Popular Music, Age, and Identity Dan Padua
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The Family ‘Playlist’: Popular music, age, and identity Dan Padua Bachelor of Media and Communication Bachelor of Creative Industries (Honours) Submitted in fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy School of Communication Creative Industries Faculty Queensland University of Technology, Australia 2017 2 QUT Verified Signature 4 Abstract Popular music has repeatedly been historicized in academic literature and popular culture as arguably the most important signifier and expression of youth culture and, generational tension. This view of popular music is challenged by the evidence presented in this thesis, which illustrates how the relationship between cultural taste and age is expressed through generational exchanges relating to popular music tastes. The family provides a way to conceptualise how discursive links between popular music, taste and age operate. Discourse analysis is used to analyse the perspectives of adults and young people regarding familial exchanges about popular music, which impact on and reflect the construction of identity through expressions of popular music taste. The key to this research is David Chaney’s (2004) framework of cultural fragmentation that maps the ways consumers are increasingly able to access and take an interest in various lifestyle choices offered by the culture industries, which were previously associated with certain identity groups and subcultures. Cultural fragmentation is used to frame the investigation into how constructions of youth and adulthood occur within and impact on the shared appreciation of popular music artists by young people and adults. This thesis argues that popular music is now no longer just a signifier of the generation gap. It is a significant space through which the family unit can bond. Even though generational tension persists in relation to family members’ different music libraries, the data suggests popular music tastes are nevertheless integral to the cohesiveness of the family unit. Such connections are facilitated through the shared practices of informal ‘education’ in music styles and the participation in music events. While music appears to bring the family together, it is more appropriate to argue that parents and children use music to foster a collective family identity while maintaining their uniqueness, and in doing so, redraw typical discourses relating to what music most people their age would listen to. This research illustrates how discursive practices reorganise our everyday common sense understanding about the relationship between popular music taste and age. 5 Keywords Popular music taste Intergenerational audiences Generation gap Family Identity Cultural fragmentation Taylor Swift Queen Old school music Contemporary music 6 Table of contents Introduction ............................................................................................................................ 15 Chapter 1 – Youth and adulthood ........................................................................................ 31 Youth vs. adulthood: the construction of the generation gap .................................................... 32 Austerity vs. affluence ................................................................................................................. 32 Hedonistic consumption and the crafting of the teenager ............................................................ 34 The rejection of adulthood ........................................................................................................... 37 Cultural fragmentation and age groupings .................................................................................. 39 The collapse of rigid cultural identities ........................................................................................ 39 The changing cultural construction of youth and adulthood ........................................................ 43 Chapter 2 – Constructions of youth and adulthood in popular music ............................. 51 The generation gap in popular music ........................................................................................... 52 Signifying the generation gap ...................................................................................................... 52 The generation gap manifested in music moral panics ................................................................ 54 Generational values embodied in popular music ......................................................................... 57 “The times, they are a changin’” ................................................................................................... 59 Young people’s engagement with music ..................................................................................... 59 Contemporary adults’ engagement with music ............................................................................ 61 The gap in research ........................................................................................................................ 64 Chapter 3 – Methodology ...................................................................................................... 69 Research question ........................................................................................................................... 69 Research objectives ........................................................................................................................ 69 Approach ......................................................................................................................................... 69 Discourse analysis ........................................................................................................................... 70 Textual analysis .............................................................................................................................. 73 Family interviews ............................................................................................................................ 75 Case study .................................................................................................................................... 80 Case selection ............................................................................................................................... 82 Limitations ...................................................................................................................................... 89 Ethics ............................................................................................................................................... 89 7 Chapter 4 – Popular music and good parenting discourses in the media ........................ 91 Cultural fragmentation and age groupings .................................................................................. 92 The changing cultural construction of youth and adulthood ..................................................... 94 Good parenting and popular music .............................................................................................. 96 The “cool” parent ........................................................................................................................... 99 Cultivating children’s cultural tastes .......................................................................................... 101 Teaching family values ................................................................................................................. 105 Conclusion ..................................................................................................................................... 107 Chapter 5 – Young people and popular music in the media ............................................ 109 Canonisation: Contextualising young people’s knowledge ....................................................... 110 Attraction to authenticity ............................................................................................................. 119 Conclusion ..................................................................................................................................... 124 Chapter 6 – Adults and individuality ................................................................................. 127 Reflections of Youth: Memories in music .................................................................................. 129 The caretakers of popular music ................................................................................................. 131 Conflict and the contemporary ................................................................................................... 136 Compatibility and the contemporary ......................................................................................... 144 Conclusion ..................................................................................................................................... 149 Chapter 7 – Data analysis: Young people and individuality ........................................... 151 A young people’s repeated cultural practice (The old tradition) ............................................. 151 Love for the new, but not popular .............................................................................................. 154 “I would walk 500 miles” … like an adult .................................................................................. 159 Conclusion ....................................................................................................................................