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Beyonce has become the subject of a brand-new course called “Feminist Perspectives: Politicizing Beyoncé” at Rutgers University in New Jersey.
According to the Rutgers Today newspaper, the class was created by doctoral student Kevin Allred, who established the class in 2010 after teaching Women’s Studies 101 for four semesters.
“This isn’t a course about Beyoncé’s political engagement or how many times she performed during President Obama’s inauguration weekend,” the Ph.D candidate explained. “Rather, the performer’s music and career are used as lenses to explore American race, gender and sexual politics.”
The class will examine how much control Bey has over her own aesthetic; the racier performances as her alter ego, “Sasha Fierce”; and the lyrics and videos from the singer, who will be compared to other vocalists, including Billie Holiday, Nina Simone and Lady Gaga, Rutgers Today reports.
“It’s important to shift students away from simply being consumers of media toward thinking more critically about what they’re engaging on a regular basis,” Allred said.
Georgetown University professor Michael Eric Dyson offers a similar course on Beyoncé’s rapper husband: “The Sociology of Hip-Hop: The Theodicy of Jay Z.”
Copyright 2014 ABC News Radio
