Questions for Readings:
8/31: Pendle, pages 331-340
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Is the author descriptive or prescriptive in her essay?
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Does she believe in a "feminine" music?
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What is one strength of her argument?
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What is one weakness?
9/5: Citron, pages 1-43
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What is a canon?
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What are the canons in your field of study?
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How do canons and repertories differ?
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Why are we afraid of changes in the canon?
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How is the canon "socially constructed"?
9/7: Monter, "The Pedestal and the Stake"
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What was "Courtly Love"?
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Do you come away from the reading believing that women had an active or
passive role in the culture of Courtly Love?
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What is the nature of the dichotomy suggested by "pedestal" and "stake"
and what was the nature of the women it reflected?
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Is this dichotomy present in any form today?
9/14: Yardley, "Full weel"
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What has stood in the way of our understanding of women's roles in medieval
sacred music?
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What caused the virtual disappearance of women as musical creators in the
late Middle Ages?
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What special conditions allowed Hildegard to create in the manner that
she did?
9/7: Kelly-Godal, "Did Women Have a Renaissance"
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What is the historical model the author is attempting to refute?
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What evidence would suggest a "renaissance" for women?
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What evidence refutes the idea?
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Do you find the argument convincing? Why or why not?
9/21: Citron: Gender and Creativity
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How does Citron show creativity as having gendered meaning?
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How do issues of creation/procreation and conception/birth play a part
in this?
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How do you react to Clara Schumann's statement of creativity (p. 57)?