THE REVOLUTION WILL BE SPOTIFIED: A RHETORICAL ANALYSIS OF MUSIC AS A MODE OF RESISTANCE IN THE 21ST CENTURY

Triauna Carey

A Dissertation

Submitted to the Graduate College of Bowling Green State University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of

DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY

May 2020

Committee:

Daniel Bommarito, Committee Co-Chair

Radhika Gajjala, Committee Co-Chair

Julia Halo Graduate Faculty Representative

Neil Baird

© 2020

Triauna Carey

All Rights Reserved iii ABSTRACT

Daniel Bommarito, Committee Co-Chair

Radhika Gajjala, Committee Co-Chair

This research project analyzes how musicians and genres of music are used as rhetorically effective modes of resistance in political and social climates in the West to break down barriers culturally and reveal systems of power. An interdisciplinary approach is implemented that combines cultural rhetorics, popular culture studies, communication studies, and ethnomusicology to investigate the way musicians send messages of resistance to different audiences and listeners. In order to do so, Huckin, Andrus, and Clary-Lemon’s concept of critical discourse analysis is used to analyze the way music lyrics convey meaning and cue the audience to certain resistant messages in different ways. In addition, Royster and Kirsch’s concept of social circulation is utilized to tap into the ways technology and online social spaces are interrogated as complex rhetorical spaces that are multidimensional and add new levels of activism for musicians. The study focuses on four mainstream genres, pop, rap and hip-hop, rock and alternative, and country, to reveal how artists in these genres use the rhetorical strategies available in the genre to reach their audience, while also navigating the power systems and structures at play. This research finds music does not move simply from the musician to listeners anymore. Instead, the continuous feedback loop through social media, popular culture, and digital music services like Spotify create a conversation that continues between musicians and listeners, giving both more power to resist through music as a method for rhetoric against the power systems working to oppress and silence. iv

For Mom & Selber v ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

I will always be grateful for my committee chairs Dr. Radhika Gajjala and Dr. Daniel

Bommarito. From random streams of consciousness over tea to deep conversations about identity, politics, and activism, each challenged me in different ways to think outside of myself and beyond my perspectives. I would also like to thank Dr. Gregory Selber, Dr. Colin Charlton, and Dr. Andrea Riley-Mukavetz for continuing to mentor and advise me throughout the years. I could not have completed this process without their words of encouragement. Thank you to my supportive mother and Aunt Kymisha, who both listened to me ramble on as I tried to piece the concepts of this research into a whole project, and to my friends Asia, Alfonso, Aaron, KP, and

Maggie. Without the love, support, and positive energy you continuously bestow upon me, I would not have been able to get through the extensive amount of research and analysis necessary for this project. vi

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Page

CHAPTER I: HOW DID WE GET HERE? ...... 1

Research Questions ...... 2

Exigency, Rhetorical Situation, and Rhetorical Velocity...... 4

Review of Research and Previous Scholarship...... 6

Ethnomusicology and Communication Studies ...... 7

Rhetoric and Composition ...... 9

Case Studies ...... 12

Defining Key Terms ...... 14

Culture...... 15

Music Genres ...... 16

Components of Analysis ...... 19

Conclusion...... 20

CHAPTER II: METHODS AND METHODOLOGIES ...... 21

Analyzing Westernized Music ...... 21

Methodologies...... 24

Method: Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) ...... 27

Method: Social Circulation ...... 31

Criteria for Song Selection and Data Collection...... 36

Limitations and Biases ...... 39

CHAPTER III: THE GENRE OF ROCK AND ALTERNATIVE MUSIC ...... 42

Muse and “Thought Contagion” ...... 44 vii

Historical Context and Kairos for “Thought Contagion” ...... 45

Critical Discourse Analysis for “Thought Contagion” ...... 46

Social Circulation for “Thought Contagion” ...... 48

grandson and “thoughts and “prayers” ...... 53

Historical Context and Kairos for “thoughts and prayers” ...... 54

Critical Discourse Analysis for “thoughts and prayers” ...... 56

Social Circulation for “thoughts and prayers” ...... 60

Rhetorical Strategies for the Genre ...... 62

CHAPTER IV: THE GENRE OF RAP AND HIP HOP ...... 67

Childish Gambino and “This is America” ...... 71

Historical Context and Kairos for “This is America” ...... 72

Critical Discourse Analysis for “This is America” ...... 72

Social Circulation for “This is America” ...... 74

Eminem and “The Storm” ...... 81

Historical Context and Kairos for “The Storm” ...... 83

Critical Discourse Analysis for “The Storm” ...... 84

Social Circulation for “The Storm” ...... 88

Rhetorical Strategies for the Genre ...... 88

CHAPTER V: THE GENRE OF COUNTRY ...... 92

Carrie Underwood and Brad Paisley’s “Before He Tweets” ...... 95

Historical Context and Kairos for “Before He Tweets” ...... 96

Critical Discourse Analysis for “Before He Tweets” ...... 97

Social Circulation for “Before He Tweets” ...... 99 viii

Willie Nelson and “Vote Em Out”...... 100

Historical Context and Kairos for “Vote Em Out” ...... 102

Critical Discourse Analysis for “Vote Em Out” ...... 103

Social Circulation for “Vote Em Out” ...... 105

Rhetorical Strategies for the Genre ...... 106

CHAPTER VI: THE GENRE OF POP ...... 109

Katy Perry and “Chained to the Rhythm”...... 112

Historical Context and Kairos for “Chained to the Rhythm” ...... 113

Critical Discourse Analysis for “Chained to the Rhythm” ...... 114

Social Circulation for “Chained to the Rhythm” ...... 118

Live Performance at the Grammys ...... 122

AJR and “Burn the House Down” ...... 124

Historical Context and Kairos for “Burn the House Down”...... 124

Critical Discourse Analysis for “Burn the House Down” ...... 125

Social Circulation for “Burn the House Down” ...... 129

Rhetorical Strategies for the Genre ...... 133

CHAPTER VII: FINDINGS, LIMITATIONS, AND IMPLICATIONS ...... 136

How Do Musicians in Different Genres Use Music as a Mode of Resistance? ...... 138

What Rhetorical Strategies Are at Play and Are There Differences Depending on

the Genre of Music? ...... 141

What Role Does Technology Play in How Musicians Communicate Messages of

Resistance through Music to Their Audience? ...... 145

Limitations of the Study...... 149 ix

Implications...... 150

Conclusion ...... 154

WORKS CITED ...... 158 x

LIST OF FIGURES

Figure Page

1 Research and supplemental questions ...... 3

2 Screenshot from Muse’s “Thought Contagion” music video ...... 49

3 Screenshot from the ending of Muse’s “Thought Contagion” music video ...... 50

4 Photograph taken at Muse concert in Dallas on February 24, 2019 ...... 51

5 Screenshot from grandson’s “thoughts and prayers” music video ...... 61

6 Screenshot from Muse’s “Dig Down” music video ...... 63

7 Screenshot from grandson’s “blood//water” music video ...... 63

8 Screenshot from Childish Gambino’s “This is America” music video ...... 77

9 Sheet music illustration of “Mr. T. Rice as the Original Jim” ...... 77

10 Screenshot of children dancing in “This is America” music video ...... 79

11 Screenshot of Childish Gambino dancing in “This is America” music video ...... 79

12 Screenshot of Brad Paisley and Carrie Underwood ...... 97

13 Screenshot from Katy Perry’s “Chained to the Rhythm” music video ...... 119

14 Screenshot of Katy Perry without 3D glasses ...... 121

15 Screenshot of Katy Perry and Skip Marley...... 121

16 Screenshot of Katy Perry and Skip Marley’s live performance ...... 123

17 Screenshot of AJR with blindfolds ...... 130

18 Screenshot of the mysterious figure from “Burn the House Down” ...... 130

19 Screenshot of televisions from “Burn the House Down” ...... 131

20 Screenshot of the ending from “Burn the House Down” ...... 132

21 Chart of genres based on resistance and restrictions ...... 144 xi

LIST OF TABLES

Table Page

1 Research Questions and Correlating Methods ...... 35

2 Criteria for Song Selection...... 36

3 Selected Songs for the Study ...... 37

4 Webs of Association ...... 139 1

CHAPTER I: HOW DID WE GET HERE?

Many cultural events throughout history coincide with a musical event or shared experience between a musician and their audience. The Civil Rights Movement in the 1960s was fueled by musicians standing against social injustices and discrimination in the United States with songs like “We Shall Overcome,” which has been performed by various artists, and Nina

Simone’s “I Wish I Knew (How It Would Feel to Be Free).” Marvin Gaye wrote “What’s Going

On” in 1971 after being incensed by police brutality. The Cranberries created “Zombie” after the lead singer was angered by the Irish Republic Army’s attack on Warrington, Cheshire in 1993 and the punk rock group Pussy Riot was formed in 2011 to speak out against the Russian government’s anti-feminist policies. Pussy Riot continues this work through resistant music that critiques the U.S., such as the band’s 2016 release “Make America Great Again.”

During the preliminary stages of this dissertation research and the thesis it follows, the work focused on the way music coincides with cultural shifts and studies of rhetoric. However, after watching the 2015 Liz Garbus documentary, What Happened, Miss Simone, about the life and career of Nina Simone, the focus shifted to what music can do when a musician wants to spread a specific message. Simone points out, “I choose to reflect the times and the situations in which I find myself. That, to me, is my duty...how can you be an artist and not reflect the times”

(Garbus)? This question fueled the research questions of my Master’s thesis based on the rhetorical power of music, the way music can affect and reflect cultures, and I investigated a few broad questions. Does music affect and reflect culture? What role does music play in assessing culture? Can the message of a musician affect culture and if so, how? My findings in regards to this inquiry are that many scholars confirm the existence of music as an impactful form of art that can reflect culture and play a role in cultural shifts. 2

However, this line of questioning did not go far enough and the field of rhetoric and composition offers helpful frameworks and lenses to gaze through to move beyond if and towards how. Past scholarship confirms that music can reflect the times it is created in. Music is the “humanly organized sound” John Blacking works to define in How Musical Is Man? Music can be used as the shared experience through social interpretation that Steven Feld alludes to in

“Communication, Music, and Speech about Music” and it is clear that music can unify in the ways Guthrie P. Ramsey’s “Daddy's Second Line: Toward a Cultural Poetics of Race Music” outlines. The focus of this dissertation is on how this occurs and the ways this coincides with rhetorical theories and studies. This research does not simply focus on music as an art form, even though its ability to be viewed as art by listeners plays a role in its power as rhetoric. The emphasis of this research is on the rhetorical strategies of musicians that actively utilize music as a mode of resistance and focuses on the following research questions:

 How do musicians in different genres use music as a mode of resistance?

 What rhetorical strategies are at play and are there differences depending on the

genre of music?

 What role does technology play in how musicians communicate messages of

resistance through music to their audience?

Research Questions

In addition to these questions, there are supplemental questions that are investigated in order to elaborate on the focus and inquiry. These questions and their relations to the main inquiries can be best described by the following chart: 3

What rhetorical How do musicians in What role does strategies are at play technology play in how different genres use and are there musicians communicate music as a mode of differences messages of resistance resistance? depending on the through music to their genre of music? audience?

What themes, Are there patterns, and webs differences How do musicians use of association between rhetorical digital spaces to through rhetorical strategies and speak? strategies are themes depending present in this genre on the genre of of music used? music? How are these spaces negotiated and what is permitted within them? What rhetorical strategies make the audience receptive to this type of resistance? How do circulation and online distribution alter the space and rhetorical How does this type of strategies allotted to resistance differ from other musicians using music as modes of resistance? a mode of resistance?

Fig. 1. – Research and supplemental questions. 4

By exploring these three main questions and the supplemental questions that accompany them, this dissertation aims to gain a deeper understanding of how music works as resistance, how music functions rhetorically when used as a mode of resistance, how genres are framed by rhetorical strategies of musicians through their music, and the way online spaces function as spaces for this type of resistance.

Exigency, Rhetorical Situation, and Rhetorical Velocity

With such a broad area of study and vast array of samples to choose from over centuries, this research chooses to focus on a flashpoint, a moment, event, or movement of cultural significance that changes the trajectory of cultures in a particular society to cause a shift and/or tension, and its aftermath. According to Ronald A. Berk, the term “is derived from two Latin words, ‘flashus,’ meaning ‘your shorts,’ and ‘pointum,’ meaning, ‘are on fire’” (15) and refers to

“critical issues, conflicts, contentious problems, and volatile hot buttons” (15). Scholar Timothy

D. Hoyt states that a flashpoint “occurs as a result of an unresolved conflict and the existence of at least one dissatisfied state” (118) and finds “flashpoints can be formed as a result of ideological differences” (118). This study analyzes the flashpoint and aftermath occurring in relation to the 2016 United States Presidential Election and the music used as a mode of resistance after the election of Donald Trump. By surveying music from different genres released from 2016 to 2018, this research examines the responses by popular musicians in mainstream

Western media to tensions, movements, and cultural events stemming from this recent flashpoint in order to reveal the rhetorical strategies implemented and messages of resistance conveyed through different genres of music.

The exigency and rhetorical situation surrounds the current state of cultures and politics in the West, especially in the U.S. in the Trump Era. This study explores musicians acting as 5 rhetors and how these artists choose to create the salience Richard E. Vatz alludes to in “The

Myth of the Rhetorical Situation:”

Rhetors choose or do not choose to make salient situations, facts, events, etc. This may be

the sine qua non of rhetoric: the art of linguistically or symbolically creating salience.

After salience is created, the situation must be translated into meaning. When political

commentators talk about issues they are talking about situations made salient, not

something that became important because of its intrinsic predominance. (160)

However, the study goes beyond Vatz’s concept of the rhetorical situation and considers the audience’s role as a primary focus, not secondary, like in the rhetor-as-creator model. Garret and

Xiao point this out as well in “The Rhetorical Situation Revisited” by resituating the audience and shifting the orientation:

The audience has loomed large in our analysis, in contrast to the speaker-orientation of

most perspectives on the rhetorical situation. For Bitzer, the audience is involved in a

rhetorical situation only to the extent that it is "capable of being constrained in thought or

action in order to effect positive modification of the exigence." Even Vatz, despite his

extremely subjective and relativistic view, did not pay particular attention to the

audience. In his view, decision and activity are characteristic of the rhetor rather than the

audience. The major exception to this generalization is Beisecker, who sees the audience

and the speaker as engaged in a process of mutual identity-building. (Garret and Xiao 39)

As a result, this study reorients the audience or listeners as part of the feedback loop, not merely projected onto by the rhetor as a reactionary aftermath, but as continuously in conversation, both starting and reimagining the conversation and tweaking the rhetorical situation. This conceptualization, along with Ridolfo and De Voss’s theory of rhetorical velocity, “a strategic 6 approach to composing for rhetorical delivery…a way of considering delivery as a rhetorical mode, aligned with an understanding of how texts work as a component of a strategy” drive the research forward to analyze how musicians respond rhetorically to this current flashpoint in resistant ways, while also taking into consideration the influence, power, and persuasive capabilities of their audiences.

The work takes an interdisciplinary approach that combines rhetoric, critical theory, cultural studies, communication studies, and ethnomusicology to investigate music as a mode of resistance and its impact on Western cultures and societies and focuses on Western societies, not simply the United States, because this may include the United Kingdom before and after the

Brexit vote, along with other global current events and music. I argue musicians not only use music as a rhetorically effective mode of resistance, but utilize the rhetorical strategies specific to their genre of music to persuade their target audience. This persuasion does not move simply from the musician to the listeners. Instead, the continuous feedback loop through social media, popular culture, and the use of digital music services, such as Spotify, create a conversation that continues between musicians and listeners. The way these conversations are carried out in the twenty-first century differs from past modes of communication through art and this research explores the way the differences impact the production of resistant music and the rhetoric at play.

Review of Research and Previous Scholarship

The main reason this research takes an interdisciplinary approach is due to the types of research and scholarship already established about music as rhetoric and the way music persuades and communicates messages to the listener. Many disciplines continue to conduct research about music’s impact on specific cultures and people, which is why it is important to acknowledge how these fields carry out research and intersect. For example, ethnomusicology is 7 a field that dedicates scholarship to the study of music and culture. Throughout its history, the research focuses on the music of non-Western cultures. Music is also studied alongside different theories of communication due to music’s complex ability to engage in different forms of multimedia and to embody different modes of significance.

This dissertation focuses primarily on the lyrical contexts and messages behind the music, so the analysis of the instrumental components and sound are secondary unless directly impacting the context and messages of resistance. In addition, visual rhetoric, like music videos and examples found in live performances, will be used at times when the impact of the rhetoric depends on visual aspects of persuasion in order to interpret the full context of the message. As a result of these different modes of inquiry, this study is interdisciplinary and will acknowledge the wide range of scholarship involved in ethnomusicology, communication studies, rhetoric and composition, and an array of case studies.

Ethnomusicology and Communication Studies

The works of scholars in ethnomusicology and communication studies survey music’s relationship to language, communication, and rhetoric. For example, Bruno Nettl’s Nettl’s

Elephants surveys the history of ethnomusicology and the impact of music on other fields of study. Within the work, Nettl explores the research of theorists and their contributions to the discipline. He alludes to John Blacking’s research with the Venda tribe, which is how Blacking’s

How Musical is Man? became a significant lens to view music through. Blacking prides himself on his mix of musicology and anthropology as he discovers how music acts as and is defined as

“humanly organized sound,” music that operates on a higher level than simple entertainment and helps to understand the nature of man as a whole. According to Blacking, the concept is important in terms of people’s role in creating understanding through music because “music can 8 express social attitudes and cognitive processes, but it is useful and effective only when it is heard by the prepared and receptive ears of people who have shared, or can share in some way, the cultural and individual experiences of its creators” (54). An important theme in Blacking’s theory is historical relevance and how music corresponds with the evidence available in certain cultural and social environments. For Blacking, the analysis of the creation of music must be done through various scopes that reveal the music’s dependence on the society and culture of the artist. “Music, therefore, confirms what is already present in society and culture” (Blacking 54).

The work of Steven Feld in “Communication, Music, and Speech about Music” adds another layer to the concept of music as humanly organized and processed due to Feld’s insistence that music is a social, meaning-making activity that is processed as an interaction between humans. Feld observes music’s ability to be engaged with through a shared interpretation:

We apprehend the surrounding scene as organized, meaningful, and intersubjectively so;

in other words, we assume that our daily realities as well as our more specifically situated

and finite sensibilities are shared. At the same time we each recognize that we might not

all have the same idea, the same “take” on “what is going on” and “what it means.” (3)

The works of these theorists are important to understanding the ability of music to be shared in a collective way by groups of humans, interpreted as part of bigger experiences, and constructed as cultural experiences. Therefore, music is a mode of communication that humans create to make meaning and social norms. Not only does music then become a meaning-making experience to be shared, but a mode of communication that can be utilized to urge action by groups of people.

