The Council at Work

Abstract

This paper attempts to illustrate certain important concepts in the field of cultural geography through the study of a very popular phenomenon—Rock and Roll music. The roles that the White and Black rural South and various American cities played as culture hearths and centers of culture contact are discussed along with the effects of mass migrations and mass media on American musical tastes and styles. Rock and Roll is looked at from a diffusionist point of view in that throughout its evolution, various places played important parts as “way stations” as certain American musical styles gradually spread from rural southern shacks to New York recording studios.