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In this presentation, Bri will share her research on popular attitudes towards the banjo throughout Colorado state history and document how folk music became popular during the “American Folk Revival” (1940-1970). In the 1890s, upper-class white Americans viewed the banjo and Folk Music as immoral and distasteful and assigned ownership of the instrument to “colored and densely ignorant communities,” such as the Western mining towns of Colorado. Beginning in the late 1920s, attitudes began to shift, and upper-class white Americans sought to justify the growing popularity of the supposedly “uncivilized” instrument. This shift was especially noticeable in Colorado, where newspaper reporting on folk musicians rapidly evolved to paint a picture of the genre as culturally significant and “elevated” from its previous form.About the Presenter
Bri Matson is a Public History Master’s candidate at CU Denver and is graduating in December 2024. Bri specializes in American Folk Music and Modern American Cultural History. This lecture is the first in a series of student lectures organized through CU’s chapter of the National History Honors Society, Phi Alpha Theta.
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Free for members and students with valid ID; $5 nonmembers.
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Event Venue & Nearby Stays
923 10th St, Golden, CO, United States, Colorado 80401
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