In the field of communication studies, Sellnow and Sellnow amplify this point in “The

‘Illusion of Life’ Rhetorical Perspective: An Integrated Approach to the Study of Music as 9

Communication” by arguing that “evidence supporting the role of music as communication continues” (395). The scholars find that music works as more than just sound or entertainment and is at times used as a form of activism:

For example, prior to the Civil War, slaves sang songs “disguised as religious hymns . . .

to urge [other] slaves to run away from plantations [via] the underground railroad”

(Stewart, Smith, & Denton, 1989, p. 213). In the 1930’s and 1940’s, folk songs were used

to engage workers to rally around labor unions (Denisoff, 1983, pp. 3–9). In the 1960’s,

political activists decried their anti-war messages in the form of protest songs (e.g., Frith,

1981; Lieberman, 1989). (Sellnow and Sellnow 395)

Sellnow and Sellnow connect multiple disciplines throughout the work and show “the rhetorical potential of music” (395) because “music does impact meaning” (396). Scholars such as these synthesize the work of different researchers in interdisciplinary approaches and frameworks to show how music affects the audience and allows a type of communication to happen that, at times, is ignored or diminished.

Rhetoric and Composition

In rhetoric and composition studies, scholarship analyzes interpretations of music and its impact, like Mark W. Booth’s research on the expectations of the audience in “The Art of Words in Songs.” According to Booth, “audiences are ready for their songs to say certain things, in certain ways. The differentiation is greater, it seems to me, than can be found among the audiences of films, or fiction, or most other arts” (244). This is evident in recent scholarship focused on the Civil Rights Movement and the flashpoints in America that took place during the

1950s and 60s. In Freedom Writing: African American Civil Rights Literacy Activism, 1955-

1967, Rhea Estelle Lathan studies gospel music to “recover and revise a vocabulary for 10 discussing the literacy history of marginalized groups - in this case, the learners and teachers who participated in the Civil Rights crusade” (xiii). Lathan constructs a framework for gospel literacy, which is defined as “a ritual of critical intellectualism that relies on sophisticated ways of knowing” (112).

Music’s link to activism during the Civil Rights Era is also the focus for Elizabeth Ellis

Miller in “Remembering Freedom Songs: Repurposing an Activist Genre.” The September 2018 article analyzes the way freedom songs act as a genre of activism and how the genre can be repurposed or utilized in current rhetorical practices:

Indeed, memory-making as social activism deserves attention, for through this rhetorical

practice figures and collectives present the past to work toward a more just future. While

much scholarship rightly focuses on analyzing arguments presented through highly

visible public memory sites, the smaller, often lower-profile projects created by social

activists offer insights into the specific narratives of the past some activists hope to

secure, and as such, reveal their arguments about how best to remember particular events,

campaigns, and figures and connect these memorial claims to the present. (70)

Analyzing music from the Civil Rights Movement is prevalent in rhetoric and composition due to the impact of the flashpoint and the way the era changed the trajectory for American cultures, politics, and societal norms.

In addition, the discipline continues to engage with research on music, sound, and its effects on students through work in the sub-field of sonic rhetoric, which allows scholars to explore how sound persists and shapes teaching, learning, and thinking. Steph Ceraso examines these concepts in “(Re)Educating the Senses: Multimodal Listening, Bodily Learning, and the 11

Composition of Sonic Experiences” by observing how important it is to understand sonic experiences in relation to listening:

In a culture where being plugged in to digital devices is a common occurrence, when so

much of what we pay attention to is streaming through earbuds or flashing on screens, I

am calling for a reeducation of our senses—a bodily retraining that can help us learn to

become more open to the connections between sensory modes, materials, and

environments. (120)

Sonic rhetoric as a subfield of rhetoric and composition continues to expand with a boom in scholarship in the past five years. Hocks and Comstock’s 2017 article “Composing for Sound:

Sonic Rhetoric as Resonance” is a deep analysis of the way sound is used in the classroom and continues to be explored by the field. The article is “an integrated approach for analyzing sounds and teaching sonic rhetoric that helps students develop strategies for multimodal composition”

(Hocks and Comstock 135). Plus, Byron Hawk explores resonance in the 2018 article “Sound:

Resonance as Rhetorical,” by stating, “resonance is such a potentially powerful rhetorical concept because it is a key aspect of how sonic rhetorics work. Resonance shows how conditions produced by past works, embodiment in present listening practices, and affective impacts on other resonant bodies and ecologies are all a part of the same process and practice” (321).

These lines of inquiry pave the way for more scholarship focused on the rhetorical practices of music and sound in the discipline, but does not fill the void in the types of research still needing to be explored, analyzed, deconstructed, and theorized in terms of contemporary music. The need for more research on rhetoric’s correlation with music is evident in Joachim

Knape’s Modern Rhetoric in Culture, Arts, and Media, in which the scholar explores how rhetoric is viewed: 12

It was only in the early 20th century that music historians rediscovered the importance of

rhetoric as the basis of aesthetic and theoretical concepts in earlier music. An entire

discipline that had once been the common property of every educated man has had to be

rediscovered and reconstructed during the intervening decades, and only now is it

beginning to be understood how much Western art music has depended on rhetorical

concepts. (187)

We continue to see this “rediscovering” in rhetoric and composition, but the concern is the lag in the research for contemporary music and current events, cultures, politics, and the activism taking place. This dissertation highlights methods and frameworks scholars in the field of rhetoric and composition can contribute to current, ongoing conversations from other fields and in sub-genres of the discipline, while still moving forward through a rhetorical lens. The discipline is undergoing a similar process in scholarship that took place for ethnomusicology in the 1990s and this dissertation works to contribute to progress in this area of research.

Case Studies

Research in music often comes in the form of case studies, which can be used to pinpoint significant moments, eras, and genres and scholarship, especially in ethnomusicology, and the

1990s changed the way music is perceived as an art form and studied. According to the ethnomusicologist Bruno Nettl, “it is possible to argue that the world of music has changed more since 1990 or so than perhaps ever before, not so much in the creation of new sounds, styles, or genres as in the ways in which music is communicated and in the experience of musical perception” (57). The perception of what music can do was altered during this period because methodologies for studying music shifted to concentrate more on “specific cases - events, genres, individuals” (Nettl 57). This influenced a shift in the scholarship regarding music and focused 13 conversations on specific regions, cultures, artists, social movements, and genres. The transition to events and genres allows researchers to study social movements and changes in cultures, which provides opportunities to look back at music during specific eras and the role the music plays in fueling certain movements.

For example, musicologist Guthrie P. Ramsey focuses on the popularization of race music and how it helped open up lines of communication for different races of people during moments of tension. In “Daddy's Second Line: Toward a Cultural Poetics of Race Music,”

Ramsey speaks about how music creates movement and breaks down cultural barriers in communities. For Ramsey, one song that struck a chord in his exploration of race music was

Stevie Wonder’s “I Wish” and the song is an example of the way music can cross cultural lines to unify people of different ethnicities. Ramsey states that songs of that nature “participated within a historically specific, socially grounded dialogue” (2).

Sociologists Roberts and Moore’s “Peace Punks and Punks against Racism: Resource

Mobilization and Frame Construction in the Punk Movement” is another case of researchers continuing the analysis of music from different eras and genres and the scholarship analyzes how punk rock rallied behind social movements to create new outlets for the genre “in response to racist sentiments expressed by rock stars” (Roberts and Moore 25). Media and communication studies scholar Catherine Strong’s work is a case study of how the Grunge Era became part of a cultural and social movement by embracing feminist frameworks and rhetoric to coincide with the Riot Grrrl Movement in “Grunge, Riot Grrrl and the Forgetting of Women in Popular

Culture.” These case studies are examples of music’s power at work and how artists utilize their art as a tool of resistance. 14

Based on this scholarship, the concepts and theories within, and the methods and methodologies, it is clear that music is humanly organized, creates meaning for groups of peoples, is a mode of rhetoric, and can be used as modes of resistance. However, previous research does not often center on how different genres of music are utilized to create groups based on communities and/or identities, and how these formulations of genres allow for certain rhetorical strategies to become more powerful or impactful based on the chosen genre. I argue that different genres of music tap into different rhetorical strategies and artists are aware of the available means of rhetoric in their genre. This impacts the way music acts as resistance and how musicians target their audiences.

Defining Key Terms

There are three key terms that are necessary to define and explore further in order to conceptualize how each term is referenced throughout the chapters and this section establishes how resistance, culture, and genre are identified throughout the study. Hollander and

Einwohner’s definition of overt resistance in “Conceptualizing Resistance” is implemented to qualify the use of a specific type of resistance in the analysis. As the scholars state, “different authors who use the language of resistance may not in fact be talking about the same thing”

(Hollander and Einwohner 533). The scholars work to categorize and define various types of resistance, including overt, covert, unwitting, target - defined, externally - defined, missed resistance, and attempted resistance. This study focuses on overt resistance, which is defined as

“behavior that is visible and readily recognized by both targets and observers as resistance and, further, is intended to be recognized as such. This category includes collective acts such as social movements and revolutions as well as individual acts” (Hollander and Einwohner 536). This is the focus of musicians that embrace their music as a tool for resistance and call-to-action for 15 their listeners, which means these musicians are actively choosing to use music to resist, critique, and bring awareness to a perceived social or political issue.

Culture

In regards to culture, William R. Bascom’s definition from “Folklore and Anthropology” is implemented, along with theories and definitions of cultures in James Clifford’s The

Predicament of Culture: Twentieth Century Ethnography, Literature, and Art. The term culture can be defined in an infinite amount of ways due to its ability to act as an abstract concept that can mean so much and so little all at once, so this research draws on multiple imaginings of the term. Bascom defines culture as “a part of man’s learned traditions and customs, a part of his social heritage” (286). Bascom’s theory treats music as an integral part of culture and sees it as a way to study “acculturation, patterning, the relation between culture and the environment, or between culture and personality” (286). For this research, culture is a sum of rhetorical choices processed through socialization to reflect the rules, laws, customs, and norms associated with a group of people.

In addition, the study recognizes Russian philosopher and critic Mikhail Bakhtin’s concept of culture as “an open-ended, creative dialogue of subcultures, of insiders and outsiders, of diverse factions” (Clifford 46) and the theory of Culture/Collage:

Collage brings to the work (here the ethnographic text) elements that continually

proclaim their foreignness to the context of presentation. These elements - like a

newspaper clipping or a feather - are marked as real, as collected rather than invented by

the artist-writer. The procedures of (a) cutting out and (b) assemblage are of course basic

to any semiotic message; here they are the message. The cuts and sutures of the research

process are left visible, there is no smoothing over or blending of the work’s raw data 16

into a homogeneous representation. To write ethnographies on the model of collage

would be to avoid the portrayal of cultures as organic wholes or as unified, realistic

worlds subject to a continuous explanatory discourse. (Clifford 146)

This dissertation does not aim to treat culture as a sum of parts making a whole, especially while considering how Westernized versions of cultures are often assimilated, whitewashed, and reimagined as crisp, clean depictions in the mainstream media. Instead, this research interrogates

“culture” specifically in the West as representations of cultures, communities, and peoples that are influenced by systems of power, structures, and institutions that create images of culture as organic wholes. Like Clifford’s work, this study is “responding to forces that challenge the authority and even the future identity of ‘the West.’” (9). Therefore, the analysis of “culture” is an analysis of how the West reflects, portrays, and affects the way cultures are perceived. As a researcher in the West, my view of cultures, like Clifford’s, is based on “off-centeredness in a world of distinct meaning systems, a state of being in culture while looking at culture, a form of personal and collective self-fashioning. This predicament - not limited to scholars, writers, artists, or intellectuals - responds to the twentieth century’s unprecedented overlay of traditions”

(Clifford 9). The focus is on interrogating Western cultures, mainly the United States and its influence globally, and considering the way the twenty-first century alters views of cultures in and influenced by the West.

Music Genres

In the preliminary stages of this study, an issue occurred while applying the criteria to an array of songs due to how subjective genres are and the way songs are labeled and grouped.

There are many factors into how songs are placed into genres and the genre can change based on the platform. As Carolyn R. Miller states, a genre “does not lend itself to taxonomy, for genres 17 change, evolve, and decay; the number of genres current in any society is indeterminate and depends upon the complexity and diversity of the society” (163). This observation is vital to understanding how genres of music operate within cultures as well because music genres are adaptable, malleable gatherings of sound and are altered based on the needs of the society. This can be seen in the way the genre of “alternative” music continues to change throughout time and how, while it is currently attached to the genre of rock, it is also embraced in other genres, such as pop.

In order to best define a music genre for the purposes of this study, the work of

Armentano, De Noni, and Cardoso is implemented from “Genre Classification of Symbolic

Pieces of Music.” The 2017 study finds that the classification of music into genres is based on the significance to specific communities, domains, and online spaces. However, there are also threads, trends, and patterns to survey. A music genre is “acknowledged by a community for any reason or purpose or criteria, i.e., a set of musical events whose course is governed by rules (of any kind) accepted by a community” (Armentano et al 581), which allows a wide range of interpretations and subjective groupings of music to form genres. This complicates the way genres are studied and there is most certainly a subjective, interpretative factor to this process:

Since music is not science, there is always a subjective component when classifying

music into genres. Furthermore, the boundaries among genres are not sharp but fuzzy.

We humans are able to identify genres by comparing the features we perceive in a piece

of music with the cultural background and musical knowledge we have related to

different music genres. For example, at a very high level, we can distinguish between

instrumental and vocal music. Then, most people are able to identify different broad

categories, such as rock, pop, jazz/blues, western classical, latin, etc. Depending on the 18

musical background and knowledge, some people are also able to identify different

subgenres. For example, some people are able to distinguish between jazz and blues,

while other people might classify songs belonging to these genres into the same category.

Furthermore, there are songs that lie at the boundary between two or more genres, and its

classification is difficult both for humans and an automatic system. (Armentano, De

Noni, and Cardoso 251)

Consequently, this study categorizes genres based on the digital music service and online streaming platform Spotify while recognizing that there is overlap, gray areas, and the “fuzzy” that the scholars mention. Spotify includes interactive features allowing users to create playlists and give input on how genres are formed. Spotify then acts as a database to collect, reconfigure, and regroup based on this information. This means songs shift between different genres, are used in multiple genres, and categorized in a variety of ways, such as Top 50 Charts, “Amplify”

Playlists, by mood, and cultural events.

Spotify is also chosen due to its expansive database of music, rise in popularity, openness to including the work of unsigned musicians, and responsiveness to its users. Spotify does more than allow users to stream music and create playlists. The software calculates algorithms to track users’ listening preferences, creates weekly playlists and allows users to share and access the playlists of others through private and public spheres, connects to radio stations based on users’ favorite artists, and offers listeners an option to view music videos. In addition, users can see how many times a song is listened to since its release on the platform, its popularity in comparison to other songs released by the artist, and allows users to keep track of new releases by selected musicians through the “follow” feature. Spotify offers a structured systematic 19 method to selecting songs from different genres for the study, while recognizing the subjectivity and interconnectivity of music genres.

Components of Analysis

There are three components to the type of data collection and analysis involved:

Reflection, Dissection, and Projection. Reflection refers to surveying the history of the genre analyzed, the formulation of the genre, the identities often perceived to be associated with the genre, and the way the genre is perceived in contemporary music. This level of analysis involves brief background information about the genre, any relevant facts about its origins, and an overview of its current state in mainstream, popular cultures in the West. Dissection refers to the lyrical analysis conducted during the study and this interpretation is based on what the musicians intend the message to represent in the lyrics, music videos, and/or live performances studied. For this stage of analysis, critical discourse analysis and social circulation are implemented to assess the message of resistance, the impact on the audience, and the responses to the music.

Projection is the phase of the study where the research moves beyond assessing one song or sample and instead surveys the intersections and connections to the genre overall. This phase of the analysis pays attention to how the rhetorical strategies revealed in the selected songs relate to the genre they are rooted in, the flashpoint the song responds to, and the implications and conclusions about the rhetorical strategies used in the genre to reach a targeted audience.

Throughout each component the main research questions are assessed in a variety of ways in order to assess how the music acts as a mode of resistance, what rhetorical strategies are implemented, how they are implemented, and the implications for the musicians and audiences impacted. By analyzing a selection of music in a variety of ways, this study shows how musicians use their music as a form of resistance in the aftermath of a current flashpoint in the 20

West and how technology continues to change, evolve, and mold the way this type of rhetoric plays out.

Conclusion

This chapter provided a brief overview of the research questions, purpose and exigency for the study, review of the scholarship and previous research, terminology to consider, and components of analysis. The next chapter will outline the methods and methodologies, criteria for song selection, plus limitations and biases to consider. The following four chapters are dedicated to one genre per chapter in the forms of rock and alternative, rap and hip-hip, country, and pop. Each of these chapters analyzes two songs per genre through frameworks to reveal the messages and themes within the songs and how these messages are distributed to listeners. The final chapter presents the findings from the analyses and synthesizes different genres to show what rhetorical strategies are unique to a particular genre and which strategies are important across many genres of music. In addition, the final chapter provides conclusions about how rhetorical strategies are used to create music as a mode resistance, the way genres are similar and differ, and implications for this type of rhetoric. Plus, the concluding chapter explores how future research can continue the ongoing conversations and survey ways the research can be used in the future for similar studies. 21

CHAPTER II: METHODS AND METHODOLOGIES

The emphasis of this study is on the rhetorical strategies of musicians in different genres that use their music to convey messages of resistance to their audiences with the assistance of technology in the twenty-first century. In order to conduct this type of research, it is important to unpack and situate it in larger conversations and frameworks. I argue that music is a meaning- making activity that relies on a shared experience and social interpretation. Therefore, music is a site of investigation for collecting data to understand what music does in specific cultures, how it is used in the forms of activism and narratives, how meaning is made and negotiated, and the way identities are constructed through music. New technology and shifts in how music is experienced help scholars, activists, and listeners engage through music even more in the twenty- first century. Social media and sites like YouTube allow for music to be experienced and shared through digital and online spaces. Platforms like Spotify give more freedom to the listener to have more autonomy in their listening experience. Plus, exposure to more avenues of music allows listeners to blur the lines of genres in ways that complicate narratives, not only about race, gender, and sexuality, but for multiple forms of identity and representation. This chapter outlines the frameworks and theories used to position the study, the methodologies that influence the work, the methods of data analysis and collection, criteria for song analysis, and limitations and biases of the research. In addition, the approach, logistics, and considerations are detailed in order to gain more understanding of the level of analysis and assessments of the selected songs for the study.

Analyzing Westernized Music

Using music as a site of investigation for rhetoric allows for ample amounts of data and research materials. Music is available on digital streaming platforms with immediate access, 22 musicians send messages to their fans through social media on a daily basis, listeners react online through social media and YouTube comment sections, and articles and interviews about the thought process behind the music are easy to access online. Popular music in the West is globalized and streamed to the extent that access to a computer with an internet connection can even allow users to view live concerts from computer screens. The amount of access to music users have online and in digital spaces exponentially increases the impact musicians have on cultures in the West, which is why it is important to conduct a rhetorical analysis of the significance of resistant messages through this mode of art, technology, and media on cultures and groups of people. It is also a way to analyze the rhetorical implications, reveal underlying issues, and expose power structures at play.

Exploring music as an integral component of cultures is important. However, it is also important to recognize that music can reinforce colonial practices and perpetuate propaganda.

The music industry in mainstream media is a colonized space where music is distributed to be consumed as commodified, Westernized versions of cultures, and while Spotify and digital music services of the sort benefit users, these platforms still rely on algorithms to mold the listeners’ preferences, at times literally making playlists to be consumed and experienced. So, before analyzing the way music can be used to resist and push back against power structures, it is imperative to first acknowledge the complicated rhetoric of music in connection with identities and cultures. Listeners of music tend to tie identity to music, especially in the form of genres, so researchers must be aware of how genres are constructed, what they can perpetuate, and how they can become part of forming identities through the rhetorical power of music.

