Biography of a Song
Songs are historical documents. That is, they are creations of a specific historical time and context. They can give insight into politics, economics,
cultural values, etc. Your assignment will be to write a biography of a song (see list). Your biography should include the following:
1) A discussion of the historical context of the song (what was going on at the time that generated the song?)
2) A discussion of the song’s meaning and use (why was the song written; what message was it getting across; how was that message related to the
historical context in which it was written?)
3) A discussion of who performed the song and why. Most songs are associated with a particular performer. Why did that person write and/or perform
the song (this is related to point 2 above)?
4) Footnotes or endnotes and a bibliography of sources consulted and/or quoted from.
5) An appendix with the song’s complete lyrics
Your paper should be about 750-1000 words in length (not counting bibliography and song lyrics in appendix).
Your paper should have a thesis statement, which your paper would then discuss, describe, prove, etc. For this assignment, your thesis statement will
probably be a statement about why your song was written and/or performed. The rest of the paper would be devoted to proving your thesis by
explaining historical context, the song’s meaning and use, the writer or performer’s purpose, etc.
Your paper should use footnotes or endnotes
Your paper should contain a bibliography and should follow Chicago/Turabian citation procedure (try to consult at least three or four sources).
Standard fonts, type sizes, margins, headers, etc. should be used. For example, do not write your entire paper in italics
Every effort should be made to write well-constructed, grammatical sentences. Remember, a simple sentence is more effective than an
ungrammatical complex one