Green Day: Rock Music and Class
GREEN DAY: ROCK MUSIC AND CLASS Olivia Roig A Thesis Submitted to the Graduate College of Bowling Green State University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of SELECT ONE: May 2016 Committee: Jeremy Wallach, Advisor Esther Clinton Dalton Anthony Jones Jeremy Wallach © 2016 Olivia Roig All Rights Reserved iii ABSTRACT Jeremy Wallach, Advisor The pop punk band Green Day is a surprisingly interesting source for a discussion of class. Despite their working class background, and their massive successes with Dookie in 1994, and American Idiot in 2004, Green Day performs many middle class values in their song lyrics, stage shows, and interviews. Using Chris McDonald’s book Rush: Rock Music and the Middle Class as a template, this paper analyzes Green Day’s performance of class through theories about social class in North America. Throughout Green Day’s career, there is a noticeable tension between wanting to stick to their working class roots and acknowledging their sudden and unexpected thrust into an upper class economic standing. Yet, despite skipping a middle class standing economically, their song lyrics, stage shows, and interviews articulate many middle class values such as individualism, professionalism, and the middle class family. iv For Grace Roig v ACKNOWLEDGMENTS I would like to thank my thesis committee, Professors Jeremy Wallach, Esther Clinton, and Dalton Jones for their help and comments. I would also like to thank my Dad, Bruce Roig, for his help and support. Last, but not least, I would like to thank the members of Green Day for 26 years of amazing music, without which this paper never could have been written.
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