In the 2009 article, “Peace Punks and Punks Against Racism: Resource Mobilization and

Frame Construction in the Punk Movement,” Roberts and Moore argue that music “is typically 23 framed in a way that views it as playing a supporting role in a social movement, rather than as an organizing catalyst. We would argue that examining the relationship between music and social movements entails not only examining music as a cultural dimension of social movements that is crucial for setting frames, forging collective identities, and expressing ideologies, but also for the mobilization of resources” (23). This forging of collective identities is especially important when thinking about how humans form music into Blacking’s “humanly organized sound.” Music is used to reflect and affect cultures of peoples and at times it is even used to categorize and identify. Genres of music can be boxes to lock individuals into, especially in terms of race. At the same time, genres can be re-imagined as a form of liberation, which is why music has such a complex role in cultures.

When Armentano et al. conducted the study on how humans classify music into different genres, it allowed the researchers to conclude that a music genre is “acknowledged by a community for any reason or purpose or criteria, i.e., a set of musical events whose course is governed by rules (of any kind) accepted by a community” (581). However, this characterization of genres does not address the power structures, industries, and systems of power at play that construct and disseminate music. I argue that while genres of music are purposed for communities and accepted as a construction of music into a collection for a community to identify with, as, and through, genres of music can also be used to play into oppressive systems and colonial practices. Understanding ways this takes place can assist in recognizing the power of music to act as a mode of resistance from those same power structures and systems, which is especially important as scholars consider the way race, authenticity, and identities are produced through music genres. As a result, this study recognizes the complicated, colonial history and context of Westernized music, the music industry, and aims to explore how musicians situated 24 within the industry use their music in resistant ways while also being made constantly aware of the spaces they are in. So while Westernized music is important to explore as a facet of popular cultures and media, it is also important to explore as a perpetuator of stereotypes, constructs, and societal norms through genres in the music industry. This study does not ignore that and instead aims to challenge these issues by analyzing the current flashpoint and resistant responses of artists that successfully navigate these systems and structures of power.

Methodologies

As a result of this acknowledgement about Westernized music and the music industry, it is fitting for cultural rhetorics to be a methodology that influences this research based on the attention of exploring music that exposes institutions of power, resists colonized ways of thinking, and makes way for decoloniality. Decoloniality requires scholars to be willing “to focus on the enunciation, engaging in epistemic disobedience and delinking from the colonial matrix in order to open up decolonial options––a vision of life and society that requires decolonial subjects, decolonial knowledges, and decolonial institutions” (Mignolo 9). Walter

Mignolo’s The Darker Side of Western Modernity Global Futures, Decolonial Options is not only a staple of cultural rhetorics, but a piece that informs this research. This study works to interrogate spaces and art that pushes back against institutions of power, colonized thought, and abuses of systematic power structures. One aim of the study is to embrace the differences in approaches to modes of resistance that rethink how humans form genres, textual analyses, and also to push back against narratives that implore scholars to work towards sameness in order to be consumed as Westernized versions of epistemological correctness. “Decoloniality, therefore, means both the analytic task of unveiling the logic of coloniality and the prospective task of contributing to build a world in which many worlds will coexist” (Mignolo 54). 25

Cultural rhetorics, a relatively new subfield of rhetoric and composition, outlines methodologies and guidelines to keep in mind while thinking about decolonial practices, how communities of people utilize techniques such as story as narrative, and how to carry out activism. Cultural rhetorics is an often misunderstood field due to the assumptions of its purpose and the scholarship it stems from. It taps into previous scholarship, such as critical and cultural theories, and according to Bratta and Powell’s “Entering the Cultural Rhetorics Conversations,” cultural rhetorics is a term that is often misrepresented as simply a combination of cultural studies and rhetoric. Instead, cultural rhetorics allows for scholarship that synthesizes rhetoric and cultural studies, but goes beyond in order to critique, analyze, and re-imagine the way rhetoric and composition as a discipline engages with communities and cultures:

More than anything, cultural rhetorics is a practice, and more specifically an embodied

practice, that demands much from the scholars who engage in it. First, scholars must be

willing to build meaningful theoretical frames from inside the particular culture in which

they are situating their work. To do so means understanding a specific culture’s systems,

beliefs, relationships to the past, practices of meaning-making, and practices of carrying

culture forward to future generations. In this way, it requires that scholars move beyond

simply applying frames derived from one culture/tradition to another culture's rhetorical

practices” (Bratta and Powell).

Another function of cultural rhetorics relies on the notion of decolonizing practices within institutions of higher learning and addressing issues we face as scholars, learners, researchers, and educators. In this way, the emphasis is on four main principles, “decolonization, relations, constellation, and story. Engagement with decolonization and decolonial practices is central to the work of most cultural rhetorics scholars. By ‘decolonial,’ we mean ‘stories from the 26 perspective of colonized cultures and communities that are working to delink from the mechanisms of colonialism’” (Bratta and Powell). Scholarship that influences this type of work are Bhabha’s The Location of Culture, Wilson’s Research is Ceremony: Indigenous Research

Methods, Mignolo’s The Darker Side of Western Modernity: Global Futures, Decolonial

Options, and Royster, Jones, and Kirsch’s Feminist Rhetorical Practices: New Horizons for

Rhetoric, Composition, and Literacy Studies.

Cultural rhetorics does not simply allow for engagement with culture through a rhetorical lens, but allows for activism through scholarship. While this dissertation does not focus on spreading one view of activism and instead analyzes how modes of overt resistance operate in music, social activism is a facet of the research. Therefore, the methodologies utilized in cultural rhetorics function as a reminder of where this research is situated, how my positionality as the researcher connects with past scholarship, and lenses to view social activism and scholarship through. As John Gagon states in “How Cultural Rhetorics Can Change the Conversation:

Toward New Communication Spaces to Address Human Trafficking,” cultural rhetorics will

“uniquely allow for the maintenance of a scholar-activist identity. Indeed, one of the key tenets of cultural rhetorics scholarship is that it emphasizes relationships, including those developed between the researcher and the community…it encourages the researcher to be an active participant in the community under investigation” (12). This concept of active participation is of interest because it does not position the researcher as a purely objective bystander, only collecting data as seen through unbiased eyes. Instead, it embraces the idea that all researchers have bias, especially in terms of communities and cultures, and acknowledging that bias is not a weakness, but a strength that leads to different forms of activism. 27

A final feature of cultural rhetorics that makes it an influential part of this study is the focus on how meaning-making occurs. As Riley-Mukavetz states in “Towards a Cultural

Rhetorics Methodology: Making Research Matter with Multi-Generational Women from the

Little Traverse Bay Band,” research rooted in cultural rhetorics “focuses on how a specific community makes meaning and negotiates systems of communication to disseminate knowledge” (110). In this way, culture is perceived through cultural rhetorics “as always rhetorical and rhetoric as persistently cultural (Cultural Rhetorics Theory Lab, 2012, p. 2)”

(Riley-Mukavitz 109). Therefore, cultural rhetorics scholarship functions as a decolonial practice in search of re-imagining the way scholars study, understand, and engage with specific communities, while also acknowledging the activism afforded through this type of research. This is seen in the work of Audre Lorde and Gloria Anza����long with other scholars that are embraced in cultural rhetorics in order to explore how peoples and marginalized groups of communities and cultures are rhetorical. These works influence this dissertation by bringing awareness to the ways music is colonized, but can also be used to decolonize. Music can be used to group based on difference and formed into genres, but also be used to break down these groupings. When utilized as such, music is not only resistant, but can be decolonial, and a way for marginalized groups of people to share their stories as narratives through music.

Method: Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA)

There are two main methods in this study for data analysis and collection: Huckin,

Andrus, and Clary-Lemon’s view of James Paul Gee’s Critical Discourse Analysis, CDA, through a rhetorical lens, and Royster and Kirsch’s concept of social circulation. As Gee notes,

“when we interpret oral or written language in specific contexts of use, based on how language is designed and on context, we build webs of associations in our minds….We associate ideas or 28 themes with both the words we hear and the elements of the contexts we are in” (26). Huckin,

Andrus, and Clary-Lemon take this a step further by connecting it to theories of rhetoric while acknowledging that “Critical discourse analysis (CDA) is an interdisciplinary approach to textual study that aims to explicate abuses of power promoted by those texts, by analyzing linguistic/semiotic details in light of the larger social and political contexts in which those texts circulate” (107). The scholars offer several principles for CDA and this study focuses on the following “distinctive principles” (Huckin et al. 108):

• CDA addresses social problems.

• Discourse constitutes society and culture.

• The link between text and society is mediated.

• Discourse analysis is interpretative and explanatory.

• Discourse is a form of social action. (108)

CDA is a chosen framework for this type of analysis of music because it allows an interdisciplinary approach, while also working within rhetorical frameworks. The main features of CDA implemented in this research are the way “it facilitates the parallel analysis of multiple, multimodal, and historical texts…it provides a lens with which the researcher can coordinate the analysis of larger (macro) political/rhetorical purposes with the (micro) details of language”

(Huckin et al. 111). The study analyzes music in multiple ways, such as analyzing the lyrics of a song, the historical context and cultural events the song is responding to, the rhetorical strategies used to voice the message, the visual rhetoric used to convey messages, and the way musicians use social media, streaming services, and other domains, such as Spotify and YouTube, to distribute the music. This analysis is not about analyzing in a singular way, but through multiple facets to observe the connectivity of rhetorical strategies to produce a message of resistance to be 29 embraced by an audience. With this in mind, the multimodality of CDA becomes beneficial because “multiple modes of communication are not only available for analysis but also, from a

CDA perspective, crucially need analysis to understand the role they play in rhetorical manipulation” (Huckin et al. 121). In addition, CDA is an important framework for this research because it fills a void where other features tend to come up short with this type of analysis:

CDA brings to rhetoric and composition a number of important methodological features.

First and foremost is the importance of grounding a broad contextual perspective in

detailed textual analysis. Although rhet/comp also takes into account this macro/micro

dualism, it doesn’t always do so systematically or rigorously. Second, a defining feature

of CDA is its concern with issues of social justice and the abuse of power. Indeed, CDA

scholarship typically consists of theorizing and documenting such abuses, framed by a

democratic code of ethics. Although such a concern for the political and ethical exists as

well in rhet/comp (for example, in critical pedagogy), it is not a defining feature of the

field and therefore does not have readily available frameworks for exposition to the

degree that CDA does. Third, because power abuse is most often centered in institutions,

CDA routinely engages in institutional analysis—especially, powerful institutions such as

government, education, the law, or the mainstream news media. (Huckin et al. 123)

Ruth Feldstein’s “I Don't Trust You Anymore: Nina Simone, Culture, and Black Activism in the

1960s” is an example of this type of an analysis when the scholar analyzes the lyrics of

“Mississippi Goddam” to explore how Nina Simone emerged as a black activist during the Civil

Rights Movement.

Feldstein explores the flashpoint that occurred after the 16th Street Baptist Church

Bombing and how it impacted Simone’s work as an activist and her intentions behind 30

“Mississippi Goddam.” By analyzing interviews, performances, and other scholarship in addition to the lyrics of the song, Feldstein outlines the ways the bombing altered the course of Simone’s career and how the song is a result of that change in focus. “Unlike Simone’s earlier work (one critic had dubbed her a ‘supper club songstress for the elite’), ‘Mississippi Goddam’ was a political anthem. The lyrics were filled with anger and despair and stood in stark contrast to the fast-paced and rollicking rhythm” (Feldstein 1349). Feldstein does not only analyze the lyrics, but also the rhetorical situation, historical context, the way Simone pushed back against gender norms, and critiques “the process of canon formation that took place in the mid-1960s,” (1377), which “reinforced a myth that still persists: that authentic civil rights music in the period before

1965 meant rural, noncommercial, grass-roots, church-inspired freedom songs that were the sound track to the nonviolent movement” (1377).

CDA allows for this type of deeply analytical approach and criticism by using an integrated, interdisciplinary method to analyze activism in art involving power structures in place through governing bodies, political systems, movements of social justice, and emphasizing how these tensions play out in Western cultures in regards to cultural events. The availability of features focusing on the abuse of power, power structures, politics, social activism, and social justice makes CDA a framework that meshes well with the work of this dissertation and the following research questions are assessed during the evaluation process:

 How do musicians use music as a mode of resistance?

 What themes, patterns, and webs of association through rhetorical strategies are

present in this type of music used?

 What rhetorical strategies make the audience receptive to this type of resistance?

 How does this type of resistance differ from other modes of resistance? 31

 Are there differences between rhetorical strategies and themes depending on the

genre of music?

Method: Social Circulation

Royster and Kirsch’s concept of social circulation is utilized to tap into the ways technology and online social spaces are interrogated as complex rhetorical spaces that are multidimensional and add new levels of social activity and levels of engagement for musicians.

How do the rhetorical strategies of musicians differ and/or how do the responses to messages of resistance differ when the message is conveyed through online spaces? The impact of online spaces is important because of the way meaning is interpreted, distributed, and shared in these spaces. No longer must the audience guess or speculate about the meaning of the lyrics or what the lyrics are in the first place. Instead, technology has shifted the use of online spaces and made them resources for distribution. Now, musicians release music lyric videos on YouTube to clarify what lyrics are presented. Musicians will answer questions and engage with their fans through social media platforms to express the meaning of songs. The social interpretation of music expands to a bigger audience with less subjectivity because of the way music is circulated and how musicians intervene in social spaces online. According to Royster and Kirsch, this is an added benefit of the concept of social circulation:

In interrogations of feminist rhetorical practices in these sorts of ways, the concept of

social circulation functions as a metaphor to indicate the social networks in which women

connect and interact with others and use language with intention. These ever-vibrant,

interlinking social circles connect women not just across sociopolitical and cultural

contexts, settings, and communities—locally and globally—but also across generations,

across time, and across space. The idea of ever-shifting social circles pushes us to move 32

beyond the public-private dichotomy and beyond just calling attention to social networks.

Instead, we shift attention more dramatically toward circulations that may have escaped

our attention, that we may not have valued (and therefore neglected to study). (101)

The technological boom since the beginning of the twenty first century impacts the way we receive messages, engage in social activities, practice meaning-making, and convey messages. I argue there is a lag time in terms of the research and attention paid to how music exists and how musicians occupy these spaces. Analyzing music used to convey messages of resistance is not new, but the impact of online spaces, social circulation, and technology’s role in how music is received and perceived by the audience is an important facet to consider.

The work of “social circulation” relies on “linking these analyses in an informative and compelling way to forward a larger understanding of rhetoric as a cultural phenomenon and very much a human enterprise” (Royster and Kirsch 23) and it is an important component of analysis for this study to keep in mind feminist and decolonial practices as well. Royster and Kirsch’s framework embodies an approach to be “considered within a thickly rendered social, political, economic, cultural context” (23) and social circulation is useful as a rhetorical tool of analysis:

With the concept of social circulation, our move is also to disrupt the public-private

divide by suggesting a more fully textured sense of what it means to place these women

in social space, rather than private space or public space. We flesh out the contours of

social spaces (communities of various kinds, including professional communities, activist

communities, and the like) so that we can see, hear, and understand more ecologically the

contours of both women’s public lives and their private challenges. In other words, we

need to make more visible the social circles within which they have functioned and

continue to function as rhetorical agents. (24) 33

I argue that music has always disrupted the separation of public and private by allowing musicians to engage in meaning-making, social, and rhetorical activities that not only call for interpretation from listeners, but allows listeners to engage in a shared, social experience.

Therefore, music becomes cultural, rhetorical, and interactive. As Feld reminds, “music has a fundamentally social life. It is made to be consumed - practically, intellectually, individually, communally - and it is consumed as symbolic entity” (2). In order to consume music, it must also be circulated, shared, engaged, and interpreted by different people. Therefore, music is “socially interpreted as meaningfully structured, produced, performed, and displayed by varieties of prepared, invested, or otherwise historically situated actors. How does this happen? What does it mean? How can one know about it” (Feld 2)? Royster and Kirsch are useful in investigating the how of the study’s main research questions in regards to the way technology offers more spaces for music to be used as a mode of resistance and further disrupts the disconnect between private and public spaces. The concept of social circulation allows for the following considerations:

 How do musicians use digital spaces to speak?

 How are these spaces negotiated and what is permitted within them?

 How does circulation and online distribution alter the space and rhetorical

strategies allotted to musicians using music as a mode of resistance?

With this in mind, this research surveys the rhetorical strategies of resistance through music in different genres, how this type of resistance is carried out by musicians online, how it is interpreted by the audience, and the impact it has on cultural events and movements. This type of analysis takes multiple lens and disciplines in order to focus in on themes, patterns, and associations that connect the musician, the music, the listener, and the idea of activism that affects cultural trends and norms. 34

Through the use of CDA and social circulation, three main research questions are studied to investigate the way music is used as a mode resistance, what makes it effective, and how different genres utilize rhetorical strategies in order to research the rhetoric of music that is used as a mode of resistance. The following chart outlines these questions in connection with the method of collection and analysis it pertains to for the study: 35

Table 1

Research Questions and Correlating Methods

Research Questions Methods of Data Methods of Data Analysis Collection How do musicians in  Spotify Playlists  Applying the Criteria for Song different genres use music  YouTube for Music Selection as a mode of resistance? Videos and  Critical Discourse Analysis Performances  What themes, patterns,  Social Media Posts and webs of association  Artists Interviews through rhetorical strategies are present in this genre of music used? What rhetorical strategies  Spotify Playlists  Critical Discourse Analysis are at play and are there  YouTube for Music  Are there differences differences depending on Videos and between rhetorical the genre of music? Performances strategies and themes  Artist Interviews depending on the genre of  Social Media Posts music?  Music Videos  Social Circulation  What rhetorical strategies make the audience receptive to this type of resistance?  How does this type of resistance differ from other modes of resistance? What role does technology  Spotify Playlists  Social Circulation play in how musicians  YouTube for Music  How do musicians use communicate messages of Video and Performances digital spaces to speak? resistance through music  Online Interviews  How are these spaces to their audience?  Social Media Posts negotiated and what is  Appearances in Popular permitted within them? Culture and Media  How does circulation and online distribution alter the space and rhetorical strategies allotted to musicians using music as a mode of resistance? 36

Criteria for Song Selection and Data Collection

In order to conduct this type of data analysis, I use the following four criteria: Time

Frame, Key Events and/or Cultural Moments, Popularity and Visibility, and Resistant. The criteria build off of prior criteria from my past research and expand to involve more parameters and options for song selection. Each criterion has its own set of required questions to filter songs through in order to qualify them for the study and these questions are outlined in the chart below:

Table 2

Criteria for Song Selection

Criteria Questions to Set Parameters  Was the song original released in 2016 - 2018? Time Frame  Was a remake, cover, or re-imagined version of the song released in 2016 - 2018?

