Who runs the (academic) world? Yale rolls out new class focused on Beyoncé’s cultural impact

Yale University is launching a new class focused entirely on Beyoncé’s influence.

For their upcoming spring semester, Yale added the “Beyoncé Makes History: Black Radical Tradition History, Culture, Theory & Politics Through Music” course in which the icon’s work will be analyzed and interpreted as it relates to Black history.

Taught by Daphne Brooks, a professor of African American studies and music, the course will follow her work over 11 years, from 2013 to 2024. The goal of the course, as explained in the Yale Daily News, is to view her art, fashion, “visual media,” and performance through an intellectual lens, seeing how they all carry political and cultural significance.

Students will be taught to further understand the experience of Black females in politics and media through reading assignments and discussions. Texts from Cedric Robinson, Karl Hagstrom Miller, and Hortense Spillers will be viewed in tandem with humanitarian projects and Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Libray’s archives.

Brooks intends to separate Beyoncé from her “typical pop repertoire,” as the star did for herself during certain eras of her career, meaning the course will focus more on the latter years.

Speaking to the Yale Daily News, Brooks detailed her intention to introduce this new class following the 2024 US election that saw Donald Trump become the 47th president. “[This class] seemed good to teach because [Beyoncé] is just so ripe for teaching at this moment in time,” she explained.

“The number of breakthroughs and innovations she’s executed and the way she’s interwoven history and politics and really granular engagements with Black cultural life into her performance aesthetics and her utilization of her voice as a portal to think about history and politics,” Brooks continued. “There’s just no one like her.”

Having previously taught a “Black Women in Popular Music Culture” course at Princeton University, Brooks thought it best to create a more focused rendition at Yale where she focused primarily on Beyoncé rather than trying to fit the impact of multiple artists into one semester.

Of the old course, she said: “There was so much energy around the focus on Beyoncé, even though it was a class that starts in the late 19th century and moves through the present day. I always thought I should come back to focusing on her and centering her work pedagogically at some point.”

Brooks wants her students to better understand how culture can serve as a sort of refuge for marginalized people and minority groups in the country. Furthermore, she wants to continue Vice President Kamala Harris’ efforts to strengthen and broaden community building for the next generation.

“By looking at culture through Beyoncé, it can invite us to think about the extent to which art can articulate the world we live in and nourish our spirits and give us the space to imagine better worlds and the ethics of freedom,” Brooks added.