Humans use expressive activities and creative outlets for a variety of purposes, including building community and a sense of individual identity, expressing happiness or grief, and influencing political and social change. Listening to and creating music has been a function of human expression, community-building, and validating a sense of identity and belonging for as long as we have recorded history. This course will direct students to engage with music on a deeper level beyond noticing whether something is enjoyable or not. Listening to music beyond the superficial aesthetic requires a knowledge of technical musical components in addition to those that are extra-musical – what you, as a listener, experience that is not the actual sound. Through writing, presenting, and discussing, this course encourages students to consider what associations or memories they have with types of music, to explore how other cultures express these concepts, and to consider how that experience connects each of them with other humans around the planet.