 Does the song respond to a cultural moment, current event, social movement, or other event in society Key Events and/or Cultural receiving significant attention or focus? Moments  Is the song popular enough to be visible to more than a niche following? This criteria includes at least one of the following:  Over 1 Million YouTube Views  On a Top 100 Chart Popularity and Visibility  On a Featured Playlist on Spotify or other Streaming Platform  Trending on a Social Media Platform, such as Twitter  Featured in a Film, TV Show, or Commercial

 Is the song a form of overt resistance?  Does the song involve a social critique, commentary, Resistant or call to action of some sort against a power structure or institution? 37

The criteria help to overcome major issues with bias toward a certain musician, song, or genre and enable the selected songs to be based on qualifications and parameters set up prior to the analysis. An example of how this criteria works is with the song “Racists” by Anti-Flag. The song falls within three of the four criteria because it was released in September 2017, responds to racist rhetoric and the use of it by political leaders like Steve Bannon, and is resistant due to being a social critique of Americans that do not understand movements against discrimination.

However, it does not meet the requirement for popularity and visibility. The song did not top music charts, is not featured at the time of analysis on major playlists or referenced in popular culture, and the music video has just over 350,000 views. So, while “Racists” is a song of resistance from a band intentionally using their music as a mode of resistance, it is not a song that will be selected for this study.

Table 3

Selected Songs for the Study

Rock/Alternative Rap/Hip Hop Country Pop

“Thought Contagion” “This is America” “Before He “Chained to the Muse Childish Gambino Tweets” Carrie Rhythm” Underwood and Katy Perry Brad Paisley

“thoughts and “The Storm” “Vote Em Out” “Burn the House prayers” Eminem Willie Nelson Down” grandson AJR 38

The songs not only fit the above criteria, but also represent an array of responses and differing rhetorical strategies. Some songs rely more on visual rhetoric, such as the case of Childish

Gambino’s “This is America,” while others rely solely on lyrics, like Eminem’s “The Storm.”

Some of the songs target a specific type of political or social activism, like the way “thoughts and prayers” targets mass shootings and gun culture, “Chained to the Rhythm” responds to low voter turnout, and “Vote Em’ Out” is a call to action for Americans to use their voices and power to vote out politicians they oppose. Others focus on general dissatisfaction with current power structures, like “Thought Contagion” and “Burn the House Down.” In the case of “Before He

Tweets,” Underwood and Paisley respond to recent tweets from President Trump by changing the lyrics to Underwood’s popular song “Before He Cheats.” In each case, the songs represent overt resistance in different forms, which makes them the selected sample for the study.

The following four chapters of the dissertation are each dedicated to a genre with two songs analyzed per genre and chapter. The chapters include pertinent background information about the genre and musicians studied, the historical context, and kairos involved in the timing of the songs’ releases. This stage of the analysis includes interviews from the musicians, brief overviews of the current events at the time, and information about the creation of the song necessary to comprehending the meaning. A lyrical analysis is conducted as well as a brief analysis of any significance in the sound of the songs. While the study mainly emphasizes lyrics of resistance and the underlying rhetoric, analysis of the sound is conducted on a case-by-case basis depending on the importance of the sound to the song and genre. In addition, the rhetorical analysis of each song involves visual rhetoric and the way the song is represented in other forms, such as music videos or live performances. The analysis of the songs concludes by identifying 39 patterns, trends, webs of association, and correlations between the songs as modes of resistance and the genres they are situated in overall.

Limitations and Biases

Reflecting on my biases and limitations as a researcher enabled the creation of the criteria for the study. However, there are other limitations and biases to consider before proceeding. As an African American woman, I am interested in resistant discourses because I am invested in the way rhetoric can be used to change the trajectory of a culture and shift societal norms in favor of or against systematic oppression of groups of peoples due to race, gender, etc. Throughout the history of the United States, there have been patterns in how resistance is carried out and how oppressed peoples overcome power structures in places that silence and stifle. I am interested in the rhetoric of resistance because I believe just as it is important to understand how dangerous rhetoric and propaganda can work against a group of people, it is important to understand how rhetoric can work for groups of people. Analyzing this in the form of music as a tool was not my original intent, but as an avid listener of rock and alternative music, I started to realize how these patterns of resistance seep into music as well. By seeping into music, resistance seeps into popular culture and I argue that is when resistance becomes impactful on a grand scale, when it shifts from niche to mainstream.

There are a few other acknowledgments that are necessary to recognize as well. First, this research focuses on music that targets English-speaking audiences. This limitation is due to my lack of proficiency in other languages besides English. While I appreciate music from different languages, my lack of proficiency would not allow me as a researcher to do justice to an in-depth analysis of lyrics from non-English speaking musicians and the shared interpretation of meaning- making throughout the process. 40

Second, this study embraces the subjective nature of music and its dependence on social interpretation. While music is widely accepted as a universal mode of art and humanly organized sound that is embraced around the world, each person has a different taste in music, values music to different degrees, and appreciates music in a variety of ways. As a result, this study does not stake a claim in the quality of music or its value in a particular society. This is important due to a pattern in past research involving music, especially Western music, being used as a way to argue for and praise the sophistication of Western music compared to other types of music all over the world. Blacking’s research warns of this type of valuing and stigmatizing of music in How

Musical Is Man? and I am mindful of the implications of placing music in dichotomies of high and low art. Instead, this study emphasizes how music works rhetorically. In addition, this research is rooted in Westernized versions of culture that at times rely on patriarchal and colonized systems. Overcoming this issue is difficult, but the focus remains on what the musicians intend the music to mean, what the listener believes it to mean, how the message is distributed, and what rhetorical strategies are in place.

Finally, I am a social activist that continues to focus on studies of culture and rhetoric involving politics. However, the aim of this research is not to attack or smear a particular administration or president, but to study how musicians respond in times of tension politically, socially, and culturally. This type of research has been conducted in the past, especially from the

Civil Rights Movement, which has been used as a case study on multiple occasions to survey how musicians use music as resistance. However, the goal of this research is to look at current examples in order to analyze how music plays a role in the twenty-first century as a mode of resistance. The music of artists across the political spectrum is interrogated and the political ideologies involved are part of the analysis on a case-by-case basis. 41

It is useful to study this current tension politically and culturally while living in this flashpoint and its aftermath because it factors into the response and context. For example, studying Nina Simone now that she is revered as the High Priestess of Soul and has been inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame is quite different from studying her music while she was being exiled and blackballed in the music industry starting in the 1960s. Distance and time allow for contexts to change and rhetoric to evolve, but the goal is to think about how in times of tensions, when people are outraged, and the nerve is still raw, musicians convey messages of resistance. Part of the power of musicians is in their ability to say and convey messages that others are ostracized for immediately. Studying this while living in a particularly tense political moment is productive because it gives observations rooted in present contexts. My passion for music, activism, and popular cultures do not work against me in this way, but for me, as long as I stick to the criteria and parameters detailed in this chapter. 42

CHAPTER III: THE GENRE OF ROCK AND ALTERNATIVE MUSIC

The history of rock and alternative as a genre is a complicated, intersectional, and often romanticized history of eras long lost, but not forgotten. When viewed as a whole, the genre is situated in the UK and the US most often with scholarship focusing on the 1960s-1990s. Rock is

The Sex Pistols, David Bowie, and The Clash. Rock is Nirvana during the Grunge Era, but the genre has always had aspects of colonial practices and often plays a role in perpetuating the problematic power structures of the music industry. Elvis Presley is regarded as the “King of

Rock and Roll,” but “The King” didn’t create or invent the genre. Presley was not the first to perform and compose rock music, but he was one of the first popular white artists to perform in the genre. As pointed out in a 2014 article in The Atlantic, “Elvis was innovative, popular, influential, and a great performer. But he didn't invent anything. By the time Elvis showed up at

Sun Records, numerous other performers like Ike Turner, Ruth Brown, Ray Charles, Big Mama

Thornton, and Fats Domino had already released early rock songs. Nor did Elvis make the music popular. While rock initially was black music, with a limited profile among white audiences, by the early 1950s it was achieving widespread success” (Berlatsky). At the same time, it is important to acknowledge Elvis’s performativity and how colonial thought played a role in his popularity and iconic status today. Elvis “put on the cultural forms of blackness” (Berlatsky) and

“absorbed as much ‘blackness’ as possible to embark on the popular trends of musical hipness and as much ‘whiteness’ as necessary to cater to the consciousness of the majority” (Berlatsky), which is one way the case of Elvis Presley embodies the genre of rock.

By the 1970s, rock had an identity crisis leaving many fans of the genre wondering about its views on racism, discrimination, and hate speech, especially with the faces of the genre continuously behaving in racist ways: 43

Rock Against Racism (RAR) was formed in 1976 in response to racist sentiments

expressed by rock stars Eric Clapton, who declared his support for xenophobic politician

Enoch Powell, and David Bowie, who was using fascist iconography, while stating

publicly that he believed ‘Adolf Hitler was one of the first rock stars.’ (Quoted in

Playboy magazine, April 1975). Responding to a concert in which Eric Clapton

announced that he wanted to “keep Britain white” and reiterated his support for Powell,

the founders of RAR wrote letters to several British music magazines which stated their

intention to form an anti-racist movement through music. (Roberts and Moore 25)

Subgenres were soon created with versions of punk leading the way. The history of rock and roll as a genre is complex and mainstream rock often taps into country, rap, blues, R&B, and pop genres, which is why it is fitting to attach “alternative” to the genre to describe contemporary rock music.

While still viewed as an industry dominated by predominantly white bodies and faces, the genre is also known for embracing resistance and rebellion. Bands like Rage Against the

Machine and Nirvana routinely used their music to address political issues, corrupt systems of power, and rape culture with songs such as “Killing in the Name” and “Polly” in the 1990s.

Currently, bands like Muse and artists like grandson lead the helm in using their music as resistance in an industry that still struggles to address systematic discrimination. Like much of the mainstream music industry, the genre of mainstream rock tends to only “rebel” when it is trendy and convenient to do so, but some artists are successful in standing out and are even popular because of the political tones to their music. So the question becomes, how are these contemporary artists creating resistance through music in an industry still dictated by Western 44 ideals and power structures? In order to analyze this question, this study focuses on a band and artist in the genre, Muse and grandson.

Muse and “Thought Contagion”

As an alternative-rock band, Muse is consistent in releasing messages of resistance through political albums, such as The Resistance, The 2nd Law, Drones, and Simulation Theory.

Established as a group in the United Kingdom in 1994, the band consists of lead singer Matthew

Bellamy, bassist Chris Wolstenholm, and drummer Dominic Howard. Throughout the decades,

Muse has critiqued capitalism and the consumption of technology in songs like “The 2nd Law:

Unsustainable,” questioned the validity of military tactics, the treatment of soldiers, and drone technology in “Psycho” and “The Handler,” and encouraged resistance to corrupt government and power structures with songs like “Uprising” and “Take a Bow.” The 2018 album Simulation

Theory focuses on the rise of populism, the danger of propaganda, and the spread of false information through technology and media with songs such as “Propaganda,” “Pressure,” and

“Algorithm.” One of the band’s most overtly political singles from the album is “Thought

Contagion,” which Bellamy says is inspired by the election of U.S. President Donald Trump, the

U.K.’s vote to exit the European Union, and the spread of right-wing populism.

As a selected song, “Thought Contagion” meets all four criteria for this study. Its

February 2018 single release falls into the time frame. The song responds to a key event and cultural moment, the U.S. Presidential Election and Brexit vote in the U.K. At the time of analysis, the song was streamed over 33 million times by Spotify users and the music video received almost 21 million views on YouTube, making it visible and popular by the standards of the study. Most importantly, it is resistant due to its political messages and dire warnings about the future of society and civilization. 45

Historical Context and Kairos for “Thought Contagion”

As a band, Muse continues to release albums responding to cultural and sociopolitical moments. The 2nd Law was released during the Occupy Wall Street Movement in the United

States. Drones was released after Bellamy attended a White House Correspondents’ Dinner and had a conversation with Colin Powell about the use of drones in war zones, so it is no surprise that the band returns with Simulation Theory to challenge hive mind mentality and the spreading of false information through technology and media. During an interview with Rolling Stone in

2018, Bellamy made the inspirations for the album clear. “We’re living in an age where these sort of ideologies, people’s belief systems, whether they are true or false, are getting a lot of air time, especially ones on the false side. I think that we’re living in an unusual period where a lot of airtime is being given to crazy ideas” (Greene). “Thought Contagion” was inspired by this notion and the spread of fanaticism, which the band considers part of the issue with supporters of

President Trump. In an interview with Tom Connick of NME, Bellamy explains the focus for the single:

If you spend a few hours watching American news, well, that’s where the first part of the

song came from really. It’s kinda like some strange bubble where they’re all living up

Trump’s bum, basically… It gets inside your mind. I think that’s where the song came

from really. You start walking round worrying about things that you wouldn’t normally

think about and so the song came from that. How other people’s ideas can kinda take

over your own if you’re not careful.

The song is rooted in political messages after the U.S. Presidential Election, but also focuses on the spread of propaganda and falsehoods around the world. With so much media, social media, 46 and information consumed by the masses through technology, “Thought Contagion” is a response to the current political climate of the West.

Critical Discourse Analysis for “Thought Contagion”

Like with all songs analyzed for the study, Critical Discourse Analysis is important due to the focus on emphasizing lyrics as a type of text connecting the song to the cultures and historical moments the artists situate themselves in. This is most certainly the case with Muse, who has a reputation for being outspoken about political movements, revolutions, and theories of culture. Muse’s reputation as a band is based on their unapologetically political approach to their music, leaving little room for interpretation in the messages and intentions of the music. The same is true with “Thought Contagion” and even the title has a specific concept in mind. “The clue is in the title, ‘Thought Contagion’. I first heard about it from a Richard Dawkins book years ago actually, it’s this idea that thoughts are contagious – they spread like a virus, or like genes” (Connick). The song begins with a sinister, 1980s horror track that brings to mind

Twilight Zone mashing together with Michael Jackson’s “Thriller,” all while being situated in an alternative rock motif. This is evident in the music video for the single as well, which taps into

1980s popular culture. The sound is rooted in an eerie, suspense-building opening that sets the tone from the beginning and the lyrics deliver the same message:

Strung out falling from the big time

Welcome to the infinite black skies

Brain cleansed, fractured identity

Fragments and scattered debris

Thought contagion

Thought contagion 47

Fall down learn when to count it out

Prop me up before I black out

Withdraw before you're out of time

A clean slate and buried war crimes (Lines 1 - 10)

According to Bellamy, one verse captures the essence of the message. “The key line in the song is: ‘You’ve been bitten by a true believer/ You’re been bitten by someone who is hungrier than you/ You’ve been bitten by someone’s false beliefs.’ That summarizes what I’m trying to get at here” (Connick). This is evident in the lines that follow and what becomes one of the most political verses of the song:

Thought contagion

Thought contagion

They'll never do what you want them to

Give it up and watch them break through

It's too late for a revolution

Brace for the final solution (Lines 15- 20)

This is not the first time the band has mentioned revolutions in their music, but the message has changed. In past songs like “Uprising” and “Revolt,” the message is hopeful and a call to action as the band encourages listeners to let their voices be heard and mobilize in movements around the world. However, the rhetoric of “Though Contagion” is steeped in pessimism. What Muse would deem “the final solution” is never revealed in the song and instead, the eeriness of the sound is accompanied by the ambiguity of the final message as the song ends:

Strung out falling from the big time

Welcome to the infinite black skies 48

It's too late for a revolution

Brace for the final solution (Lines 29 - 32)

Social Circulation for “Thought Contagion”

As stated in Chapter Two, Royster and Kirsch’s concept of social circulation is utilized to tap into the ways technology and online social spaces are implemented to spread the messages of resistance from the musicians to the audience. Musicians tend to break down the “private-public dichotomy of social circles” (Royster and Kirsch 101) due to music’s ability to be experienced in a multitude of ways. Music can be an individual experience through speakers or headphones for a single listener. It can also be shared through social media, Spotify, and YouTube. Even before these modes of media and technology were available, music could be a shared experience with a larger audience in the form of a concert or live performance and the rhetorical strategies and moves during live performances are aspects of social circulation through the use of technology to connect online audiences with live concerts as well. Muse implements each avenue in different ways to circulate the messages of resistance in “Thought Contagion.” For fans of the band, access to messages, exclusive media, and the music video can be found on the band’s website,

Instagram, and other social media accounts. Muse has over a million followers on Instagram and the band often posts Instagram stories and messages about the lyrics of songs.

In addition to connecting with their audience through social media platforms, Muse has a

YouTube channel that goes beyond the traditional use of YouTube channels by artists. Not only does the channel include official music videos and lyric videos for new releases, but Muse posts videos explaining the meaning of the songs and behind-the-scenes videos for the making of their music videos. In a video posted March 26, 2018, Bellamy explains the purpose of the song by saying, “the meaning of the song ‘Thought Contagion’ is kind of about how other people’s 49 thoughts and ideas and beliefs can sometimes infect your mind and get into your head…and change the way you think yourself.”

Fig. 2. – Screenshot from Muse’s “Thought Contagion” music video.

The music video embraces the 1980s horror trope by including zombie-like dancers in the style of “Thriller” that run around the streets at night infecting anyone they can find. At the beginning, a young man is playing a video game on an arcade machine at night. As he continues playing, a young woman lures him into the street where she turns into a vampire-like creature and bites his neck. He tries to escape and is relieved to see the authorities and law enforcement as they arrive in tactical gear, appearing to take the woman away. However, as he limps toward them for help, they begin to dance with her and eventually make their way over to grab at him.

The music video ends with the words “Game Over” appearing on the arcade machine the young man now appears to be trapped inside as he screams. While the theme of thoughts being contagious is on full display in the music video, so is the fear of becoming immersed, isolated, and eventually trapped in technology, which is why the fate of the young man being captured in the arcade game is captured in a dynamic way through the visual rhetoric of the scene. The words “game over” are on plastered on the screen in the same way they would be for a video 50

Fig. 3. – Screenshot from the ending of Muse’s “Thought Contagion” music video. game, making the audience wonder at what point the music video turned into a video game simulation. This is fitting since the song is part of the Simulation Theory album, where the effects, capabilities, and consequences of technology are questioned.

The blurring of reality, delusion, and simulation is a theme throughout Simulation

Theory, in “Thought Contagion,” and within the band’s live performances during their world tour for the album as well. Muse became a valuable case to analyze for the study due to the timing of the release of their album and the beginning of their world tour. The rhetorical choices musicians make in terms of a set list, stage setup, and visual effects during concerts all become part of an overall message and rhetorical strategies to deliver to their audiences, so it was helpful to see a live performance of Muse in order to analyze the way the band represented the music, chose to present messages, and what types of visual rhetoric were relied on during the performance. I was able to attend the second stop on the Simulation Theory World Tour in

Dallas, Texas and entered the arena with a few questions in mind. Would the band perform its most political and resistant songs? If so, how would the songs be presented and represented rhetorically? 51

Fig. 4. – Photograph taken at Muse concert in Dallas on February 24, 2019.

