Music in Multicultural America (HOM 372) is a course in ethnomusicology taught by Prof. Sydney Hutchinson at Syracuse University. This hands-on class explores the multiple groups and identities that make up the United States today, asking how various communities use music and why music is important to them. We will use Syracuse as a microcosm for examining the issues various “hyphenated” and “un-hyphenated” groups face and how music can be a way to confront, avoid, escalate, or solve problems of community cohesion or intergroup relations. By conversing with and learning from local practitioners of genres as diverse as hiphop, powwow, klezmer, salsa, shape note and many others, we learn not only to identify various musical and dance genres but also to understand their histories and their relevance to people who are our neighbors. We learn about the different issues refugee, immigrant, indigenous and native-born communities must deal with in a multicultural context, and we will critically examine the discourse of multiculturalism. This is a writing-intensive course that requires students to conduct fieldwork in our local community. As a group, we are putting our collective talents to work in a unique collaboration with the acclaimed Syracuse food traditions projects “My Lucky Tummy” and “With Love,” culminating in student-generated, -curated, and –presented musical performances for the general public in October and December.