Reference no: EM133749981
Possible Writing Prompts:
In this module, we discussed the life, career, and music of Ravi Shankar. In addition, we discussed his influence on music outside of his native country of India. Shankar had a successful and unrivaled career within his own country, and the success of his career grew exponentially after building a relationship with George Harrison and when The West discovered his talent. The impact of his career after global recognition was really two-fold: in one aspect, he was recognized by the world over as a classical musician of India and appreciated in, more or less, his own musical context. In another aspect, this global recognition also impacted new and popular music from those who wanted to learn sitar and the Indian classical tradition, like George Harrison.
Take a moment to reflect on these two impactful contributions to Ravi Shankar's musical heritage. Was the world ready to appreciate Shankar's music for what it was as part of it's own musical tradition, or was it so well received because people were seeking something truly different from what they were raised to believe about music? Were people of the West romanticizing the classical Indian tradition that Shankar represented? Or was the whole movement of "looking East" just exoticizing Indian music? Is the whole experience of embracing classical Indian music part of inevitable globalization? (Such as how the Beatles incorporated aspects of Indian music into their mainstream music making the sounds more familiar and comfortable).
Essay Assignment:
Taking from the content shared in this module (assigned readings, videos, lectures), as well as from previous module's materials discussing globalization and exoticism, share your opinion on the impact and relevance of Ravi Shankar's career and his legacy of sharing his native musical tradition with the world. Importantly, this is a reflection and opinion paper, not a research paper. There is no single correct answer here, but move beyond merely stating your opinion and make a greater move to explain why. Use any of the questions raised in the writing prompt above as a point of departure. But please do not feel pressured to answer all of the prompts or questions; the assignment is too brief to do that. Rather, view the above prompts and questions as a menu from which you can choose ideas that you wish to discuss.
Specific Guidelines:
Assignment length: ~300 words. Write your mini-essay in a word processing program, back it up, edit it, proofread it, then when ready copy and paste your text into the Module 4 Writing Assignment #1 window and submit your writing.
More specific direction:
Do write in complete sentences, with clear, solid prose.
You may write in the first or third person.
Feel free to write personally, but not informally (i.e., avoid overly casual language, slang, profanity, etc.).
Introduce and conclude your essay (introduction and conclusion sentence)
If you refer to class readings or topics, do so very briefly but please do not summarize readings; the writing assignment is about your reaction to the topic and is too brief for content summary. You may use the reading for examples, but the examples should only support your ideas/opinions.
All ideas and quotations that are not your own must be properly cited to follow standard academic procedure and avoid breaches of the Honor Code(you may any citation style as long as you are consistent in its application). It is not a requirement of the assignment that you include outside sources, but any sources that you do use must be cited.