Not only was “Thought Contagion” part of the performance, but so were many of Muse’s most resistant and political songs, such as “Psycho,” “Drill Sergeant,” “Uprising,” “Knights of

Cydonia,” “Propaganda,” and “The 2nd Law: Unsustainable.” One of the most fascinating visual elements of the concert was Muse’s revealing of the evil to be wary of, the mysterious entity, system, or Big Bad the band often alludes to throughout their songs but rarely shows as a tangible entity. In the past, Muse played on the ambiguity of a villain or dark force working behind the scenes, speaking more of systems, governments, and the powers that be without giving an idea of what the band sees as the true evil in the power structures or what that evil could create. However, after performing “Thought Contagion” and other songs about revolutions and resistance, the arena went dark. This was routine by this point in the show and was the third time the band used the darkness to transition in and out of intermission. As the audience sat in anticipation, trying to figure out which song would be next for the set, an eerie, high-pitched screech of a guitar echoed around the dark arena. Shadowy figures could be seen onstage as the stage began swaying. As soon as white, red, and blue strobe lights began flashing, a massive 52 alien-like robot emerged from behind the stage. For the rest of the concert, the robot hovered over the stage, slowly swiping its massive hands at the band as they pretended to dodge and fight back. Throughout the concert, the band hinted at what the creature would look like with blueprints of technology created by governments and eerie messages of technology taking over, which all accumulated in the final visual effect of technology consuming humans in ways often unintended and unseen until it is too late.

As a band, Muse continues to present calls to action and rhetoric of resistance through its music. Cultural movements and events in the West have changed Muse’s approach to no longer focus solely on capitalism and corrupt systems of power though. The spreading of misinformation through social media and technology is now a bigger concern of the band, along with the notions of populism taking an unexpected turn due to how technology impacts the way the rhetoric is spread and distributed. Bellamy argues how dangerous these can be in a radio interview with Dave Berry from Absolute Radio. “Information has become so readily accessible and popularized, so whoever gets the most likes or whatever gets the most attention. You know what I mean? And therefore, controversial stuff, or incorrect stuff, or false, crazy stuff ends up getting way more airtime than it ever used to across the board and that’s what defines our age slightly differently to say ten years ago” (Absolute Radio 2:32 - 2:54). This is the concern for the band, which is why “Thought Contagion” is a song with dire warnings and is spread to as many people as possible. It is an example of musicians using rhetoric through lyrics, visual rhetoric through music videos and live performances, and how social circulation distributes this form of resistance in rhetorically effective ways to an audience. 53 grandson and “thoughts and prayers”

Unlike Muse, who uses sustainability and popularity in the music industry as leverage in order to consistently send out resistant and, at times, controversial messages of resistance, grandson is a new artist in the genre who fully embraces music as a mode of resistance. As a case study of an artist, he is fascinating rhetorically due to his newfound popularity, rise in the industry, and short time in the spotlight. Often, newer artists tend to have less of an established reputation in the industry and do not look to stir up political controversy unless the label and studio sign off on the rhetoric involved. Fueled by Ramen is grandson’s label and is owned by

Warner Music Group. The music is then distributed by Atlantic Records. This is an important aspect of the music industry as a whole because of the way the power structure is set up. There are three music labels that own and control a majority of the music produced and distributed in a year. The three labels in charge, called The Big Three, are Sony BMG, Universal Music Group, and Warner Music Group. The labels own subsidiaries as well, like Fueled by Ramen, which often give the appearance to fans of certain musicians that they are not actually owned by a big company. In reality, The Big Three own a majority of mainstream music and control how it is produced, manufactured, and distributed. In this way, grandson’s ability to make a name as an artist through music of resistance is an interesting case study.

While Muse has been part of the rock and alternative music scene for over two decades and used their first albums to ease into producing more political and resistant music, grandson is making a name for himself with highly political singles such as “blood//water,” “war,” and

“thoughts and prayers.” This study analyzes “thoughts and prayers” because the song fits the criteria in interesting ways. The song is part of grandson’s EP, a modern tragedy vol. 1, which was released in 2018. It is an example of a song used as a theme for a social movement after a 54 tragic event in the U.S. and out of the songs selected for the study it is one of the most openly resistant to a specific issue. The question becomes, how is grandson able to create such a resistant song as a new artist without being silenced by a powerful label? The answer may rely on kairos in the timeliness of the message for the generations willing to embrace it and its significance for a social and political movement.

Historical Context and Kairos for “thoughts and prayers”

On February 14, 2018, Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School was attacked by a shooter in one of the largest mass shootings at a high school in the U.S. The tragedy occurred at a time when mass shootings were becoming regular occurrences, with the massacres in Las

Vegas and Sutherland Springs fresh on the public’s mind. The rhetoric accompanying these tragedies was under fire as well due to the often used condolences of “thoughts and prayers” many politicians and social media users posted in response. While “thoughts and prayers” as a reply was at first seen as a respectful way to give condolences and honor the victims, frustration began to build over how often the term was used and its hollow meaning. If all politicians were willing to do was give “thoughts and prayers” instead of enact stricter gun control bills and the closing of loopholes allowing the selling of semi-automatic weapons, was “thoughts and prayers” truly enough? This became the debate online and in news cycles, which makes it a fitting title for a song calling out the lack of action by the U.S. government and its political leaders. As Billboard’s Melinda Newman points out, “the song is a stinging indictment of politicians sending out their ‘thoughts and prayers’ to the victims of the Feb. 14 attack at

Marjory Stoneman Douglas high school and other mass shootings, while consistently resisting any attempt at meaningful gun reform.” The frustration and rise of social movements inspired grandson and he wrote “thoughts and prayers” as a way to respond to the moment he found 55 himself in as an artist. During an interview with OnestoWatch, grandson speaks about how shifts in politics and social movements in his generation shaped his perspective:

I think you have a responsibility to reflect the time that you’re writing that art in–

whatever medium it is. My favorite artists had a certain fearlessness, being their

willingness to confront difficult topics. To some extent, we are in a place now where we

don’t have the luxury of apathy, as influencers or artists. Kids these days, especially kids

in stricter environments, need that source of light and inspiration to let them know that’s

it okay. It’s okay to stand up to war, to stand up towards the authority figures that are

telling them the world has to be a certain way. It’s okay to love who you love, to believe

what you believe. Now, more than ever, we need artists to be willing to take steps to

facilitate those connections for their audiences.

The song stems from grandson’s belief in his duty as an artist and what he believes his duty is in his genre as well because “the responsibility of rock and roll is to provide a certain commentary, sense of urgency, sense of aggression. I’ve used music to say ‘this isn’t normal right now’”

(Newman).

The mass shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School and the rise of the group now known as “The Parkland Kids,” a group of survivors from the high school shooting who organized the movement March For Our Lives, inspired the music and created momentum for the song. The music became a theme song for the organization’s events in 2018 and grandson performed the song at an event, along with the West Los Angeles Children’s Choir in March that year. Kairos, the timeliness of the message, boosted its rhetorical power due to an audience, a generation and movement willing to embrace it. Kairos also played a role in the artist signing with Fueled by Ramen and the president of the label, Mike Easterlin says the label known for 56 signing bands like Paramore and Panic! At the Disco was “immediately drawn to grandson’s powerful union of art and activism. He’s an incredible artist carrying a powerful message and we saw how deeply that was resonating. grandson’s songs speak to a growing collective consciousness and we’re proud to stand behind such an inspiring vision” (Newman). Tapping into what appeals to the “collective” and what is popular and/or important at the moment is significant to music labels, especially the most powerful labels in the industry, so while messages of resistance may seem off-putting to the mainstream, they become songs to capitalize on when the audiences continue to go in search of them. It is a dynamic and balance the music industry plays off of and the rhetorical power of “thoughts and prayers” fits a call to action Fueled by

Ramen and Warner Music Group can back due to the amount of kairos at hand.

Critical Discourse Analysis for “thoughts and prayers”

The song itself is powerful, inspirational, and pointed in its use of rhetoric to spread a message of resistance and grandson makes it clear throughout the song that he wants to speak for a generation tired of mass shootings, gun violence, and desensitization to the tragedies. For the artist, the message is personal as someone who grew up in a generation accosted by mass shootings from a young age:

Grandson was 5 when the Columbine High School massacre happened in 1999. “I was in

university working in education when I heard about Sandy Hook,’” he says. “My

childhood, education and adult life have been marred by these violent, senseless

happenings and what I’ve noted is how we’ve become increasingly apathetic.” However,

he has not given up hope that the next generation will not grow up with the spectre of gun

attacks and as they embrace "thoughts & prayers," he believes the song can provide a

framework for a larger conversation. “This is so much bigger than me,” he says. “The 57

way these kids have stood up for the message. I want to help them along. We want to use

the opportunity to be a mirror to reflect them.” (Newman)

One way the musician helps the movement along is by including the voices of children in the song. Not only is it an inclusive move to remind the audience of the age of some of the victims involved and the people impacted, but by involving the West Los Angeles Children’s Choir in the actual song, grandson appeals to pathos and the feelings of vulnerability and innocence through the voices of the children as they open the song:

No thoughts, no prayers

Can bring back what's no longer there

The silent are damned

The body count is on your hands (Lines 1 - 4)

Unlike grandson’s other popular single, “blood//water,” a loud, screeching, rock song challenging adults to stand up to the government, “thoughts and prayers” relies on a quieter, almost haunting tune. “I juxtaposed the severity of the situation with an almost sing-song melody and incorporated the children” (Newman). When grandson enters the song, the artist begins by mocking press conferences and speeches politicians hold after mass shootings. “I wrote the song towards these politicians with transparent connections to the NRA and gun industry who trot out the tropes about ‘thoughts and prayers’ and do nothing time and time again from a legislative perspective,” (Newman):

Smile for the camera

Another politician bought

I swear I heard another shot

Cash another payment 58

Red all on the canvas

It's murder on the campus

Another press conference

Nothing gets accomplished

The suit is an accomplice

Money is the motive

The war is in the street

Watch history repeat (Lines 5 - 16)

In the theme of repetition, the chorus is then repeated three times with “No thoughts and no prayers/Can bring back what's no longer there/The silent are damned/The body count is on your hands.” grandson then gives examples of how the government refuses to enact stricter gun control laws and instead focuses on measures the artist believes will only add to the violence:

They lobby for the violence

It's a governmental shakedown

Welcome to my breakdown

Bulletproof backpacks

They wanna arm the teachers

I think I saw the reaper

Fear's good for profit

Deregulate the casket

They're lyin' to the masses

How much will it take

'Til you get buried in the coffin that you make? 59

Heaven's sake (Lines 29 - 40)

Repetition of the chorus three times is used again to drive home the message of “no thoughts, no prayers” and it is followed by one of the eeriest verses of the song. grandson does not only use the choir for the chorus. He implements the use of the voices of children and the sing-song melody to create a nursery rhyme with a verse. The verse is similar in cadence and rhythm to the children’s nursery rhyme “Ring Around the Rosy,” which many in his audience could be familiar with as a song. Instead of the original lyrics of the song, the children sing a haunting description of a mass shooting drill in schools.

Turn off all the lights, nobody make a sound

Ashes to ashes, we all fall down

Are we out of time?

Can we turn this all around?

Are we out of time?

Will we all fall? (Lines 53 - 58)

The words “all fall down” are then whispered by a child before grandson finishes the song with two messages. “The body count is on your hands” and “no thoughts, no prayers” are repeated until the song ends. The use of children’s voices, a nursery rhyme, and haunting silence drive home the message of the song and that these tragedies tend to include children and young people.

In addition, the use of the phrase “thoughts and prayers” as a repetitive message reminds the audience of how hollow the condolences are due to the dire situation and violence involved in these mass shootings, plus the frequency at which the message is spread. 60

Social Circulation for “thoughts and prayers”

There are three types of distribution of the song to consider in terms of social circulation, the involvement in a social movement, its performance during a March For Our Lives event, and the visual rhetoric of the official music video. When “thoughts and prayers” was first released, grandson made a point to sell limited edition merchandise on his website in order to promote the song along with the social movement. “All proceeds from the sale of “thoughts & prayers” limited edition merchandise available on grandson’s Bandcamp page will benefit the Youth For

Safety and Justice Fund” (Newman). After releasing the song online, he debuted it at a live performance, which took place prior to a March For Our Lives event in Los Angeles. The event included the children’s choir “whose members wore black t-shirts numbered 1-17 to represent the 17 students and teachers killed in the Parkland shooting” (Newman). By attaching the song to the movement, another level of social circulation took place as the song became exposed to a bigger audience, the media, and gained more attention, which Fueled by Ramen capitalized on.

“The same day, FBR rushed to get the song on Spotify’s New Music Friday. The next day, grandson and the choir performed the song along the March For Our Lives route in downtown

Los Angeles” (Newman). All of these events became part of the rhetorical strategies for distributing the song and its social circulation. Without the movement and moment at hand, the song’s popularity and visibility may not have been as significant.

In addition to attaching the song and performances to the social movement, the music video centers on mass shootings and gun violence as well. While many music videos rely on multiple images, scenes, and involve showing the artist, the music video for “thoughts and prayers” focuses solely on one graphic that changes as the video progresses. 61

Fig. 5. - Screenshot from grandson’s “thoughts and prayers” music video.

The graphic is a picture of the United States on a clean, white background. Beside it is an altered image of the American flag with red bullets instead of red stripes. The bullets are different sizes and the blue square only has two white X’s taking the place of white stars. As the music plays, black X’s mark up the map, representing mass shootings and events of gun violence throughout the country. The longer the song plays, the more marks appear, and the clean, white background of the country becomes tainted with a darker red.

By the time the music video ends, the once white, clean map of the United States is marked up with black X’s and steeped in dark red. At no point does grandson appear in the video, relying on the song and graphic to represent the rhetoric. At the time of analysis, the music video had over 2 Million views on YouTube with over 50,000 Likes and almost 4,000 comments. While comment sections on YouTube are rarely places for productive conversations and discourse, many of the comments engage in conversations about mass shootings, posting the lyrics that mean the most to the users, and sharing personal experiences with gun violence. One user commented, “As someone living in Colorado and knowing the DA who worked on the 62 movie theater shooting case, as well as family who went to school near Colombine, this song hit hard. Especially when I remember those few moments when all I knew was there was a school shooting in Florida and all I could think was, "Please, not my cousins." Which is selfish, I know, but in those heart stopping moments of terror you think of your family first. Turns out, they were only a school away.” The song “thoughts and prayers” is a rhetorically effective example of music used as a mode of resistance due to the social movement and events it accompanies, the inclusion of a children’s choir in the song, and the visual rhetoric of the music video.

Rhetorical Strategies for the Genre

Muse and grandson’s songs are two different, but impactful examples of music used as a mode of resistance in the genre of rock and alternative. Both rely on visual rhetoric, social circulation, and music videos to distribute the messages of resistance to their audiences. They also involve live performances with powerful meanings and representations of the lyrics. While

Muse relies on their reputation and clout in the music industry to spread messages of resistance as they please, grandson tapped into a social movement to attach his messages of resistance to and gain popularity. Both cases show the importance of technology as a main tool for distributing the messages and visually representing the rhetoric as well. So, what can these examples reveal about the rhetorical strategies prevalent in the genre of rock and alternative music in general?

Rock and alternative is a loud, rebellious genre, even mainstream rock, so it has multiple rhetorical strategies and means of persuasion available. Resistance and rebellion for the genre have taken on different meanings and interpretations throughout its history. What Elvis rebelled against is much different from the fights Muse and grandson are willing to pick. A theme or trope that makes contemporary music of resistance compelling rhetorically is the notion of white 63 faces as protagonists and antagonists. This is not generational in the sense of younger white musicians mocking the older generations of white people. Instead, Muse and grandson use white faces to embody oppression and control. Muse often depicts the conventional, white male as part of a corrupt system and grandson depicts the white, male face as a face of evil in some of his other music videos. Interestingly, both also use themselves to depict this in other videos.

Fig. 6. – Screenshot from Muse’s “Dig Down” music video.

Fig. 7. - Screenshot from grandson’s “blood//water” music video.

For Muse, a recurring figure is Bellamy’s face with slicked back hair, brainwashing glasses, and seemingly portraying a 1950’s style G-Man. A similar depiction is found in grandson’s “blood//water” music video, but while Bellamy is this character in Muse’s videos, 64 grandson plays a milk man who is part of the system. Muse does this by embodying the evil faces they warn about by depicting the white males in tidy suits with slicked back hair and glasses meant to lure unsuspecting victims in through brainwashing. Conversely, grandson uses visual rhetoric to depict a white, male face as the embodiment of corporations, lobbyists, and powerful officials willing to sacrifice children and the masses for greed and power. Muse and grandson are different in approach, popularity, and status in the industry, and yet it is difficult to ignore the identity politics, access, and spaces for speaking out white males are privileged to in the genre and music industry as a whole.

In addition, the issue of gender in the genre is a point of contention for many of the female bands, artists, and popular faces of the genre. While analyzing the genre as a whole, it was clear that men still are the faces representing the genre in the mainstream media. Even though they are not the sole faces of the genre, the representations and imagery of rock and alternative music tend to be men. Out of the 28 images for playlists on Spotify representing the genre, only 3 of those images were women at the time of this study. In Can You Deal?, a group of female artists from the genre bring attention to this issue by contributing excerpts, artwork, or narratives about their experiences in the industry in terms of the treatment of women. Hayley

Williams, the lead singer of Paramore, used her section to speak about being a female lead in a punk rock band. “It took me a while to realize that my microphone was powerful. It took me even longer to realize that in my own femininity, there was also power. Never did it occur to me that seeing a female behind a microphone could be seen as a threat” (Williams 23). Williams has faced controversy over the years for being the lead of the band and is often blamed for band members leaving Paramore over the years, even though members leaving the music industry or a band is quite normal. When the Farro Brothers left the band, many fans and people in the 65 industry blamed Williams and suggested she could not handle leading her own band due in part to her being a woman in a predominantly male band. Williams often speaks about how her ability to lead has been questioned and she was offered chances to go solo as an artist instead, but refused. In the book, she recounts the times she tried to downplay her femininity, struggled with her appearance, and how long it took her to embrace her identity as a woman long after

Paramore became a mainstream name in the industry. “At some point, I realized that whether or not I could change the whole game, I had to change the way that I existed within it. So, I stopped apologizing for being female and started accepting all the power and responsibility that comes along with it” (Williams 23).

The genre of rock and alternative has a very complex, complicated history with gender and race. The way contemporary artists in the genre address these issues is not often studied, but there are certain rhetorical strategies offered in the genre based on identity politics. Even in subgenres of rock and alternative, such as punk, a trend in privilege, access, gender, and race begins to form. In “Suburban American Punks and the Musical Rhetoric of Green Day’s ‘Jesus of Suburbia’,” Chuang and Hart survey the themes and types of rebellion found in the subgenre of punk. “Boredom of middle-class life and ideals, self-marginalization, rebellion against order, search for authenticity, and anticorporate attitudes appeared as prominent themes in studies conducted on punk…Punk ideals appeared as the opposite of American suburban ideals of conformity, success based on affluence, and assimilation” (Chuang and Hart 185.) However, these themes often are situated in places of socioeconomic and racial privilege, while also ignoring the gendered strategies forced upon artists in the genre. Rock and alternative as a genre is willing to embrace rebellion as a trope, but often with the stipulation that those resisting look like the status quo and can help the labels in power capitalize off of the resistance at hand. 66

Within their music, Muse and grandson seem to at the very least be aware of these issues of identity politics and play on them to send out their messages of resistance. 67

CHAPTER IV: THE GENRE OF RAP AND HIP HOP

While the genre of rock and alternative is embraced for its raucous, rebellious messages of resistance, the history of the genre of rap and hip hop is full of clashes with the music industry and the U.S. justice system. In order to analyze the music in the genre of rap and hip hop, it is imperative to first consider the deeply rooted tensions historically in the genre with these two systems of power. Since its rise in popularity in the 1980s, the genre has faced pushback by the mainstream music industry. As Matthew Oware states, the genre became a movement for young people, especially people of color, because “the budding hip hop movement could draw upon what they saw happening in their communities in their music” (32). Rap and hip hop as a genre was created to voice unfair living conditions in the inner city, police brutality, and the corrupt justice system viewed by many rap artists as being in place to keep people of color under the control of the government. “Rap music is a medium that helps inner-city residents express their anxiety, fear, hope, and joy. Quite surprisingly, one of the more popular musical forms of our time was born out of urban abandonment and deterioration at the exact moment when creative and imaginative juices bubbled among inhabitants of the Bronx” (Oware 23).

