Course Description

This is an Osher Online course, created and offered through the Osher National Resource Center.  These courses are different from our regular OLLI at Emory program.  These are six-week courses and live attendance required.  You must also have an active OLLI at Emory membership and to register. Currently all classes are limited with 13 seats.

This class is supported by the NRC and participation details can be found on our website.

Instructor: Matt Jennings

Whether you’re in Macon, Memphis, Muscle Shoals, or Massapequa, music matters, and our varied musical heritage is one of the best ways to understand crucial moments in American history. This course will explore Indigenous expressions, colonial invasion, forced African migration, and the cultural shifts of the 19th, 20th, and 21st centuries. Through the interplay of genres and traditions, we’ll examine how music captures the evolving American experience.

Matt Jennings, PhD is Professor of History at Middle Georgia State University. He has authored several books on Native American and local history, including New Worlds of Violence, The Flower Hunter and the People, and Ocmulgee National Monument: A Brief History with Field Notes (with poet Gordon Johnston). While he specializes in Native American history, he teaches in a variety of fields, including the history of music in America (perhaps as a way of compensating for his sporadic, and sophomoric efforts on the guitar, mandolin, and banjo).