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The Old Folks at Home
Minstrel songs were part of 19th-century pop music. "The Old Folks at Home" was originally sung from the perspective of an enslaved person longing for his life on the plantation. The song remains Florida's state song but its lyrics have undergone…
A Change is Gonna Come
This song can be used to introduce students to Civil Rights songs, many of which spoke to the movement's optimism. However, this song was unique in comparison to other songs such as "We Shall Overcome" for not being as optimistic. Like many other…
Desapariciones
Forced disappearances were a key tactic of various dictatorships of the Americas. The song follows the story of a man and woman, ordinary people who have disappeared, and the fight their family engages in to try and locate them. The final stanza…
El Padre Antonio y el Monaguillo Andrés
The song describes the assassination of a popular village priest and altar boy, indirectly referencing the assassination of Bishop Óscar Arnulfo Romero, major figurehead of Liberation Theology. Romero's preaching of liberation theology sought to…
Come on in My Kitchen
The song could be used as an example of the loose narrative and references to the supernatural and/or folk beliefs often found within the blues genre. Though the song lacks a linear narrative, the collection of somewhat unrelated vignettes which…
Crossroad Blues
This song introduces the common Blues music themes of crossroads and collective suffering. Crossroads, high traffic vehicular roads, feature prominently as landmarks in the Mississippi Delta area that Johnson called home. In the song, Johnson tries…
Tags: devil, genre: blues, U.S. South, United States
The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down
"The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down" was written by a Canadian - with assistance from his Arkansas-born bandmate, Levon Helm - who spent an extended period of time in the U.S. South. The song depicts the story of a poor white Southerner and former…
No More Apartheid
In addition to contributing to the 1985 dance track and protest song "Sun City," Peter Gabriel wrote a new song for the Artists United Against Apartheid's album Sun City. The protest group was founded by American musician Steven Van Zandt with the…
Mississippi Goddam
Written in direct response to the 1963 Birmingham, Alabama Church bombing which killed 4 African American girls, this song can be used to instruct students on the shifting attitudes surrounding the conversation on race relations and the Civil Rights…
One (Hu)'man One Vote
Written by Johnny Clegg in memory of his former professor, friend and fellow academic, Dr. David Webster, the song's lyrics speak to the nation's frustration with its government. In addition to his work as a social anthropologist, Dr. Webster was…