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Home , Big Girls Cry, Chris Braide, Greg Kurstin

Journal of Research and Reviews in Social Sciences Pakistan, Vol 1 (2), 2018 pp 250-255

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Journal of Research & Reviews in Social Sciences Pakistan

Journal homepage: http://journal.kinnaird.edu.pk

POPULAR CULTURE: EXPLORING ALTERITY IN TERMS OF FEMINISM AND POST- COLONIAL FEMINISM IN KATE FURLER’S “” AND “NEVER GIVE UP” Sofia Arslan1* 1English Literature Postgraduate Department, Kinnaird College for Women, Lahore, Pakistan.

Article Info Abstract

“Big Girls Cry” is a song that is emphatic of how social gaze *Corresponding Author pushes efforts to be “tough”, they are not veritably Tel: +092 3426662843 acknowledged by the society. “Never Give Up” is a song that Email: [email protected] can be considered denotative of the women struggle in the

post-colonial feminist paradigm. This paper carries out an exegesis of Gaytri Spivak’s concept of ‘Alterity’ as reflected

in terms of Feminism and Post-Colonial Feminism in the

music videos based on Sia Kate Furler’s songs, “Big Girls

Cry” and “Never Give Up”, respectively. The music videos of the two songs share certain abstractions, binaries and motives that identify the need to transcend beyond concrete realities, parochial boundaries and restrictive barriers that fetter an individual’s imagination as well as his existence. The study Keywords chooses to analyze the visuals in tandem with lyrics in these Alterity, Post-Colonial Feminism, videos because of the distinctive affinity that they share with Female Consciousness, Social Gaze, the contemporary feminist and post-colonial feminist issues Disidentification of otherness that the world currently confronts. @Kinnaird College for Women. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction to Songs Writers: Sia; together they have written for her own The song “Never Give Up” was a joint- projects, movie soundtracks and for several production of Sia and while the other artists. Braide has won an Ivor Novello song “Big Girls Don’t Cry” was a joint- award and been nominated for a Grammy. He production of Sia and Christopher Braide. is published by BMG Music Publishing 1.1 Christopher “Chris” Braide is a British worldwide and Magical Thinking BMI. , and based 1.2 Sia Kate Isobelle Furler known as Sia, is in Malibu, . Braide is known for an Australian singer, songwriter, record being a pianist. First signed as a solo artist by producer and music video director. She started Dave Stewart in the UK and Craig Kallman at her career as a singer in the acid jazz band in the US, Braide relocated to Crisp in the mid-1990s in Adelaide. In 1997, Los Angeles to produce and write for artists when Crisp disbanded, she released her debut including Sia, , , studio album titled OnlySee in Australia, but it , , David did not sell well. In 2014, Sia broke through as Guetta, , Beth Ditto, Yuna and a solo recording artist when her sixth studio Beyoncé. Braide is a frequent collaborator of album, , debuted at No.1 in the U.S. Billboard 200 and generated the top-

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Journal of Research and Reviews in Social Sciences Pakistan, Vol 1 (2), 2018 pp 250-255

