Draw from material that has made up the course–the assigned readings to make your argument. Reference citations should be
included whenever relevant (regarding quotations, historical references, musicological information, etc.), but only through
direct sourcing; Wikipedia references or the like are not acceptable.
For the paper content:
Consider the insistence on death, violence, and crime as subjects in the songs we’ve listened to and the novels and
historical studies we’ve read this semester. Citing a range of examples from class and the texts, consider why folk
performers and audiences are drawn to material that involves violence and death.
Is there something inherent in the form and function of the folk song that encourages these themes? Is there something
about our own time that keeps certain folk stories, images, melodies, and phrases going back hundreds of years alive today?
This could include murder ballads and blues songs, essays from “The Rose & the Briar,” material from “Wisconsin Death
Trip,” ” My Pafology” from “Erasure,” the Handsome Family’s “Arlene,” Bob Dylan’s comments on the Civil War in
“Chronicles,” the shooting in “John Henry Days,” and more.
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