MUS2651 – Music and the environment
Course description
Course content
What is the relationship between music and the environment? Across various genres and historical moments, music has been engaged to celebrate breathtaking mountain- and seascapes, to protest environmental crises, and to acoustically meditate on humanity’s relationship to an ever-changing environmental context. But music has also contributed to noise pollution, generated tons of greenhouse gas emissions, and flourished as a result of almost inconceivable resource extraction.?
This course is about the history of musical thought and scholarship on the environment. It is equally about the history, current state, and future of the relationship between music and the environment. Engaging with a diverse range of musical examples, the course draws on ideas from foundational fields such as acoustic ecology and soundscape studies as well as contemporary and developing fields such as ecomusicology, sound studies, the environmental humanities, and the energy humanities.?
Learning outcome
On passing this course, students will be able to:
- Critically analyze relationships between music and the environment.
- Describe and evaluate the broad history and development of music’s relationship to the environment in theory and practice.
- Apply historical knowledge, terminology, and ideas learned in class to other past or present examples of music, visual-sonic media, sound art, or related creative practices.?
- Outline and participate in current debates, explain different theoretical and academic positions, concepts, and methodologies relevant to musical and environmental research.?
Admission to the course
Students who are admitted to study programmes at UiO must each semester register which courses and exams they wish to sign up for in Studentweb.
If you are not already enrolled as a student at UiO, please see our information about admission requirements and procedures.
Overlapping courses
- 10 credits overlap with MUS4651 – The Political Ecology of Music (discontinued).
Teaching
- 10 double periods of lectures and seminars
Compulsory activities
- Qualification Assessment 1 (English): three short critical summaries on core readings of the student’s choice, with their submissions distributed evenly throughout the semester (i.e. approximately one critical summary per month). Students should submit their summaries after the core readings have been presented and discussed in class, so that they may incorporate class discussion into their own commentaries.?
- Qualification Assessment 2 (English): 300-word abstract of topic idea for semesteroppgave and annotated bibliography of 3 sources to be used in the term paper’s bibliography.??
- Qualification Assessment 3 - Mandatory attendance at 7?of 10 class sessions?
Information about the qualification assessments and the deadlines will be given during the teaching and in Canvas. You must hand in the assessments by the deadlines and you are responsible for familiarising yourself with the requirements for the qualification assessments.
Fulfilled course requirements are only valid the semester you attend the course.
Read more about compulsory activities here.
Apply for a valid absence from compulsory activity or attendance.
Examination
- Term paper (10 pages, each containing approx. 2,300 characters, spaces not included or 5 pages for students who choose to submit a creative/practical component)
- Creative/practical components may include recordings, videos, devices, and so on—as long as the creative component may be submitted for assessment. The creative component will account for half of the overall grade for the written examination.
More information about the exam requirements will be given in Canvas and during the teaching.
You must fulfill the requirement for compulsory activities to submit the exam.?
The grading guidelines for MUS2651 can be found here.
Language of examination
The examination text is given in English, and you submit your response in English
Grading scale
Grades are awarded on a scale from A to F, where A is the best grade and F is a fail. Read more about the grading system.
More about examinations at UiO
- Use of sources and citations
- How to use AI as a student
- Special exam arrangements due to individual needs
- Withdrawal from an exam
- Illness at exams / postponed exams
- Explanation of grades and appeals
- Resitting an exam
- Cheating/attempted cheating
You will find further guides and resources at the web page on examinations at UiO.