ten single “Chandelier” and a trilogy of music espoused by one particular segment of the videos starring child dancer . In social calendar to press the other to the 2016, she released her seventh studio album peripheries. It is the abstraction that highlights , which spawned her first Hot a substantive identity in opposition to which 100number one single, “Cheap Thrills”. The another identity is formed. These two same year, Sia gave her Nostalgic for the identities then get referenced as the “self and Present Tour, which incorporated performance the other”. This paper carries out an exegesis art elements. Sia has received accolades, of alterity as reflected in terms of Feminism including ARIA Awards and an MTV Video and Post-Colonial Feminism in the music Music Award. 1.3 Gregory Allen Kurstin is an videos based on Sia Kate Furler’s songs, “Big American record producer, musician and Girls Cry” and “Never Give Up”, respectively. songwriter. Kurstin has been associated with The music videos of the two songs share releases which have cumulatively sold more certain abstractions, binaries and motives that than 60 million albums worldwide. He has identify the need to transcend beyond concrete won five Grammy Awards, including Producer realities, parochial boundaries and restrictive of the Year (Non-Classical) in 2017 and 2018. barriers that fetter an individual’s imagination Kurstin co-wrote, produced and played most as well as his existence. The study chooses to of the instruments on the record-breaking 2015 analyze the visuals in tandem with lyrics in single, “Hello”. Among others, he has these videos because of the distinctive affinity worked with Sia, , , Ellie that they share with the contemporary feminist Goulding, Pink, the Shins, , and post-colonial feminist issues of otherness , and the . He often that the world currently confronts. Jeffery plays guitar, bass, keyboards and drums, and Nealon, in Alterity Politics: Ethics and engineers and programs the records he Performative Subjectivity, debates that “ethics product. is constituted as an inexorable affirmative 2. Discussion and Analysis rejoinder to different identities, not through an Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak’s theory of inability to comprehend or totalize the other”. alterity was introduced in a 2014 seminar titled Therefore, it is essential to highlight how “Remaking History”, the purpose of which alterity operates through various theoretical was to challenge the masculine conventions of levels in Feminist and Post-Colonial Feminist history writing. According to Spivak, it is vital discourse. for one to unearth the antiquities and intrinsic 2.1 Alterity and Feminism in “Big Girls historical conducts of individuals, in order to Cry”: Treatment of Independent Women in exercise a right to authentic experience, Patriarchal Set ups identity and reality. Within the concept of Feminist literary criticism offered a staunch socially constructed backgrounds, one “must rebuttal to popular male-chauvinistic standards take into account the dangerous fragility and upheld by key 18th century figures who tenacity of these concept-metaphors” (269). reflected their male-oriented points of view, Spivak recalls her personal history: “As a subjugating female voices in the society. postcolonial, I am concerned with the Charles Maurice de Terryland, who was the appropriation of ‘alternative history’ or French Ambassador to United Kingdom and ‘histories’. I am not a historian by training. I also the Prince of Terryland, maintained, “Men cannot claim punitive expertise in reshaping are fated to live on the stage of the world… a history in the sense or redrafting it. But I can public education suits them… the paternal use an example of how historical narratives are home is better for the education of women… substituted. The parents of my parents’ since they need to lead a calm and secluded grandparents' grandparents were made over, life”, whereas the French Philosopher Jean- not always without their consent, by the Jacques Rousseau, was of the view that “little political, fiscal and educational mediation of girls disliked learning to read and write British imperialism, and now I am because they were always ready to sew”. independent. Thus I am, in the severest sense, Women were always marginalized, their future a postcolonial”. Alterity is an essential theme could be defined precisely in the way that it in post-colonial written discourse, referring to has been described in Flaubert’s Madame the concept of “otherizing”. The notion of Bovary, “a dark corridor with a bolted door in otherizing can be defined as an ideology the end”. In earlier times, it was considered

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Journal of Research and Reviews in Social Sciences Pakistan, Vol 1 (2), 2018 pp 250-255

that their lives existed in overly-romanticized expressions. She gesticulates with her hands, notions stretching barely any further from the muzzles herself, and then moves her wrists in chores at their parsonages to the church circular motions on either sides of her activities; they were expected to be radically forehead, representing a certain state of the proper in their mannerism and respectability, mind. She occasionally covers her mouth with thriving hence merely on merry anticipations her hands and the way she feigns her smile is about a thrilling married life. Pitiably, the reflective of her agonized inner self that she marital experience proved to be even more masks under the veneer of this smile. The torturous than the pre-marital one for most, if social gaze pushes independent women to the not all. They longed for a spark in life, an peripheries, and despite their continual efforts anchor to hold on to. During the Industrial to be “tough”, they are not veritably Revolution of the eighteenth century, the acknowledged by the society. This song stands economic necessity of having women as for all women diligently working towards workers, caused them to work outside their playing their individual role in the society— homes. Women mostly found jobs in domestic from contributing as productive citizens and service, textile factories, and piece workshops. career-oriented professionals to hardworking Contributing as productive citizens, they single mothers and abandoned daughters sought for equal political rights as well, chiefly trying to make their mark and prove their focusing on the right to vote. The idea lead to mettle. the great Women Suffragette Movement of The lyrics reflect how women who come 1848, which successfully won them their across as self-reliant are “otherized” by constitutional right to vote, though on a limited patriarchal societies. They are portrayed as scale. In the era following the world wars, ambitious, materialistic and self-centered women became more inclined towards coming women, because the patriarchal dynamics of out of their domestic paradigms and working the society favour demure, submissive and to gain financial autonomy, now on a massive subservient women. scale. With men engaged at the battlefields, practically the women at home had to win Tough girl in the fast lane bread for livelihood, which resulted in women No time for love, no time for hate exploring new dimensions in their long No drama, no time for games journey leading to professionalism and career- Tough girl whose soul aches orientedness in the twenty-first century. However, it is observed, contemporarily, that most women with a strong will to work are The visuals in the music video explaining stereotyped with deprecating labels such as benumbed and fragmented consciousness of “she is too ambitious” and/or receive the girl (Maddie Ziegler) expressing the comments like “too ambitious to run a normal psychological turmoil that independent women household”, whereas, if on the other hand men are indoctrinated with by the side of the come across as ambitious, they are applauded society. as “remarkably focused” and “hardworking” The horrifying stereotypical jargon associated individuals. with “tough” women rests upon statements The music video of “Big Girls Cry”, represent like “men do not want wives who play football what notions are espoused by the society all the time, learn to make aloo gobi” (“Bend it towards “tough” women, and how they feel Like Beckham”); Halley Bock, CEO of about it. The song represents the state of mind leadership and development training company of the society against independent and strong- Fierce, notes that the ruthless “ice queen” willed women on two levels: one, the idea of stereotype is rampant. Cultural depictions, like othering women because they have always frigid magazine editor Miranda Priestly in been considered objects, bereft of the will to “The Devil Wears Prada” (and her real-world succeed in life; two, the idea of othering counterpart Anna Wintour of Vogue) and strong-willed and career-oriented women in backstabbing boss Patty Hewes on the society. The song includes minimalist “Damages”, paint successful women as setting, in which there is a young girl with a unsympathetic power-mongers. It is, of course, black background behind her. Her countenance a Catch-22. “A woman who shows emotion in readily fluctuates between sad and jovial the workplace is often cast as too fragile or

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Journal of Research and Reviews in Social Sciences Pakistan, Vol 1 (2), 2018 pp 250-255

unstable to lead,” Bock said. “A woman who Dismantle the Master's House”, uses the shows no emotion and keeps it deliberately metaphor of “the master's tools” and “the hyper-professional master’s house” to explain that western is icy and unfeminine. For many women, it can feminism is failing to make positive change be a no-win situation” (Jenna Goudreau, “Ten for third world women by using the same tools Worst Stereotypes about Most Powerful used by the patriarchy to oppress women. The Women”). Michael Kenny, in his Politics of idea that the lyrics are predominantly Identity: Liberal Political Theory and the punctuated with the phrase. “I’ll find my way Dilemmas of Difference states, “The home, my way home…” is something that the regulation of alterity becomes a defining post-colonial feminists also reiterate when attribute of self-hood, as my sense of who I am they theorize the concept of how their is crucially mediated by an understanding of geographical roots should not be a hindrance that which I am not”. The lyrics of the song in their path to success—the idea that the similarly define how working women who western feminists conceptualize all Third come across as “tough” and self-reliant are World women in monolithic terms and blame prejudiced against. their geographical anchorage for the limitations and the constraints they face. I may cry ruinin' my makeup Mohanty asserts in “Under Western Eyes” that Wash away all the things you've taken Western feminists write about Third World And I don't care if I don’t look pretty women as a compound, singular structure that Big girls cry when their hearts are breaking is capricious and limiting. She states that these women are represented in works as sufferers of masculine control and of traditional culture The girl in the video stands to articulate to the without including information about historical world that independent women should not be context and cultural differences within the labelled as the “other”, because they might Third World. This generates a dynamic where pull a very strong disposition throughout their Western feminism functions as the norm day but they do need to be treated the way that against which the situation in the developing independent, hardworking men are treated by world is evaluated. Mohanty’s primary the society, because at the end of the day they initiative is to allow Third World women to need to claim from within the mainstream a have agency and voice within the feminist space of their own. realm. The lyrics of this song are very assertive of this attitude, especially coupled 2.2 Alterity and Post-Colonial Feminism in with the idea that female voice in the song has “Never Give Up”: Otherization of Third World been crafted with meticulous significance. Women Carrying out an exegesis into the music video Chandra Talpade Mohanty in her article, based of the song, it can be observed that the Under Western Eyes, states: music in the beginning of the song is very oriental (sitar strings) and the two girls are Universal images of ‘the third-world woman’ running to the beat of the drum. This drumbeat (the veiled woman, chaste virgin, etc.), itself is oriental in nature and this idea coupled images constructed from adding the ‘third- with the semiotic visuals in the video, can be world difference’ to ‘sexual difference’, are considered denotative of the women struggle predicated on (and hence obviously bring into in the post-colonial feminist paradigm. It is sharper focus) assumptions about western this beat of the drum that engenders organic women as secular, liberated and having control emotions pulsating in a rhythm within the over their own lives. psychological frameworks that operate on two “Never Give Up” is an emotional and levels—one, being self-reliant and determined powerful song with an uplifting message. This to acquire freedom that transcends the section considers the two girls in the music confined spaces, and two, being imprisoned video as the voices advocating the post- within the mental recesses. colonial feminist model; it explores the lyrics The girls run in the opposite direction of the of the song in tandem with post-colonial rail tracks—rebelling against predefined feminism. In Audre Lorde's foundational notions; the journey undertaken by the two essay, “The Master's Tools Will Never girls poses them as being individuals

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dispossessed of any conscious memory of the primarily what explains the idea of being past, as the train most vividly does not belong snagged by social constructs, taboos, gaze and to anyone. The messages/notes on the railway grappling with the idea of western impositions. tracks are phrases like “abandoned” and “I’ve battled demons”, which are emphatic of the Oh yeah, I’m haunted by the distant past post-colonial feminist struggle. Called to the skies but she was overcast But I won’t never give up, no, never give up, I won’t let you get me down no, no I’ll keep getting up when I hit the ground I won’t give up, won’t give up, no, no The concept of alterity or the self and the I’ll find my way, find my way, home, home other, has been tremendously embossed in post-colonial feminism. Simone de Beauvoir’s In the article "Third World Women and the essential stance, “He is the Subject, he is the Inadequacies of Western Feminism", Ethel Absolute—she is the Other”, gestures the Crowley, sociology professor at Trinity significant prominence of the concept in College of Dublin, remarks how western feminism. In global perspective, all notions of feminism is quite deficient when practiced on the selfhood have been masculinized, and in non-western societies. She charges western the post-colonial world this notion has been feminists of theoretical reductionism when it used by the western feminists to collectively comes to Third World women. Her major create a monolith of Third World women problem with western feminism is that it labelling them with their own definitions i.e. devotes too much time in ideological “nit- all Third World women are weak, demure and picking”, as a substitute to expressing not capable of exercising their agency and/or strategies to restore the highlighted issues. The fending for themselves. Another reason that is most noticeable opinion that Crowley in her foundational to the idea of the song being article expedites on, is that ethnography can be validated from the post-colonial feminist essential to problem solving, and that freedom perspective is that of the girls in the video does not mean the same thing to all the women having ragged clothes—something that the of the world. Being the other, makes the Western feminists deem the Eastern women individual a non-individual, a non-agency and as: lowbrow and monolithically subjugated. a disregarded, useless object, this is However, at the end of the video, the two Precisely what the Western feminists have done seemingly downtrodden girls accomplish their to the Eastern Third World women— goal and find their way home. The song with indoctrinated the mind of the free world with its theme of struggle, essentially induces the their “disidentification”; this disidentification idea of unchaining fetters to question the is in terms of responsivity and objectivity; the marginalization that the Third World women Western feminist critics feel that all Third are purposefully made to face by the Western World women have the same objectives and thinking agencies, consequentially paving way the same kind of responses towards various for them to recognize their potential and prove social ideologies. They present a nebulous their capabilities as veritable self-reliant justification for gender discordance in the individuals. Third World and consider that the female 3. Concluding Remarks physicality is a stoppage, a limiting prison The music videos of the two songs share house in every social segment of the Third certain constructs and aims that epitomize the World countries. However, the lyrics of the need to surpass objective truths and insular, song show how the girls are being pulled back compartmentalized thoughts choking the but paralingually, they are rebelling against mind’s eye of the individual. The study has these pull-back currents. made a detailed analysis of how the visuals The two girls in the video explore their and lyrics in these videos have a distinctive inherent selves, and eventually attain freedom, affinity with the contemporary feminist and by the unitedness in their disposition coupled post-colonial feminist issues that the world is with love for each other in a world where currently challenged with, and has displayed emotional-amnesia abounds. The hair of the how art and literature can be collectively two girls are bifurcated to represent one half as analyzed, examined and researched over, black, and the other as white, and this is under a theoretical lens.

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References Crowley, Ethel. “Third World Women and the Inadequacies of Western Feminism.” Global Research. N.p., 8 Mar. 2014. Web. 21 Sept. 2015. Flaubert, G. (2018). Madame bovary. Alma Books, 25. Goudreau, Jenna. “Ten Worst Stereotypes about Powerful Women”.https://www.forbes.com/site s/jennagoudreau/2011/10/24/worst- stereotypes- powerful-women-. Accessed on November 29, 2017. Lorde, A. (2003). “The Master’s Tools Will Never Dismantle the Master’s House”. Feminist postcolonial theory: A reader, 25, 27. Mohanty, C. T. (1988). “Under Western eyes: Feminist scholarship and Colonial Discourses.” Feminist Review, (30), 61-358. Misztal, B. A. (2006). The Politics of Identity. Liberal Political Theory and the Dilemmas of Difference–Michael Kenny. The British Journal of Sociology, 57(2), 322-323. Nealon, J. T. (1998). Alterity politics: Ethics and Performative subjectivity. Duke University Press, 35-50. Rousseau, J. J., & Hédouin, E. (1925). The Confessions of Jean Jacques Rousseau. W. Glaisher. 1, 234. Spivak, G. (1989). Who Claims Alterity?. Remaking history, 4, 269-292

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