Word Count: 1,250-1500 words
File formats accepted: .pdf, .doc, and docx
Sources: 8 sources, including two peer-review academic journals
Format: Modern Language Association (MLA)
General Education Learning Outcomes (GELOs): 1-5
Overview: For this assignment, you will write a Critical Synthesis essay. It will require you to synthesize multiple sources to show how different participants in a debate (i.e. “stakeholders”) discuss and provide evidence for their viewpoints on a highly debated, music-related topic. You will need to think about each stakeholder’s reasons and assumptions in the debate and situate these assumptions within a broader context. The length requirement for this essay is 1,250 to 1,500-words.
Directions: Write a critical essay in which you synthesize the arguments of the key stakeholders involved in a music-related debate of your own choosing and stake your own position.
Guidelines for Critical Synthesis Essay
Music generates all kinds of debates and controversies. Does Robin Thicke’s “Blurred Lines,” for example, steal from Marvin Gaye’s “Got to Give It Up?” Moreover, is the video for this song sexist in its depiction of women? Are K-pop stars unfairly exploited by the Korean music industry? Do the credited writers of “The Lion Sleeps Tonight” add anything new to Solomon Linda’s “Mbubu,” the song from which their international hit was derived? Answers to questions like these have real world consequences for the stakeholders involved in the debate.
This leads to a crucial point: In many cases it is not music but the business of music that generates many arguments. Was Scooter Braun trolling Taylor Swift when he purchased the rights to her recordings, or was he simply making a business investment? Did Jay-Z intend to use his new business deal with the NFL to bring attention to important social justice issues, or was he merely a “sellout” as some have accused him? These are the kinds of claims made by various stakeholders in a music-related debate.
Your task is to 1) provide a summary of a music-related controversy/debate of your own choice, 2) synthesize and evaluate the arguments made by, or on behalf of, the major stakeholders in it, and 3) stake your own position in the debate, providing support for your own argument.
Your essay should include the following:
Stakeholders: Who are the major stakeholders in the music-related debate or controversy you chose to write about? Keep in mind the stakeholders may not be the ones making an argument. For example, Solomon Linda is probably the biggest stakeholder in the debate over the royalties to “The Lion Sleeps Tonight,” but he never publicly made his own case and appears not to have been interested in how copyright royalties worked in the West. In his case, you would have to examine the arguments made by others (such as his surviving daughters) on his behalf. NOTE: Since we will be examining this debate closely in class in order to prepare you for your Critical Synthesis, the controversy over the songwriting credit and royalties for Solomon Linda’s “Mbube” is not available for this assignment.
Research: Your essay should include at least eight sources, two of which must be peer-review academic journals. In addition, you may also use books, websites, songs, articles and editorials from newspapers and magazines, and even social media posts, provided they are created by a major stakeholder in the music-related issue you have chosen to analyze. Using MLA guidelines, you should cite your sources and include a works cited page.
Thesis: Although you will be analyzing other peoples’ arguments, you will still want to share your own argument. Take care to avoid stitching together summaries of the different arguments made by stakeholders in a debate without evaluating their merits or drawing your own conclusions. Think of yourself as the judge who presides over a hearing, listens to the various arguments made, and reaches a verdict. The difference, however, is that, unlike a judge, you will also be reporting on and evaluating the arguments made by the different stakeholders in this debate, indicating points of agreement or disagreement between them. As you do so, answer the following questions: What are underlying values and assumptions of the various arguments being made? Does a pattern or theme emerge as you view the different arguments? How do the various stakeholders respond to each others’ arguments? Finally, what are the grounds and warrants for your own claim in this music-related debate?
