Western Michigan University ScholarWorks at WMU Dissertations Graduate College 12-2011 All I Am: Defining Music as an Emotional Catalyst through a Sociological Study of Emotions, Gender and Culture Adrienne M. Trier-Bieniek Western Michigan University Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarworks.wmich.edu/dissertations Part of the Musicology Commons, Music Therapy Commons, and the Sociology Commons Recommended Citation Trier-Bieniek, Adrienne M., "All I Am: Defining Music as an Emotional Catalyst through a Sociological Study of Emotions, Gender and Culture" (2011). Dissertations. 328. https://scholarworks.wmich.edu/dissertations/328 This Dissertation-Open Access is brought to you for free and open access by the Graduate College at ScholarWorks at WMU. It has been accepted for inclusion in Dissertations by an authorized administrator of ScholarWorks at WMU. For more information, please contact [email protected]. "ALL I AM": DEFINING MUSIC AS AN EMOTIONAL CATALYST THROUGH A SOCIOLOGICAL STUDY OF EMOTIONS, GENDER AND CULTURE. by Adrienne M. Trier-Bieniek A Dissertation Submitted to the Faculty of The Graduate College in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy Department of Sociology Advisor: Angela M. Moe, Ph.D. Western Michigan University Kalamazoo, Michigan April 2011 "ALL I AM": DEFINING MUSIC AS AN EMOTIONAL CATALYST THROUGH A SOCIOLOGICAL STUDY OF EMOTIONS, GENDER AND CULTURE Adrienne M. Trier-Bieniek, Ph.D. Western Michigan University, 2011 This dissertation, '"All I Am': Defining Music as an Emotional Catalyst through a Sociological Study of Emotions, Gender and Culture", is based in the sociology of emotions, gender and culture and guided by symbolic interactionist and feminist standpoint theory. A primary focus is on understanding the emotional and empowering relationships women build with music that is written and performed by women, especially if they are using the music for emotional support or as a means to heal themselves. This study examines the cultural, emotional and gendered role music plays in day-to-day social life using data collected during forty-two semi-structured interviews with women who identified as fans of musician Tori Amos, as well as observations at three of Amos' concerts in 2009. Analysis focuses on how this music allows them to express emotions which have been labeled taboo or inappropriate for a woman (i.e. anger), how women have used Amos' music as a holistic approach to healing and how Amos' feminist identity is defined and understood as empowering for women. The findings conclude that women often seek out music written and composed by other women because they want to see their experiences reflected in the music they listen to. Further, the women interviewed described Amos' music as something they use to coax out, understand, or label the emotion they are feeling. Finally, women discussed Amos' status as a feminist musician as central to both helping them heal as well as empowering them to challenge hegemonic perceptions and patriarchal expectations of who or what a woman should be and what emotions are appropriate or her to express. This is significant because gender, emotions and music have not been explored from the perspective of the female fan, and are rarely discussed in the context of popular music. From a scholar-activist perspective, these results can be applied and used when training people (in clinical settings, social work settings, etcetera) to understand the stereotypes placed on women's emotions and to also consider holistic approaches to healing using female, feminist musicians. UMI Number: 3455077 All rights reserved INFORMATION TO ALL USERS The quality of this reproduction is dependent upon the quality of the copy submitted. In the unlikely event that the author did not send a complete manuscript and there are missing pages, these will be noted. Also, if material had to be removed, a note will indicate the deletion. UMI Dissertation Publishing UMI 3455077 Copyright 2011 by ProQuest LLC. All rights reserved. This edition of the work is protected against unauthorized copying under Title 17, United States Code. ProQuest LLC 789 East Eisenhower Parkway P.O. Box 1346 Ann Arbor, Ml 48106-1346 Copyright by Adrienne M. Trier-Bieniek 2011 DEDICATION For Tim: Thank you for helping me make this dream a reality. You are my best friend and my partner in crime. I love that I get to come home to you. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I am forever grateful to Dr. Angela Moe for serving as my dissertation chair. Angie you have been an advisor and mentor to me. But perhaps most importantly you have been a teacher and a friend. I thank you for sharing all the ups and downs of the last four years with me and for guiding my growth. I have also been privileged to have the most wonderful women in my corner as committee members. To Dr. Chien-Juh Gu, I thank you for being invested in my progress and development since my first class at Western. I am in awe of your compassion and commitment to your students and your work. To Dr. Zoann Snyder, I thank you for mentoring me through the last few years and investing yourself in my development. To Dr. Rebekah Farrugia, thank you for teaching me about gender and music and for being so supportive of me through this process. I want to say a special thank you to the forty-two women I interviewed for this study. Thank you for opening your hearts and your lives to me. Thank you for sharing your stories. I now carry each of them with me, proudly. I have been lucky enough to have been raised by a couple of hippie-turned-social worker parents whose life and music influenced me to no end. Thanks to Rick and Deanne Trier for deciding early on that you were going to allow me to be the best version of who I wanted to be. I am awfully proud to be your kid. ii Acknowledgements-Continued Thank you to the Bieniek's for being so supportive and for moving Tim and I around the country a couple of times. I also thank my cousin Krysta Williams for her support and friendship. Fate made us cousins but I am so glad we can also be such great friends! The family I have made for myself begins and ends with my friend Matt Dufon. I'm glad you're on my side. I thank the sisterhood that I have found in my friends Bea Yarbrough, Eileen Weigand, Efua Akoma, Samantha Parker and Jen Wiles. I feel incredibly lucky to have each of you as my chosen sisters and as my own personal pantheon of warrior women! Thank you also to Random Messeder and Chantal McDaniel for introducing me to Tori's music all those years ago. I am so glad that I have both of you in my life still and grateful for the music you gave me. Thank you to Patricia Leavy for your friendship and mentoring over the last year. I am so grateful for all of the conversations we have had! I look forward to many more. Professional thanks go out to Chelsea Laird and John Witherspoon at The Bridge Entertainment Group for responding to my emails and questions with such grace. I also thank Audry Romano at www.hereinmyhead.com for posting the recruitment message that so many women responded to. Special thanks to Chelsea Bowers and Katherine Hull at RAINN. Thank you to the administrators at Toriphorums and Atforumz for your professionalism. I also thank The Kercher Center for Social Research at WMU for funding part of this project. Thank you to AnnaLee Miller and Ann Browning at WMU for always answering my questions and helping me negotiate the world of departmental iii Acknowledgements-Continued funding! A massive thank you to Susan Standish, our graduate advisor at WMU. Susan you are a gift from the heavens! I have enjoyed every moment with you. I also thank Dr. Doug Davidson and Dr. Charles Crawford at WMU for your participation and help with my race and ethnicity area exam. I loved working with both of you. Finally, I thank anyone who has ever read and responded to my Tori inspired blog. Your words of encouragement have meant a great deal to me. A special thanks to my four-legged friends Charlie and Mara who were never far during the writing of this dissertation. On August 3, 2009 I got to meet Tori Amos outside The Riverside Theatre in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. I had the opportunity to tell her about my life and my project. It is fair to say that your work, Tori, has inspired me, my feminism, my activism and continues to act as the soundtrack to my life. But I now realize that the community your music has built is a community of survivors, warriors and creators. People who stare at destruction and say "I can fix that." Thank you for bringing us together. Finally, while my Ph.D. is from Western Michigan, I earned a M.S. from Virginia Tech in May of 2007. I take this moment to honor my fellow Virginia Tech community, the people whose lives were lost, and those who were injured on April 16, 2007. Adrienne M. Trier-Bieniek IV TABLE OF CONTENTS ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ii LIST OF TABLES x CHAPTER I. INTRODUCTION 1 Purpose and Research Questions 2 Why Study Tori Amos? 6 Brief Biography of Tori Amos 6 Why Study Tori Amos' Female Fans? 9 Summary of Following Chapters 13 II. CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORK 17 Sociology, Music and Gender 17 Sociology and Music Culture 17 Exploring Gender through Culture and Music 18 Intersections of Gender and Race in Music 26 Examples of Third Wave Feminism in Popular Music 30 Exploring Women Singer/Songwriters 34 Scholarly Work on Amos 37 Emotions and Gender 40 Sociology of Emotions and Gender 40 Gender, Emotions and Music 47 v Table of Contents- Continued CHAPTER Musical Healing 50 Chapter Summary 57 III.