Shaheer Ahmed
University administrators desperate to attract Gen Z students have long added gimmicks to courses to boost their appeal. But a university in Texas is taking it to the next level. A new college history course at Texas State University will focus on Harry Styles and the culture of celebrity. The course will begin next spring where roughly 20 students will learn the pop culture and life of a celebrity.
The course is titled “Harry Styles and the cult of celebrity: identity, the internet, and European pop culture”.
It is said that the course will focus on Mr Styles and popular European culture; to understand the cultural and political development of the modern celebrity as related to questions of gender and sexuality, race, class, nation and globalism, media, fashion, fan culture, internet culture and consumerism.
Students who complete the course will be able to earn credits towards qualifications in history, international studies, popular culture studies, diversity studies and women’s and gender studies.
It is the latest in a series of university courses offered on pop stars. Previously The University of South Carolina has run a sociology course on the life, work and rise to fame of Lady Gaga. Concordia University in Montreal offers a course inspired by Kanye West, while Beyoncé has been the subject of a course at Rutgers University in New Jersey.
Students as well as alumni are extremely happy and highly excited for this new course. Dr Louie Dean Valencia, associate professor of digital history at the Texas university, announced details of the course on Twitter, saying: “It’s official, official. I’m teaching the world’s first ever university course on the work of #HarryStyles.”