Like all of the genres studied, the history is complex and nuanced, especially in terms of the genre’s use of rhetoric. However, rap and hip hop stems from a different type of rebellion or resistance than rock and alternative music. While mainstream rock is represented by white males speaking of revolutions, rebellion, systems of power, and political and social movements, the genre of rap and hip is embodied by narratives of harsh urban and inner-city life voiced by predominantly black artists. It is a complicated genre because resistance can come in the form of racially charged lyrics, depictions of violence, and problematic narratives that often perpetuate stereotypes of African American cultures. However, what is often overlooked is how rap and hip 68 hop embodies its own version of cultures, tethered to the narratives and experiences of people of color in urban neighborhoods, but embodying far more in poetic lyrics and resonating messages.

Rap is rhythm and poetry. It is Nas and his “One Mic.” It is an angry call to action and a middle finger in the air as N.W.A. tells the listener to “Fuck tha Police.”

Rap can also be misogynistic and homophobic. It is a genre where A Tribe Called Quest can encourage American citizens to rise up with songs like “We the People” while also objectifying women’s bodies in the music video for the song. Rap and hip hop is a rhetorically challenging genre at times, but it is also one of, if not, the most resistant:

In her seminal monograph, Black Noise, Tricia Rose writes that rap music “…is the

central cultural vehicle for open social reflection on poverty, fear of adulthood, the desire

for absent fathers, frustrations about male sexism, female sexual desires, daily rituals of

life as an unemployed teen hustler, safe sex, anger, violence, and childhood memories.” 8

She continues that the music simultaneously offers “…innovative uses of style and

language…and ribald storytelling.”9 Albeit often saturated with misogynistic, sexist,

hyperviolent, homophobic, and hypermasculine themes, rap artists quite often articulate

subversive, creative, political and sometimes contradictory messages, in their music.

Moreover, record companies and market forces may dictate, temper, or mute what artists

express in their songs. (Oware 3)

The genre’s negotiations with the music industry and mainstream media are an important aspect of what makes it popular, resistant, and groundbreaking. It is a genre regularly taking on The Big

Three and the industry while providing political and social commentary against a justice system openly trying to silence and hinder it from the beginning of its creation. Rap and hip hop plays out like a microcosm for the tension between the African American community and institutions 69 of power in the U.S. Rap artists often remind of the ways the government segregates neighborhoods, funnels drugs into them, creates harsh living conditions, and then works to gentrify those same neighborhoods when an opportunity to profit arises. These artists voice concerns about police brutality and often call out the murder of black men and women in their streets in unjust manners. For example, at the time of this study, a group of rap artists decided to use their platforms to speak out against the way African Americans are treated by the justice system and accused the system of using the genre against people of color in order to win court cases. According to CNN’s Veronica Stracqualursi, “several famous rappers are urging the US

Supreme Court to take up a case involving a Pittsburgh rapper and whether his song lyrics are protected under the First Amendment.” The filing is significant because it puts a spotlight on the way rap artists believe political statements in the form of songs and the genre in general are interpreted, analyzed, and stigmatized by the mainstream media and government. “A person unfamiliar with what today is the nation's most dominant musical genre or one who hears music through the auditory lens of older genres such as jazz, country, or symphony, may mistakenly interpret a rap song as a true threat of violence and may falsely conclude a rapper intended to convey a true threat of violence when he did not” (Stracqualursi). The case of Jamal Knox v. The

Commonwealth of Pennsylvania focuses on the way rap lyrics are used in court cases and how the rhetoric may be construed to the audience. In the legal briefing, the artists request the

Supreme Court investigate if Knox, also known as Mayhem Mal, had his constitutional right to freedom of speech infringed upon during the ruling. Knox is currently in prison for two years and one charge is for “terroristic threats and witness intimidation stemming from the song “Fuck the Police,” which is a nod to the popular N.W.A. single. One verse includes the lyrics, “Let's kill these cops cuz they don't do us no good,” along with other violent descriptions of killing 70 police officers. The song was used against Knox in court and officers argued the song was a direct threat. According to the filing, the rappers argue that the context, history, and genre of rap must be taken into account to understand why the lyrics and personas represented in the song are not actual threats to officers:

Amici seek to put rap music, which is a heavily stigmatized form of expression

associated with negative stereotypes and often subject to misinterpretation, in the context

of the history and conventions of the genre. The poetic nature of rap lyrics requires

analysis of the multi-layered meanings attributable to such lyrics, viewed through the lens

of the intended audience. Amici thus urge the Court to view rap music, through which the

alleged threats in this case were purportedly communicated, as not only a form of artistic

expression but as political expression that falls well within the scope of activity protected

by the First Amendment. (Spiro and Thompson)

The filing uses previous court cases and examples of songs in the genre to show how the lyrics should be protected under the First Amendment. Historically, the genre has often clashed with law enforcement and the justice system, which makes the 2019 case integral in terms of exploring what types of rhetoric of resistance are allowed in the genre and how music is viewed as expression and freedom of speech.

While the genre of rap and hip hop is used in conflicts with the government and issues of freedom of speech through rap lyrics, it also often clashes within the music industry. This can be seen in the history of the genre and the industry’s award show, the Grammys. In 1989 many rap artists boycotted the Grammys and accused the industry of trying to diminish the popularity and rise of the genre during the award show due to the awarded categories being announced during commercial breaks. As Joe Coscarelli examines, “the Grammys’ relationship with rap has 71 progressed in fits and starts, with the awards often going to the anodyne — most recently in

2014, when the white rapper Macklemore won in three of four current rap categories over Mr.

Lamar. Last year, the televised ceremony featured no rap awards for the first time in 25 years. In

1989, ‘to put it bluntly, a lot of the Grammy committee was 60-year-old white men that didn’t understand this brand-new genre,’ Jazzy Jeff recalled” (Coscarelli). While issues of racism, sexism, and the music industry’s inability to grapple with the resistant nature of the genre continue, progress continues to be made. For example, Childish Gambino won Record of the

Year, Song of the Year, and Best Rap/Sung Performance at the 2019 Grammy Awards for “This is America.” With this historical context in mind, it is important to analyze the way musicians in the genre tap into rhetorical strategies and implement them to send messages of resistance during times of tension and crisis. In many cases, not only must the artists be cognizant of the response of the audience, but aware of very critical justice systems listening as well.

Childish Gambino and “This is America”

This study focuses on two songs and popular rap artists in order to analyze the rhetorical strategies at play. Eminem represents an older era of the genre by implementing rhetorical strategies popular in the early 2000s and is an intriguing case study of a white artist in a predominantly black genre. Childish Gambino represents the contemporary approaches in the genre. “This is America” fits the criteria of this study in different ways and the main focus will be on the visual rhetoric involved in the provocative music video and its social circulation. “This is America” was released in 2018 as a social commentary to violence and culture clashes in the

U.S. The music video is the most controversial and jarring example of visual rhetoric in the study and has over 510 Million views at the time of analysis. The music video is deeply rhetorical and critiques racial stereotypes about the entertainment value and commodification of black bodies. 72

Historical Context and Kairos for “This is America”

One aspect of what makes the song so jarring is how it does not directly stem from or respond to one cultural movement or event. Instead, it is a commentary about the current climate and state of America as a whole. While it does not necessarily correlate with a specific event to create a sense of kairos, the readiness of the audience, tension of the political era, and cultural shifts make way for timeliness in the message. It is impactful because it is startling. It is startling because it hits close to home in terms of recognizing how desensitizing and violent news cycles and social media can be. Childish Gambino, who is also an actor, director, and writer as Donald

Glover, plays off of the tension in a particular era, while unapologetically challenging his rhetorical strategies to be critiqued. Doing so not only begins a conversation about race, the glorification of violence, and black bodies solely for entertainment purposes in the U.S., but also the double standards of how society and cultures view violence, racism, and entertainment as long as it is deemed comfortable to do so.

Critical Discourse Analysis for “This is America”

The lyrics and overall message of resistance in the song are nothing out of the ordinary in the genre. In fact, “This is America” is quite tame compared to many controversial rap and hip hop songs loaded with triggering rhetoric to get the attention of the audience. The song sparingly uses profanity and plays more as a catchy, summertime chart-topper. At times, it is even quite lighthearted in tone:

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah

Yeah, yeah, yeah, go, go away

We just wanna party

Party just for you 73

We just want the money

Money just for you

I know you wanna party

Party just for me

Girl, you got me dancin' (yeah, girl, you got me dancin') (Line 7-15)

Even the chorus refrains from going into much detail or tapping into resistant rhetoric with descriptive lyrics. Instead, it simply states “This is America/Don't catch you slippin' up/Don't catch you slippin' up/Look what I'm whippin' up.” However, as the song continues, references are made to popular materialistic values, entertainment, dances, and while not overtly critical, the tone becomes a bit mocking of trends and fads in consumerism and popular culture with lyrics like “Look what I'm whippin' up (Slime!)/This is America” (Line 59). Slime is in reference to the internet and YouTube trend of slime videos where YouTube creators show their audience how to make the substance and engage in challenges with it. Videos of this nature became wildly popular on the platform starting in 2017 and continue to be a focus for creators with children in their target audience. The overall use of the reference in the song appears to mock the general concept of popular, trendy, and at times, frivolous content online for entertainment purposes and how entertainers who may not even be interested in the trend engage with it to please their audiences. Another repeated reference to materialism in the song emphasizes the importance to

“get your money, black man,” while also pointing out the level of fetishism, commodification, and dehumanization that occurs in the process:

Grandma told me, "Get your money," black man

Get your money, black man (black man)

Get your money, black man (black man) 74

Get your money, black man (black man)

Black man

You just a black man in this world

You just a barcode, ayy

You just a black man in this world

Drivin' expensive foreigns, ayy

You just a big dawg, yeah

I kenneled him in the backyard

No proper life to a dog

For a big dog (Line 92 - 104)

For Childish Gambino, notions of what is trending, popular, and done for entertainment purposes become a cautionary tale about the way black bodies are used, viewed, and treated in American cultures and mainstream media. So, while the song is not the most obviously resistant in the genre or in the study, it does set up the visual rhetoric of the music video to become one of the most overtly resistant songs in 2018.

Social Circulation for “This is America”

As a music video, “This is America” is one of the most impactful and stirring videos of

2018 due to its violent content, shock value, and litany of hidden and coded messages about violence, racism, and the history of discrimination in America. The four-minute video is packed with shocking imagery, loaded messages of resistance, and poignant moments that shocked many viewers. When the video was published on YouTube on May 5, 2018, it immediately garnered attention and started conversations. Not only did media outlets cover the music video and its meaning, but analyzing the messages in the video became a popular trend on YouTube. Videos 75 such as “Hidden Meanings Behind Childish Gambino’s ‘This is America’ Video Explained” began popping up on twitter timelines and received millions of views. The music video was also used to stir up conversations about race, violence, and the representation of black men and women in America. As The Undefeated’s Clinton Yates points out, the music video holds so much meaning that the meaning could easily be misconstrued, misrepresented, and misinterpreted, which only adds to what makes it scary:

The night I watched Childish Gambino’s video for “This Is America,” I was scared.

Having skipped the song’s premiere on Saturday Night Live, I’d seen the images and

their deconstructions on the internet all weekend. And when I finally sat down to watch

the full product, as opposed to just a collection of GIFs and clips, I didn’t even have it in

me to turn on the sound. When it comes to “what people on the internet say about black

[insert word here],” I am instantly leery. And, as a matter of course, I’m instantly fearful

of any form of black public expression that white people either identify as something they

can’t live without or pull away from. With zero sound, the images from Donald Glover’s

latest musical project felt like monsters under the bed. I had a nightmare that night.

(Yates)

Yates is cautious of the video at first because of the headlines it makes, the memes that follow, and the way it is picked apart for meaning, and yet the journalist cannot look away or deny the powerful messages of resistance in the music and video:

The inevitability of destruction. The specific mimicry of deplorable stereotypes that call

back to an era we try to forget. Watching him dance the Jim Crow dance is jarring and

familiar, which is both equally bizarre and, again, frightening — the real scope of the

black experience in this country. It replays over and over again on television, movies, the 76

internet and, yes, music videos. Glover/Gambino is not exploiting as much as he’s

reminding us how well-woven all of it is into our consciousness. And, just like in a

dream, where you’re never really sure what’s real and what’s a perverse version of your

brain creating a reality you don’t know you can trust, this video makes you ask questions.

How am I supposed to know what everything means if it’s all free-flowing, dangerous

and unstoppable? That’s the reality of being black in this country in 2018. (Yates)

This is one facet of what makes the video so rhetorically effective and powerful in its mode of resistance. It taps into social circulation, technology, and social media to become part of online culture. The music video is easily shared on social media, controversial enough for the trolling nature of internet cultures, and rhetorically effective enough to be startling without making the audience want to log off or scroll past. While it has its critics with over 589,000 clicks of the dislike button on YouTube, it has over 7 Million likes as well. So what makes it rhetorically effective as a visual representation of the music? One answer is that the music video taps into the tensions, fear, and violence of American cultures in critical ways.

The video starts like many Vevo music videos on YouTube. Vevo is a music video platform that popular artists use to publish their music videos online. No matter the genre, if an artist is on a Billboard chart, they tend to have a Vevo channel and the setup, format, and logo tend to unsurprisingly be similar for the videos. “This is America” starts with the title scrolled out in white text against a black background. Like the song itself, the video starts with a catchy, upbeat tone. A black man with a guitar sits down in a chair and begins strumming along as

Childish Gambino dances to the beat. He continues to dance with purpose as he makes his way over to the man and stands behind the chair. Without warning, he pulls out a gun and shoots the man in the back of the head as he begins rapping. 77

Fig. 8. - Screenshot from Childish Gambino’s “This is America” music video.

The scene is jarring and seems out of place, but it is actually quite fitting for the rest of the video and the interpretations of its meaning. Throughout the music video, Childish Gambino makes many intentional moves, poses, and rhetorical choices to send messages of resistance and it starts with the opening scene. He does not simply just murder a presumably innocent black man who is happily playing a guitar. The way he poses and his appearance is part of the visual rhetoric as well. The song and music video critique the history of black bodies used for entertainment purposes, the way they are commodified, fetishized, and exploited in order to entertain the masses, so it is fitting that the artist taps into imagery used during the era of minstrels in America to convey this.

Fig. 9. - Sheet music illustration of “Mr. T. Rice as the Original Jim.” 78

In the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, minstrel shows were a form of entertainment in America where white performers painted their faces with black paint, known as blackface, to depict racist stereotypes about African Americans. While this is part of the dark history of the United States, the debate about blackface over the past few years, which usually accompanies photos circulated online around Halloween or as parts of offensive costumes, continues on due to the loss of meaning, a lack of education on the historical significance, and a disregard of respect for the people who were oppressed, targeted, and exploited through the practice. Blackface is not deemed acceptable or appropriate in the twenty-first century and yet cases and instances continue to be hotly debated. In this regard, it is no surprise Childish

Gambino tapped into the caricature and offensive stereotype to critique the way black bodies are used and perceived in entertainment industries.

The video continues as the murdered black man is dragged off in the background and

Childish Gambino dances away. The dances he performs are significant because they are trendy, popular dances that are often seen in popular cultures, video games like Fortnite, and as part of the mainstream media. These dances are often culturally appropriated from the communities of minorities, performed by white dancers, and introduced to the mainstream as suddenly popular.

These dances are then part of mainstream cultures and often then appropriated by white entertainers in the media as if the dances are their own. An example of this is the case of

Backpack Kid, a teenager who went viral on YouTube by posting videos of himself dancing with his backpack on. The videos became so popular that he joined Katy Perry onstage during a nationally televised performance and became an internet sensation. Backpack Kid performed a popular dance called flossing, which was so popular in 2018 that kids, teens, and adults could be seen doing the dance in commercials, television, film, and all over social media. This is just one 79 example of dances being culturally appropriated, made popular by white performers, and used to increase entertainment value.

Fig. 10. - Screenshot of children dancing in “This is America” music video.

Fig. 11. - Screenshot of Childish Gambino dancing in “This is America” music video.

Childish Gambino signals to this through the dances he performs in the video with black children backing him up. In these scenes, there is chaos and several instances of violence going on behind them, but the children and artist do not acknowledge the destruction. Instead, the children keep dancing with big smiles on their faces. Childish Gambino alternates between smiling and giving exaggerated facial expressions that make the audience wonder how much he is actually aware of the violence he is immersed in.

In addition, the theme of violence and the blatant disregard for the lack of humanity and the seemingly joyful act of murdering human beings resonates throughout the music video and is 80 shown in a variety of ways. This includes a scene where a black choir is happily singing along to the song and dancing before Childish Gambino grabs an AK-47 gun and shoots them. As they lay in piles on the ground, blood splattered on the concrete wall behind them, the artist continues to rap for the camera. As the music video continues, the chaos and terror grow around him as more people run around in hysteria and a panic, all while he continues to dance, rap, and focus on the camera.

In the final scenes, the destruction and chaos seem to disappear and Childish Gambino is temporarily frozen in place before pulling a joint of marijuana from his pocket and lighting it up.

The noise, chaos, and hysteria disappear and he begins to dance around again. He eventually climbs on top of a car and dances in similar fashion to the late, great black musician James

Brown. This resemblance is significant in part to how recognizable Brown’s dance moves and sound are, but also some of the popular music Brown contributed. During his successful career, one song to stand out is “Living in America,” which is an upbeat song about America as a

“promised land” (Line 10) and “celebration” of life. Brown’s representation of America is in stark contrast with Childish Gambino’s and while the rap artist dances on the car with urges to

“get down” clear in the music, a popular phrase of Brown’s, there is an eerie sense that the dancing and joy will be short-lived as the camera zooms and the lights begin to fade.

He dances until the world around him disappears and he is suddenly in darkness resembling the “Sunken Place,” which is a reference to the Jordan Peele film Get Out. As Peele describes in a tweet about the film, “The Sunken Place means we're marginalized. No matter how hard we scream, the system silences us.” As the surrounding area is shrouded in darkness, the final scene of “This is America” reveals Childish Gambino running and terrified as a crowd 81 of shadowy figures chase after him. It is the first time in the video true terror is evident in his facial expressions as he appears to run for his life and the music video fades to black.

“This is America” as a song is admittedly not the most resistant or controversial, but when accompanied by the music video, the visual rhetoric is difficult to forget. It is haunting, startling, and leaves the audience with much to consider, discuss, and reflect on. According to the artist, that is the point, which is why he refuses to interpret the meaning for the audience.

