in the 20th and 21st centuries? Choose a story of music in/and al-Andalus or manifestation of “Andalusian music” in the recent century to explicate and analyze.
What is, as Patricia Kubala describes it, “purposeful art” (al-fann al-hadif)? Choose two or three examples (perhaps Malaysian nasyid, Sami Yusef, other examples discussed in Kubala and/or Janmohamed), perform close readings, and offer an analysis of this category in context.
How has the Islamic tradition been racialized? How and why does this racialization appear in the policing of music? Use examples and draw across different course readings.
Formatting Guidelines
Submit assignments as Word documents
Use 12-point Times New Roman or Garamond font
Double-space
Number each page
Use one-inch margins
Give your assignment a title
Include your name and the date at the top of the first page
Cite sources using Chicago format (notes and bibliography or author/date style are both acceptable: choose one and be consistent): https://www.chicagomanualofstyle.org/tools_citationguide.html
Give full citations – **even for material on the syllabus**
