Popular Music in Traditional Gender Constructions - Essay Example

In what ways can popular music be understood as reinforcing and/or challenging traditional constructions of gender and sexuality? Your essay must make reference to one popular musician or pop band, popular music video, pop song, or popular music reality. Introduction Culture is a very significant part of a country and is responsible for changing, altering, modifying or completely switching to another culture or cultures. Culture is a collection of values, norms, beliefs, religions and gender roles in a certain area (Zeisler, 2008). Culture is considered to be the most powerful tools that can influence people. Popular culture is defined as culture followed by and approved by the masses. It is what is considered to be widely accepted and widely practiced. Similarly, popular music is the kind of music that has a deep impact on people who listen to music (Whiteley, 1997). With the upsurge in the existence and intensity of media, music has a more serious and deeper impact on those who believe that music represents a certain culture. Not only internally, but music also represents a culture/nation/country outside its premises. The paper that follows defines how music affects culture and how it has become a challenge for appropriate traditional construction. It also highlights how gender has been an important subject of demonstration in the music industry. Along with an example of how gender is discussed and what meaning it has attached to it, we see that the role of gender and its representation is somewhat a serious threat to culture and traditions. If not a serious threat, it surely has a weird and confused effect on vulnerable minds of young people who listen to such music that exploits, misguides or shows the face of the society – true or false is for the listeners and critics to decide. Following is the analysis of the effects, and the extent of the effects of popular music on gender and sexuality. Influence of Music on culture and traditions Music has always been an important part of rich cultures for ages. Music tends to tell a story about the current state of what is happening and what that particular culture is about. The move from folk to classical to pop to rock is a journey which portrays what the world has been through and what it looks like now (Longhurst, 2007). If the history of music is seen, we will see a development in what contemporary music shows and what historical trends suggest. Not surprisingly, even if seen in isolation, one can get a very good idea of the norms and practices of a society by understanding and interpreting its music at a certain time which shows relevance at that time. Because music has a great impact on individuals; it ultimately has a great influence of groups of people, nations or countries and regions who listen to that kind of music. Music is known to provoke feelings, increase or decrease their level and even create feelings of using drugs, sexual desire and other negative traits that follow etc. Different kinds of music are meant to attract different age groups of people emotionally as well as physically (Longhurst, 2007). The melody and the lyrics play a major role in defining what impact the music will have on the person who is listening to the music. With time, music is accused of becoming more explicit, sexually arousing, provoking undesirable and destructive acts as being ‘cool’ and as ‘not a big deal’ (Leonard, 2007). The greatest impact that music has is on the teenagers who are in their growth stage and can get influenced by whatever they see, hear or experience. If the kind of music they listen to is explicit, overt and way too emotional, it is likely to affect their minds a lot as they might also think that this is the norm and socially acceptable, which is why it is being portrayed publically in the form of music (Whiteley, 1997). Relationship between Music and Gender Over the years, music has had a deep abstract relation with gender roles and gender. In particular, it is seen to promote the concepts and aims of feminism by advocating them as equal to men in music videos today. Previously, women were only a prey to ‘male gaze,’ to be seen as objects to be stared at or a property of men (Holtzman, 2000). Today, however, the concept is different. Women are shown as powerful, commanding and influential. With the rapid improvement and technological explosion, media overall as well as music have served as a great medium to end sexism and its oppression by helping feminism boom and ensuring that women realize their rights, powers and abilities (Green, 2002). However, there are some very serious concerns about what music means nowadays. For instance, Lady Gaga is one of the most popular American singers today who is subject to great criticism in several categories. First, she is accused of being a hermaphrodite. An analysis of all her music videos and lyrics reveals very interesting facts about her music as well as the accusations on her. Sometimes, her lyrics portray that she is a ‘girl-lover’; at other times she is accused of being bi-sexual and in other instances, the lyrics and videos of her songs appear to be sexually explicit, challenging the feminist theory that believed in giving women rights and to save women from ‘man-gaze’ and protecting them from being properties or potential properties of men (Leonard, 2007). The video of her song ‘Bad Romance’ is a serious problem to the concept of women’s freedom. She has depicted women as submissive creatures who are not free to live their lives as they want and are commodities to be bought by men whoever pleases and however wants to use them. The lyrics are somewhat contradictory as well. In the song ‘Monster,’ the video illustrates that women are powerless in front of men and they can do anything because they are physically more powerful. ‘Born This Way’ has another different message related to gender (Steinberg, Parmar, & Richard, 2006). The analysis of this song shows that everyone should have freedom of selecting sexual preferences and accepting other people’s preferences. It portrays that one has no control over their choices and that they are inborn or natural. Mark Blencher’s psychoanalysis theory also suggests that there should be freedom of deciding and feeling whether a person is a homosexual or a heterosexual. According to him, we give more weight to things of lesser importance such as age, social class and societal constraints rather than our innate feelings (Zeisler, 2008). Another American star, more popularly known as the King of Pop Michael Jackson, portrayed another dimension of discrimination that was the difference between the blacks and whites. Whites were considered more respectful and better than others in every regard whereas in those days blacks were not considered equals, let alone more dominant. The way Michael Jackson changed his outlook from black to completely white with excessive medical surgeries shows how important it was to ‘Not’ to be black (Longhurst, 2007). He was, undoubtedly, more popular and famous than most other artists at that time; he laid the foundations of break dance, was much of an advocate of disco, jazz, pop and his invention, the new Jack swing (Green, 2002). Conclusion In conclusion to the above discussion, we see that it is absolutely important to preserve and, at the same time, ensure that music is conserved in a way that shows the real face of the society rather than a false or confused one. Since music is a widely accepted influential tool that affects people, especially the youth who are most vulnerable to external influences such as the media, it should like everything else be monitored adequately enough to see that it does not portray wrong images of the society or falsely interprets a culture (Whiteley, 1997). It should not be so explicit that it crosses the boundaries of culture and traditions. It becomes a reason of being judged as a nation internally as well as externally, and media/music both are perhaps the quickest and most significant ways in which information travels to other countries/nations/societies. Music should be a true face of where one lives. It should not exploit a certain gender, race or people of a different color (Zeisler, 2008). Unfortunately, music does portray these differences and exploits groups of people; it should be controlled. Lyrics or videos may not be correct, or may be exaggerated forms of what is actually happening in a society. It does appear to others as somewhat a way to judge the norms of the society and the actions of people of that society. The moral of the discussion here is that music is part of the culture of every society and aims to portray the realistic picture of that society, not a false image or one that challenges the norms and traditions of the society. Bibliography Green, L. (2002). How Popular Musicians Learn: A Way Ahead for Music Education. Ashgate Publishing. Longhurst, B. (2007). Popular Music and Society. Polity. Holtzman, L. (2000). Media Messages: What Film, Television, and Popular Music Teach Us About Race, Class, Gender, and Sexual Orientation. M.E. Sharpe. Leonard, M. (2007). Gender in the Music Industry: Rock, Discourse and Girl Power. Ashgate Publishing. Steinberg, S. R., Parmar, P., & Richard, B. (2006). Contemporary Youth Culture: An International Encyclopedia (Volume 2). Greenwood Publishing Group. Whiteley, S. (1997). Sexing The Groove: Popular Music and Gender. Routledge. Zeisler, A. (2008). Feminism and Pop Culture: Seal Studies. Seal Press. Read More