During a press junket for Solo: A Star Wars Story, in which Glover plays Lando Calrissian, he was asked about the music video and to explain what is happening in it. “No, I feel like it’s not really my place to do that. I think it’s just something that should just be out there, you know? It’s for the people….I don’t want to give it any context” (Van Vliet 2:20 - 2:50). The complexity of the context, the multiple layers of the visual rhetoric, and the lack of certainty in the meanings behind all of the messages play a role in why the music video is so popular, widely circulated, and discussed. Childish Gambino’s “This is America” made quite the impression on the mainstream media in 2018, which is why it was recognized and so successful at the 2019

Grammy Awards. As a mode of resistance, it is layered and complex, relying on more than the song itself as a representation of the rhetorical situation.

Eminem and “The Storm”

Eminem represents a different type of rhetorical strategy, message of resistance, and approach. In terms of their use of violence in the form of lyrics and music videos, Eminem and

Childish Gambino are polar opposites. While Childish Gambino tends to use violence as part of social commentary about desensitization and exploitation, historically Eminem has used violent lyrics and videos to engage in shock value and controversy, which was popular in the genre in the early 2000s. In songs like “Guilty Conscience” and “Just Don’t Give a Fuck,” the rap artist 82 boasts about statutory rape and sexual assault. Meanwhile, one of his most controversial songs

“Kim” is a fantasy about murdering his ex-wife. His lyrics often contain sexist and homophobic slurs and he spent years targeting female celebrities such as Christina Aguilera in his music.

Eminem is polarizing as a rap artist and his love of controversy makes him a curious case study.

As a white, male rapper in a predominantly black genre of musicians, Eminem’s rhetorical strategies originally differed a bit from his contemporaries due to his race, questions about his authenticity, and use of “blackvoice,” a concept Amanda Nell Edgar explores in

“Blackvoice and Adele’s Racialized Musical Performance: Blackness, Whiteness, and

Discursive Authenticity.” In the article, the scholar explores the role race and identity play in perceptions of cultures and genres of music. Edgar focuses mainly on Adele as a case study for analyzed perceptions of racialized voices in music and argues “discourses about the Black sounds of White artists like Adele are in conversation with those surrounding artists like Dusty

Springfield and Amy Winehouse. In fact, singer Stephin Merritt referenced an ongoing debate about racialized sounds when he argued that Adele exemplified ‘British people who sound like

American Black people’ (e.g., Weiss, 2012)’” (168). The question of authenticity, racialized musical performances, and the notions of what it means to have “blackvoice” are issues Eminem encounters throughout his career as well because of the way he speaks about the communities he identifies with and the vernacular he uses. However, questions about his authenticity go beyond his existence as a white rap artist in a predominantly black genre and the deeper rooted issue stems from the history of theft of music and cultural traditions from black communities by labels and people in power in the music industry. Gilbert B. Rodman touches on this in “Race … and

Other Four Letter Words: Eminem and the Cultural Politics of Authenticity” by questioning “is

Eminem the Elvis of rap: a White man who makes Black music credibly, creatively, and 83 compellingly? Or—alternately—is Eminem … the Elvis of rap: a White man who’s unfairly achieved fame and fortune by making Black music, while Black artists with equal (if not greater) talent languish in poverty and obscurity” (Rodman 106)? With this historical context in mind about the music industry as a whole, the power struggles involved in establishing the genre of rap, and Eminem’s complex and at times controversial rhetorical strategies as an artist, he is a valuable case study in this analysis.

Eminem’s “The Storm,” a freestyle rap performed at the 2017 BET Awards fits the criteria for this study in multiple ways. It was performed during the given time frame and is a direct response to supporters of President Trump, which makes it both resistant and part of a cultural moment. In addition, the YouTube video of the performance has over 48 Million views, making it quite popular and visible as well. The freestyle is an explicit rant about the state of politics, current administration, and geared toward any of Eminem’s fans who question his thoughts or positions after the presidential election.

Historical Context and Kairos for “The Storm”

Before the release of the freestyle, Eminem’s status in the rap and hip-hop community began to dwindle over the past five years. While he is still considered a respectable rap artist, younger artists and a different style of rap music began to emerge in the genre, which embraces more of the genre of pop and mainstream popular cultures. Rap artists like Drake, Nicki Minaj, and Cardi B continue to gain popularity with younger audiences while Eminem becomes part of an older generation of artists in the industry. At 46 years of age, Eminem seemed to be out of the spotlight, appearing on EP’s and releasing freestyles less often, so many of his fans were surprised when he appeared at the 2017 BET Awards in the form of a video shot in his hometown of Detroit, Michigan. BET aired the video during the award show and later posted it 84 on YouTube by saying “Eminem is back! And he's in classic bar-for-bar form going kamikaze at

Donald Trump from his Detroit home. The cyphers went crazy too. Peep.” Not only was the freestyle a reminder for listeners of Eminem’s impressive freestyling abilities, but also a chance for the artist to express his frustration and anger after the 2016 election. This has become more common with rap artists lately as “scores of seemingly ‘non-political’ rap artists referenced

Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton in the 2016 presidential election. According to an analysis performed by CNN, there were a total of 83 songs by 70 different rappers in 2015 that mention

Donald Trump by name with the vast majority denouncing him for his “hateful” comments”

(Oware 2). Since the election of President Trump, more musicians have created music to resist the administration and Eminem’s “The Storm” is an example of this type of resistance.

Critical Discourse Analysis for “The Storm”

Eminem wastes no time making his intentions and the target of the freestyle known.

President Trump is mentioned five lines into the freestyle along with threats of violence and references of plans to carry out:

It's the calm before the storm right here

Wait, how was I gonna start this off?

I forgot… oh yeah

That's an awfully hot coffee pot

Should I drop it on Donald Trump? Probably not

But that's all I got 'til I come up with a solid plot

Got a plan and now I gotta hatch it

Like a damn Apache with a tomahawk (Lines 1 - 8) 85

When Eminem targets people in his raps and freestyles, he often questions manhood or tries to assert his masculinity over his target. “The Storm” is no different and the rap artist attacks and degrades the masculinity of the president. This is an interesting aspect of the freestyle rap because Eminem also acknowledges the similarities in approach between him and the president since the president has stirred controversy for his posts on Twitter and degrades people through the account by mocking their masculinity, gender, spouses, and other aspects of his targets’ identity. Eminem points out these similarities, but also what he sees as their differences:

Trump, when it comes to givin' a shit, you're stingy as I am

Except when it comes to havin' the balls to go against me, you hide 'em

'Cause you don't got the fuckin' nuts like an empty asylum

Racism's the only thing he's fantastic for (Lines 19 - 22)

The musician then goes on to argue the way he believes President Trump distracts American citizens from actual tragedies. He gives examples of the distractions and the spotlight these distractions take from other issues:

But this is his form of distraction

Plus, he gets an enormous reaction

When he attacks the NFL so we focus on that

Instead of talkin' Puerto Rico or gun reform for Nevada

All these horrible tragedies and he's bored and would rather

Cause a Twitter storm with the Packers (Lines 32 - 37)

Some of the last verses of the freestyle are not what many of his listeners have come to expect from Eminem though. His history of misogyny, perpetuation of rape culture, and controversial statements under the guise of shock value are well documented, but his frustration and anger in 86 the last verses of the freestyle also show a man no longer trying to make waves like Slim Shady or engage in hate speech merely to cause a spectacle. It is clear in his final verses of pointed critiques that Eminem is well aware of the political climate the country finds itself in and the repercussions. This is clear in his focus on the claims of President Trump’s racism, sexism, and bigoted rhetoric, which is a fascinating shift in tone for an artist with Eminem’s reputation:

Same shit that he tormented Hillary for and he slandered

Then does it more

From his endorsement of Bannon

Support for the Klansmen

Tiki torches in hand for the soldier that's black

And comes home from Iraq

And is still told to go back to Africa

Fork and a dagger in this racist 94-year-old grandpa

Who keeps ignorin' our past historical, deplorable factors

Now if you're a black athlete you're a spoiled little brat for

Tryna use your platform or your stature

To try to give those a voice who don't have one

Says, "You're spittin' in the face of vets who fought for us, you bastards!"

Unless you're a POW who's tortured and battered

'Cause to him you're zeros

'Cause he don't like his war heroes captured

But that's not disrespectin' the military (Lines 41 - 57) 87

In the last verse of the freestyle, Eminem does indeed draw the line in the sand he references at the end as a message to his fans. Not only does he make it clear who he stands with and against, but openly mocks supporters of the president and their views. He does this by altering his voice and adding a twang and drawl to his words as if speaking in an accent often heard when portraying the stereotype of the “hick” or “redneck.” Eminem implements and exaggerates the accent while mocking views on immigration policy and the controversial wall debate before the artist returns to his usual voice to finish the freestyle. Eminem has never been one to mince words and his message of resistance is quite clear:

Fuck that, this is for Colin, ball up a fist!

And keep that shit balled like Donald the bitch!

"He's gonna get rid of all immigrants!"

"He's gonna build that thing up taller than this!"

Well, if he does build it, I hope it's rock solid with bricks

'Cause like him in politics, I'm usin' all of his tricks

'Cause I'm throwin' that piece of shit against the wall 'til it sticks

And any fan of mine who's a supporter of his

I'm drawing in the sand a line, you're either for or against

And if you can't decide who you like more and you're split

On who you should stand beside, I'll do it for you with this:

Fuck you!

The rest of America, stand up!

We love our military, and we love our country

But we fuckin' hate Trump! (Lines 58 - 72) 88

Social Circulation for “The Storm”

The concept of social circulation for “The Storm” is notable due to the social media response in favor of Eminem. As Billboard’s Lars Brandle notes “Eminem’s incendiary and uncompromising anti-Trump cypher is a massive social media hit. The Detroit rapper’s cypher,

‘The Storm,’ has been swirling on Facebook and trending on Twitter since he let it fly Tuesday night for the BET Hip-Hop Awards, earning plaudits from musicians and athletes.” According to

Brandle, many celebrities posted their support for the freestyle online, like Lebron James, Colin

Kaepernick, and Snoop Dogg. In addition, the video of the freestyle and lyrics were shared and spread on multiple social media platforms, which added to the power of the messages of resistance. Surprisingly, even Ellen Degeneres gave a nod to the freestyle and, despite his history of homophobic slurs and lyrical attacks against the LGBTQ+ Community, Degeneres posted a heart symbol in response to the freestyle. Meanwhile, her executive producer for The Ellen Show

Andy Lassner responded as well by posting, “Not totally sure how rap battles work, but I believe

Eminem is now the President of the United States of America.” In the case of Eminem, the type of resistant message and social circulation helped him reach audiences and listeners who either had long forgotten about his presence in the mainstream media or disagreed with his controversial messages.

Rhetorical Strategies for the Genre

Childish Gambino and Eminem are two rap artists with very different rhetorical strategies. While some of their chosen strategies are based on their creative preferences as artists, analyzing the two case studies reveals more than differences in approach. Two patterns emerged during the analysis of the artists and both pertain to the genre overall. First, the rhetorical strategies are evolving in the ways artists show and embrace controversy in the name of social 89 commentary versus controversy for the sake of controversy. Many rap artists, such as Childish

Gambino and Kendrick Lamar, are releasing music to spread messages of resistance and put a spotlight on the continuous oppression and unfair treatment of people of color, especially in black communities in the U.S, and this use of music as resistance and a call to action is reminiscent of the original rhetorical strategies of gangster rap and hip-hop with songs from

N.W.A., Tupac, and A Tribe Called Quest, but there are differences. One difference is due to rap’s emergence as a powerful mainstream genre. As rap artists continue to collaborate with pop, rock and alternative, and country musicians, the genre continues to expand and be spread globally. This is evident in the way popular K-Pop groups like BTS have at least one member mimic the style and artistry of rap and hip hop and in the way rap and hip-hop singles consistently dominate Spotify’s top charts. At the time of analysis, seven of the top ten songs on

Spotify’s “United States Top 50” chart were from the genre. Rap and hip-hop is a powerful genre with many influential artists in the music industry using their power to speak up for social issues in ways that are similar, but overall different from past rhetorical strategies in sub-genres like gangsta rap. Awareness to the amount of explicit language used, the historical and social context, and discriminatory and biased nature of some language, especially in terms of misogyny and rape culture, are all components of contemporary rap and hip hop focused on resistance.

The second pattern to emerge is one of great interest to this study due to its correlation to systems of power and the way rhetorical strategies are dictated by these systems and social constructs. The race of the resistant performer played a role in the response by the listener and the rhetorical strategies implemented. While Childish Gambino used the music video for “This is

America” to shock audiences into reflecting on desensitization to violence in American cultures and the issues of racism in the nation, his approach to addressing racism differed from 90

Eminem’s. While their different styles as performers contribute to this, Childish Gambino is also a black man in America who is well aware of the ways he can be resistant in predominantly white spaces. Childish Gambino is also Donald Glover, an actor, director, and writer navigating two different worlds of entertainment in a black body. In terms of rhetorical strategies and the means of available persuasion, there are certain privileges not available to him that are available to Eminem.

Childish Gambino plays on stereotypes and tropes about black men in order to get his message across. He acts violently and guns down a church choir. He dances as if performing in a minstrel to entertain a white audience. He even finds himself running for his life from a group of authorities and a mob once they are no longer entertained by him. As an artist, he shows resistance through stereotypical behavior as satire, symbolism, and visual rhetoric. However, the messages can be easily masked in the actual lyrics of the song, unlike with Eminem.

As a white body taking up spaces often available and accessible to him, Eminem stands in front of the camera and rants. He shouts obscenities and threatens the President of the United

States of America. He taunts supporters of President Trump and mocks their beliefs. He doesn’t mask his words or their meaning and he certainly doesn’t shy away. Some of this is due to

Eminem’s reputation, but the responses to his verbal attacks reveal how the race of the artist factors into the effectiveness of the rhetoric. At a time when President Trump had no issue calling Colin Kaepernick and black athletes who kneel during the national anthem a “son of a bitch” and had no problem engaging in Twitter feuds with Rosie O’Donnell or mocking Lebron

James and Jay-Z, President Trump did not immediately respond to Eminem. In fact, Eminem continued to taunt the president in interviews and online, but was ignored. Eminem benefits from 91 white privilege in ways Childish Gambino cannot and yet again, race factors into the rhetorical strategies of artists in a genre.

This issue of identity politics based on music genre was brought up in the Supreme Court filings by the famous group of rap artists fighting Knox v. Commonwealth of Pennsylvania as well. “Consider country music. Like rap, it often depicts sex, drug or alcohol (ab)use, poverty, and certainly violence. Indeed, the murder ballad, which can be traced back centuries, has always had a prominent place in country music, thanks to artists like Johnny Cash, Waylon Jennings,

Willie Nelson, and many others. Yet people tend to have very different responses to country music” (Sapiro and Thompson 20). The role of race in the rhetorical strategies, perceptions, and categorization of genres continues to be prevalent because “racial discourses like these are deeply intertwined with popular music, structuring the way musical genres are understood and circulated. Classifications of musical genre often correspond to the perceived race of the performer, particularly in cases of nonwhite artists” (Edgar 168). This is seen in the case studies of Eminem and Childish Gambino as well and the genre of rap and hip hop is fascinating because of the way the genre can use rhetorical strategies to portray violence, disenfranchisement, and push back against systems of power through music steeped with messages of resistance, while still being part of an industry and system treating non-white bodies as different and in need of different rhetorical strategies in the same spaces as white artists. 92

CHAPTER V: THE GENRE OF COUNTRY

While rap and hip hop is a genre that uses music as a mode of resistance to push back against power structures perpetuating colonial practices in racism and discrimination, country is an interesting genre to analyze due to the way it is similar and yet a stark contrast. Like rap and hip hop, country is a stereotypically racialized genre in the music industry. Both genres routinely assign white or black faces to the music, have cultural norms enforced within the genre and communities they root themselves in, and use identity politics to spread messages and rhetoric to audiences. However, the analysis during this study finds that country music as a genre is surprisingly one of the least resistant in the current time frame. This may be due to the audience, expectations from the culture in the genre of country, and the rhetorical strategies at play.

As a genre, country music most certainly engages in identity politics in the form of the types of faces, bodies, and rhetoric existing in the spaces and readily available in the genre. This study finds samples from the genre pertaining to resistant music scarce during political shifts toward traditionally conservative power. There are some notable examples of resistance during presidential administrations considered conservative or Republican, such as the Dixie Chicks during former President George W. Bush’s two presidential terms and the contemporary music of Sturgill Simpson. However, country music’s relationship with resistance is complex and layered, just like the history of the genre. Much like rap and hip hop, country music has its fair share of critics and as David Morris points out in “Hick-Hop Hooray? ‘Honky Tonk

Badonkadonk,’ Musical Genre, and the Misrecognitions of Hybridity,” these critics often argue the culture of the genre perpetuates stereotypes and relies on homogeneity:

No critic of country music has highlighted its multiple cultural debts with the impact of

Murray’s (1970) treatment of jazz in The Omni-Americans. On the contrary, country has 93

largely succeeded in presenting itself as the pure expression of a singular, essential

underlying identity, as music ‘‘produced by white people, consumed by white people,

apparently appealing almost exclusively to white people, at least in North America,’’ a

claim supported by ‘‘virtually every scholar of the genre’’ (Mann, 2008). Country is

strongly linked to notions of a pure, exclusive ‘‘folk’’ with racial and nationalistic

significance (Gold & Revill, 2006), and its audience has been among the least likely to

listen to music outside of narrow generic boundaries (Peterson & Kern, 1995). But

country music, no less than jazz, grew from complex roots in a variety of racial groups

and cultural traditions. This has been suppressed and denied through an array of

rhetorical and discursive tactics. (Morris 471)

While Morris’s exploration of the complex nature of country as a genre is illuminating, it is also important to acknowledge how the genre continues to play into homogeneous perceptions by propping white, male faces up as the norm and standard in the industry. It is not just about the outside perception or the perception of the audience, there are intentional, rhetorical moves implemented by those in power within the industry to establish these perceptions. Country’s lack of diversity in the race and ethnicity of the genre’s artists is problematic in its own right, but the focus in media, popular culture, and social circulation at the time of this study is on the lack of diversity and opportunities for women as well. Country artists like Reba McEntire spoke out about this before the 2019 Country Music Awards and a recent study supported her claims.

“Recently, the Academy of Country Music (ACMs) announced – for a second year in a row – all male nominees for the prestigious Entertainer of the Year award. The host of their award ceremony, Reba McEntire, not only pointed out the lack of female representation among the candidates but also that a “bro culture” seems to be pervading country music” (Smith et al. 1). 94

The University of Southern California’s Annenberg Inclusion Initiative conducted a brief study to analyze the role gender played in the genre. Researchers tracked data from over 500 songs on the Billboard Hot Country charts to assess how many of the artists were male and how many were female. The study spans from 2014 to 2018 and shows how the “bro culture”

McEntire alludes to is evident in the charts and popularity of the music as well:

Though representing half of the U.S. population, females only comprised 16% of

performers across 5 years and 500 songs on the Year-End Billboard Hot Country charts

from 2014 to 2018. Among top performers, male artists appeared on the charts at least

twice as many times as female artists did across the sample. Additionally, not one of

these top-performing women was over the age of 40, while all but one of country’s top

performing men had reached or exceeded that age. Women represented 12% of

songwriters across the five years studied—one positive finding emerging from this report

was that female artists were more likely to work with female songwriters than male artists

were. Finally, at the ACM’s women were outnumbered in the four major categories

assessed, and in multiple years no women were nominated in the Entertainer and

Songwriter of the Year categories. (Smith et al. 4).

