American History In Six Songs (OOL)
Virtual /Online | Registration opens Tuesday, August 19, 2025 10:00 AM
Whether you’re in Macon, Memphis, Muscle Shoals, or Massapequa, music matters, and our varied musical heritage is one of the best ways to understand crucial moments in American history.
This program will explore Indigenous expressions, colonial invasion, forced African migration, and the cultural shifts of the 19th, 20th, and 21st centuries. Through the interplay of genres and traditions, we’ll examine how music captures the evolving American experience.
TUESDAYS, OCTOBER 14 THROUGH NOVEMBER 18
4pm CT | Each live session is 90 minutes
Tuesday, October 14
Tuesday, October 21
Tuesday, October 28
Tuesday, November 4
Tuesday, November 11
Tuesday, November 18
As this class is delivered by the National Resource Center for OLLIs (NRC) at Northwestern University, you will receive a welcome email from osheronline@northwestern.edu. The email will include your credentials (username & password) as well as a hyperlink to the Osher Online Website through which you will access your course website. Please save the link once you receive it.
Multi-session courses will use this same link each week.
Matt Jennings
Matt Jennings joined the Macon State College (now Middle Georgia State University) faculty in 2007, after receiving his Ph.D. from the University of Illinois. His research interests include Native American history, early American history, and the history of violence. He is currently studying the relationship between Native American peoples and the mounds at Ocmulgee Mounds National Historical Park, and the intertwined history of tourism and archaeology at the site, as well as homeland-oriented displays in tribal museums in Oklahoma. Matt has also studied Thomas Paine’s interactions with Native Americans and the roots of John Brown’s ideas about violence. His current research includes work with the Acme Brewing Historical Society and Georgia and a study of the Ocmulgee River region during the War of 1812, as well as side trips into pop culture history. He has presented numerous papers, and published several books, including New Worlds of Violence, The Flower Hunter and the People, and Ocmulgee National Monument: A Concise History with Field Notes.