Epq help!!

So we’ve pretty much decided on our questions and I’ve decided to go do for my EPQ. something related to politics in music because I do politics and music is my interest really. The 2 questions I came up with so far are:

Is political messsging in music a tool for genuine activism or is it exploited as a commercial strategy by artists and the music industry?

Is music an effective tool for political activism or is its impact limited to cultural expression

However when it came to finding academic sources on either jstor or google scholar, I couldn’t find anything. Well actually for the argument that music is a tool for activism I found probably too much, and a lot of stuff that didn’t apply

But for the other side of those questions (commercialisation and cultural expression) I could find absolutely nothing of use

My question is either how can I get better at using these sites to find articles because right now it’s hopeless. Or if my question isn’t good enough, what politics & music related question should I change it too (the only requirement from my school is that it needs to be a debate question)

Reply 1

xzyuo_137

Original post by JimMorrison27

So we’ve pretty much decided on our questions and I’ve decided to go do for my EPQ. something related to politics in music because I do politics and music is my interest really. The 2 questions I came up with so far are:
Is political messsging in music a tool for genuine activism or is it exploited as a commercial strategy by artists and the music industry?
Is music an effective tool for political activism or is its impact limited to cultural expression
However when it came to finding academic sources on either jstor or google scholar, I couldn’t find anything. Well actually for the argument that music is a tool for activism I found probably too much, and a lot of stuff that didn’t apply
But for the other side of those questions (commercialisation and cultural expression) I could find absolutely nothing of use
My question is either how can I get better at using these sites to find articles because right now it’s hopeless. Or if my question isn’t good enough, what politics & music related question should I change it too (the only requirement from my school is that it needs to be a debate question)

one answer, ask chatgpt 😁

Reply 2

bethr_20

I completed my EPQ last year and my topic was quite niche ('are all inclusive resorts economically detrimental to the Caribbean'). I would recommend breaking your question(s) down into subheadings which will make the research aspect sooo much easier to find potential sources. So for me, I looked into specific topics such as the multiplier effect, development within the Caribbean as a result of resort presence, the rise in TNC presence, and the disruption to the trade equilibrium.
Obviously my question was very different to yours, but having targeted areas to focus on means that finding articles is far easier. Googling 'economic impacts of all-inclusive resorts in the Caribbean' brings back limited responses, but searching 'how does tourism impact the balance of trade' opens up a lot more sources that otherwise may not come up.

Also remember that, especially for the lit review, using a range of sources rather than just academic papers is preferred. I'm sure there will be a couple of published articles on BBC News about artists who have shown political activism through their music, maybe a podcast or a documentary on the topic (Miss Americana on Netflix, for example, contains a bit about Taylor Swift's political activism in the song You Need to Calm Down), blog posts, books; literally anything works in the lit review.

If you find any academic papers which do cite a source that could be reputable and useful in your discussion, backtrace that source through its bibliography back to wherever the source originated. Doing this will open you up to more papers that you might have not come across otherwise.

Best of luck :smile: