Journal of Research and Reviews in Social Sciences Pakistan, Vol 1 (2), 2018 pp 250-255 Contents lists available http://www.kinnaird.edu.pk/ 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 SIA KATE FURLER’S “BIG GIRLS CRY” 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 Greg Kurstin 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. songwriter, record producer and singer based 1.2 Sia Kate Isobelle Furler known as Sia, is in Malibu, Los Angeles. 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 Atlantic Records 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, Lana Del Rey, Britney Spears, studio album titled OnlySee in Australia, but it Christina Aguilera, Selena Gomez, David did not sell well. In 2014, Sia broke through as Guetta, Marc Almond, Beth Ditto, Yuna and a solo recording artist when her sixth studio Beyoncé. Braide is a frequent collaborator of album, 1000 Forms of Fear, debuted at No.1 in the U.S. Billboard 200 and generated the top- 250 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 Maddie Ziegler. In social calendar to press the other to the 2016, she released her seventh studio album peripheries. It is the abstraction that highlights This Is Acting, 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 Adele single, “Hello”. Among others, he has these videos because of the distinctive affinity worked with Sia, Beck, Kelly Clarkson, Ellie that they share with the contemporary feminist Goulding, Pink, the Shins, Tegan and Sara, and post-colonial feminist issues of otherness Lily Allen, and the Foo Fighters. 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 251 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.