In addition, the study finds that “less than a sixth of all nominees (11%, n=3) were women in the

Entertainer of the Year category. In reality that figure reflects only 2 women who were nominated across the sample time frame: Carrie Underwood (1 nomination) and Miranda

Lambert (2 nominations)” (Smith et al. 3). So while country has a complex history of incorporating sounds and music from different genres, it also has a history of exclusion by creating a system of gatekeepers persistent in efforts to omit people of color, women, marginalized groups of peoples, and voices with political affiliations and ideologies deemed 95 different from the traditional, conservative values the country music industry perpetuates. For this reason, the samples of resistance in the genre for this study are even more interesting as samples of resistant music. Carrie Underwood and Brad Paisley’s live performance of “Before

He Tweets” and Willie Nelson’s “Vote Em Out” are both examples of when artists in the genre resisted and had to rely on rhetorical strategies to do so.

Carrie Underwood and Brad Paisley’s “Before He Tweets”

It is fitting that Carrie Underwood is one of the only females in the Annenberg Inclusion

Initiative to be highlighted as recognized by the ACM because she is also one of the country artists willing to present resistance in the form of music. This willingness to resist in a genre that tends to discourage such things could be due to Underwood’s popularity and status as an influential artist. Her position of power as a face of country music enables her to speak out and voice concerns in ways many country artists do not, but power and popularity have not saved other female artists in the past from backlash. The now infamous case of the Dixie Chicks is an example of a popular group of country artists with momentum on their side who still were blackballed and ostracized in the industry for their political views. During a performance in

London in 2003, Natalie Maines said she was ashamed that the president at the time, George W.

Bush, was from Texas. This was in response to Bush’s rhetoric and the decision to invade Iraq.

The comments were met with anger and outrage leading to a boycott of the artists. By this point, the Dixie Chicks were chart-topping artists with mainstream popularity, but they still became targets of hate. Many country artists, fans, and public figures spoke out against the group and they were even blackballed from radio stations. The Dixie Chicks were able to recover, but it took years and the group is still known for their stance at the time. So the question becomes, with 96 these types of responses in mind, how do musicians like Carrie Underwood and Brad Paisley tap into rhetorical strategies to resist through music in such a restrictive genre?

Historical Context and Kairos for “Before He Tweets”

In order to understand this, it is important to understand how “Before He Tweets” gained popularity and the context for the song. The song itself is a parody of Underwood’s popular release “Before He Cheats.” The song gave Underwood mainstream, global recognition and is still one of her most popular releases. The parody “Before He Tweets” was chosen for this study due to it being a show of resistance in 2017 after the Country Music Awards warned performers and presenters to not be political, the cultural moment and events the song responds to, and the response the performance received. In 2017, organizers for the CMAs decided to announce the award show as a non-political space where performers, presenters, and the media were to steer clear of speaking negatively or critically about the current social and political climate and the

Trump Administration. “The CMA had previously asked media outlets to avoid questions about the recent mass shooting in Las Vegas, gun rights or political affiliations at the awards show, or risk losing their credentials and being escorted by security off the premises” (Paulson). However, the announcement was met with enough frustration that the organization eventually recanted and changed course. Once the backlash became public, the organization issued an apology stating the

“CMA apologizes for the recently distributed restrictions in the CMA Awards media guidelines, which have since been lifted. The sentiment was not to infringe and was created with the best of intentions to honor and celebrate Country Music” (Paulson). Underwood and Paisley were two of the most vocal critics on social media about the restrictions and this became a catalyst for

“Before He Tweets,” which became a memorable moment at the award show co-hosted by the country artists. 97

Fig. 12. - Screenshot of Brad Paisley and Carrie Underwood.

Critical Discourse Analysis for “Before He Tweets”

“Before He Tweets” is the only parody selected for the study and its use of humor as a rhetorical strategy is one reason it is rhetorically effective as a mode of resistance for this specific genre. To start the performance, the hosts began speaking to the audience and one another and alluded to the CMA’s restrictive policy. While the organization recanted, it did not stop Underwood and Paisley from mocking it. Underwood assures Paisley “we can't be doing any of our silly little songs because this year's show is a 'politics-free zone’” (Ryan). Paisley replies that it isn’t fair and starts in on a couple of parodies to consider like “Way down wander on the Scaramucci” and “Hold me closer, Bernie Sanders.” By doing so in a comedic way, the artists shift the tone from serious to comedic and also engage in performativity by acting as if one is willing to enforce the rescinded policy while the other is not. In this case, Underwood is the authority figure and Paisley is the rebel willing to buck the system for laughs from the audience. This set up for the performance is an integral component to its effectiveness.

Underwood acts as if she is trying to keep Paisley on task and even begins introducing the next presenters, but Paisley cuts in by strumming his guitar and singing. Underwood asks him what he 98 is doing and he responds by saying he is “definitely not doing this one” before singing the first lines of the parody. “Right now/He's probably in his PJs /Reaching for his cellphone” (Lines 1 -

3). Underwood interjects as the audience laughs and cheers him on.

The recognition by the audience of who “he” is and the reference to the cellphone relies on kairos. The parody was performed at the beginning of President Trump’s term when his constant and at times controversial tweets about foreign policy, government agencies, and politicians was still new and fresh on the minds of many Americans. President Trump’s rhetoric continues to be a hotly debated topic and many people wondered how the President of the United

States would be regarded if he continued to tweet to antagonize, provoke, and mock public figures, world leaders, and celebrities alike. Underwood and Paisley use this context to their advantage and depend on the audience to understand the rhetorical situation at hand as well.

Paisley continues referring to the president’s tweets as the audience laughs and Underwood shakes her head in mock disproval:

Right now

He's probably asking Siri

'How in the hell do you spell Pocahontas?'

In the middle of the night from the private seat

Of a gold-plated White House toilet seat

He writes, 'Liddle Bob Corker,' 'NFL' and 'covfefe,' (Lines 4 - 9)

Underwood then belts out “covfefe,” which is the first time she actually sings during the performance. The audience erupts into cheers while she and Paisley begin questioning how to pronounce “covfefe.” They each say the term in different ways, ending of “fee-fee,” before

Underwood jokes “gesundheit.” This treatment of the word as more of a sound similar to a 99 sneeze amuses the audience as Paisley continues the song. “It's fun to watch it/That's for sure/Until little Rocket Man starts a war” (Lines 10 - 12). This reference is to several of

President Trump’s tweets where he refers to North Korean’s Kim Jong Un as “Rocket Man.” In a

September 2017 tweet, the president states “I spoke with President Moon of South Korea last night. Asked him how Rocket Man is doing. Long gas lines forming in North Korea. Too bad!”

Underwood then joins in on the song to finish the last lines with Paisley. “Then maybe next time he'll think/Before he tweets” (Lines 13 - 14).

Social Circulation for “Before He Tweets”

In terms of social circulation, the performativity and presentation of the live performance on stage play a big role in the effectiveness of the resistance rhetorically. Unlike many of the songs examined for this study, “Before He Tweets” depends on the interplay for comedic timing of the jokes and response to the messages. While the lyrics themselves are important, the delivery of the message on a visual platform, the live audience and millions watching at home, play the biggest roles. In addition, the performance itself and the intentional acts of who says what lines contribute to the rhetoric. While the song is a parody of one of Underwood’s most recognizable singles, Paisley performs a majority of the song. She spends most of the performance playfully interjecting and only joins in at the end. Out of the two co-hosts, Paisley was the most vocal about the CMA’s policy, so this may be a reason for his resistant voice being the main one amplified in the moment. However, the history of country as a genre and the “bro culture” McEntire alludes to provides a different lens to consider as well. Carrie Underwood is a popular country artist in a male-driven genre that historically has proven to have adverse responses to resistant messages, especially from female voices. By Paisley being the main voice 100 of resistance, he implements a privilege not readily accessible to Underwood and taps into this privilege to voice his resistance in meaningful ways.

The use of humor, kairos, and positions of power all are implemented to present the message of resistance to the audience, but the importance of the distribution of the message through media cannot be overstated in this regard as well. Without platforms like Twitter and its users to tweet about the performance, news outlets like CNN, USA Today, and shows like Good

Morning America covering the moment from the award show, only audiences that saw it live at the show or as a viewer would receive the message. The ability of the message to be spread online assisted in reaching multiple audiences. Ironically, so did the influential figures of the genre and their stance on politics at the award show in the first place. By initially banning questions and topics political in nature, organizers for the CMAs created an opportunity for the artists. The backlash over the policy received so much media attention that it became part of the kairotic moment to resist. As Patrick Ryan states in USA Today, “did you really think Carrie

Underwood and Brad Paisley would open the CMA Awards without getting political?” The policy itself became part of the rhetorical situation and the artists capitalized on the moment with

“Before He Tweets.”

Willie Nelson and “Vote Em Out”

While Underwood and Paisley had to rely on multiple rhetorical strategies and be aware of the response of the audience, Willie Nelson is a figure in country music known as a rebel willing to go against the grain. His career spans over six decades and he not only is one of the most successful country artists, but also the most recognizable due to his appearances in films throughout his career: 101

Nelson’s influence is often overlooked because of his image as a weed-smoking cowboy

caricature – the guy who shows up in Austin Powers or admitting to Larry King that he’s

stoned on the air. But he’s a lot more than that. He is the most unique and versatile

country artist of all time – a cowboy singer with jazz phrasing, playing Django Reinhardt

guitar licks on a beat-up classical guitar. In the same way Miles Davis is considered the

quintessential jazz artist because he explored almost every iteration of the genre over 50

years, Nelson has seen through every chapter of country music – first as a radio host and

honky-tonk bandleader in the Forties and Fifties, then as a slick crooner in Sixties

countrypolitan Nashville, then as the face of the outlaw country movement, something

that happened after Nelson moved back home to Texas, grew his hair out and stopped

caring about the charts. (Doyle)

Wilson has the epitome of star power in the genre, so it is no surprise his rhetorical strategies for resistance differ from Underwood and Paisley’s. Nelson has made headlines in the past for taking opposing stances to the genre’s overall ideology with his urging for the legalization of marijuana and willingness to speak about his support and endorsements of Democrats. His clout in Nashville and the country music world cannot be doubted, and yet his status and power in the industry did not stop him from receiving backlash from some listeners and public figures for his song “Vote Em Out.” As a song, “Vote Em Out” fits the criteria for this study because it was first performed at a rally to support Beto O’Rouke’s Texas Senate campaign in 2018, responds to the political climate during elections in America, and became a talking point about celebrities and politics for multiple news outlets and talk shows. 102

Historical Context and Kairos for “Vote Em Out”

The 2018 Midterm Elections in the U.S. gained more attention than previous midterms and many celebrities and public figures used it as an opportunity to encourage more voter turnout. Musicians from a range of genres joined in the efforts to promote voter registration, education about the policies, issues, and bills to consider, endorsing candidates on social media, allowing voter registration booths to be set up at concert venues, and attending rallies. Artists from the genres of pop, such as Taylor Swift, rock and alternative musicians like Bon Iver, and rap artists like Meek Mill used their platforms to show support for candidates, so it should not have been surprising for Willie Nelson to join the efforts by attending Beto O’Rouke’s Austin rally to perform “Vote Em Out.” However, due to country music’s reputation as having musicians with a conservative political slant, some country music fans were critical of Nelson’s endorsement. “The ‘On the Road Again’ singer was criticized by some conservative fans who objected to his performing at the O’Rourke rally” (Hudak). In response, Nelson addressed the criticism on the talk show The View by reminding his critics historically he has supported

Democrats and that “everybody has a right to an opinion. I think I have one too” (Hudak).

Nelson has been vocal about his views and ideology for years, but the 2018 Midterm Elections and the tension surrounding them became a cultural moment in the U.S. that placed Nelson’s music and advocacy even more in the spotlight. While the moment became the focus for

Nelson’s critics, the artist’s actions had been consistent, especially in regards to responding to the current administration in power and President Trump’s policies on issues like immigration:

Along with his endorsement of O’Rourke, Nelson has also been an outspoken advocate

for immigrants. In a release announcing “Vote ‘Em Out,” he encourages people to

support the RAICES organization, a nonprofit that provides free and low-cost legal 103

services to immigrants in his home state of Texas. In June, at the height of the immigrant

family-separation controversy, Nelson released his own statement criticizing the Trump

Administration’s policy. “What’s going on at our southern border is outrageous.

Christians everywhere should be up in arms. What happened to ‘Bring us your tired and

weak and we will make them strong?’ This is still the promise land,” he said.” (Hudak)

What makes “Vote Em Out” stand out is the political and cultural moments the release coincides with and the special attention placed on the elections. Nelson’s reputation, status as an influential musician, and advocacy all play a role in the audience the artist received for “Vote Em Out” and the timeliness of the message makes the song even more impactful as music with a resistant message.

Critical Discourse Analysis for “Vote Em Out”

Compared to some other songs analyzed for the study, “Vote Em Out” is mild and lacks derogatory language, controversial rhetoric, and provocative tones. The two minute and twenty two second song has a simple message for Americans frustrated with the state of politics and

Nelson makes the message clear from the very first line. “If you don't like who's in there, vote em out” (Line 1). It is a straight-forward message that does not appear to be very resistant in the first place. Nelson is not calling for a revolution, attacking the current president, or threatening the government, which is why the criticism of the song is even more fascinating. Nelson ultimately uses the song to implore Americans to engage in civic duty and vote:

That's what Election Day is all about

The biggest gun we've got

Is called "the ballot box"

So if you don't like who's in there, vote em out 104

Vote em out (Vote em out)

Vote em out (Vote em out)

And when they're gone we'll sing and dance and shout

Bring some new ones in

And we'll start that show again

And if you don't like who's in there, vote em out (Lines 2 - 11)

Nelson’s call to action is the same call many public figures embrace during election years, the focus on voter turnout, and the only derogatory language used in the song is when the artist refers to some of the politicians currently in office as “clowns.” However, Nelson is vague and does not mention any politician in the song by name. Instead, his approach focuses on general voter sentiments and a simple resolution for disenfranchised voters as the election approaches:

If it's a bunch of clowns you voted in

Election Day is comin' 'round again

If you don't like it now

If it's more than you'll allow

If you don't like who's in there, vote em out (Lines 12 - 16)

The rest of the song relies on repetition and restates the same verses and messages as it ends. As a rhetorically effective message, it works because of the simplicity in the approach, which matches Nelson’s approach to country music in general. As an artist, he embraces advocacy, has a no-nonsense demeanor, and promotes transparency in his music and approach to life, so it is no surprise “Vote Em Out” follows suit. 105

Social Circulation for “Vote Em Out”

The simplistic approach to the lyrics of the song is also evident in the social circulation for the music. Unlike the other songs of resistance across the genres, Nelson’s song does not implement much technology or social media in terms of social circulation. There is no official music video for the song, simply an audio video with an image of a voter box and the title. There is no official lyric video either and the only performances to be found online are from the free concert he headlined to support O’Rouke in Austin and when the artist performed the song on

Jimmy Kimmel Live. The official audio video on Nelson’s YouTube channel has over 122,000 views and the Jimmy Kimmel Live performance has over 57,000 views on the Jimmy Kimmel

Live YouTube channel. In this regard, “Vote Em Out” is the least circulated song of the study and yet the criticism it received still is notable. There are two main reasons for the backlash to the song and both stem from assumptions about the genre of country. First, Fox News brought attention to the song by writing a story stating Nelson’s fans were upset about his support of

Beto O’Rouke. Second, it was assumed that because Nelson is a country musician, his political views and ideology are automatically conservative and favor the Republican Party.

On September 13, 2018, Fox News posted a story on their website about how “furious”

Nelson’s fans were about his support of O’Rouke and his plan to perform at the Austin rally. The story includes several comments from Facebook users upset about Nelson’s support of O’Rouke and threatening to never listen to Nelson again. “If that’s true im done after 45 years with the

Red Headed Stranger, by [sic] Willy,” (McCarthy). Another user commented “Willie I have always loved you and I played your music on the local country station when I was in high school. I've always thought you were a patriot but you have jumped the shark my friend”

(McCarthy). The article also claims “some of his fans took to the comments to support the 106 singer’s decision to headline the rally, noting that true fans were aware of his political leanings all along. However, a more vocal majority seemed surprised and against the upcoming gig”

(McCarthy). The news story placed a spotlight on Nelson’s performance at the rally and fueled on the notion of outrage and backlash.

In addition to the story, the criticism of Nelson is rooted in the false assumption that the artist suddenly changed his political views and began supporting democratic candidates and their policies when in fact Nelson has always been a supporter of liberal views. This assumption and the continued cycling of it are due to the culture surrounding the genre of country music and the perception of its artists. Conservative values continue to be automatically placed on Nelson because he identifies as a country artist. It does not matter that Nelson has a history of endorsing democratic candidates and has shown support in the past for democratic presidents like former

President Barrack Obama. Country music as a genre and the political ideology it embodies usurps Nelson’s actions, patterns of behavior, and outspoken advocacy. He is supposed to reinforce conservative values and support the Republican Party as a country artist and his resistance to this notion creates the backlash. Nelson does not hide is political views and has gone out of his way on more than one occasion to voice them, so the inability for those views to be clear shows how a genre can infringe an identity upon the artists within it. Nelson is a case of the rhetoric of the artist being overpowered by the perception and rhetoric of the genre as an entity.

Rhetorical Strategies for the Genre

The rhetoric and audience responses to the cases of Nelson’s “Vote Em Out” and

Underwood and Paisley’s parody “Before He Tweets” reveal just how restrictive and critical the genre of country is to messages of resistance. Both cases reflect how the country music industry 107 views identity, politics, and its target audience and makes it clear why musicians in the genre are hesitant to speak out. Underwood and Paisley were supposed to remain silent and not bring up politics at the CMAs, especially if they planned to be critical of the Republican president. Nelson received criticism for “Vote Em Out” and his endorsement of a Democratic candidate even though he has supported Democrats most of his life and continues to take clear stances. While each genre carries a perception and identity to be placed on artists, country music as a genre creates a perception of political ideology and identity that acts to deter resistant music.

However, it is important to be clear about the type of resistance country music tries to deter. It is resistance that is critical of power structures and systems politically categorized as conservative or Republican. If Nelson was in support of O’Rouke’s opposition Ted Cruz and performed at a rally to show his support of the Republican Senator, would the backlash be the same? If Underwood and Paisley wanted to mock former President Obama at the CMA’s, would the organizers be as critical? No, the rhetorical strategies and trends in the genre lend evidence to support the argument that artists in the genre of country music are condemned and at times are even blackballed if they resist conservative political views. The Dixie Chicks are another example of this pattern as well.

Country music as a genre is the least resistant genre when the type of resistance involved is rooted in critical messages that oppose conservativism and the Republican Party. In order to be resistant to these political systems in the genre, the rhetoric must not be provocative, like in the case of “Before He Tweets,” which softens the blow of criticism by thinly veiled comedy and pathos, or the influential power of the artist must be able to withstand the potential controversy through ethos, like in the case of Nelson. While each genre has its restrictive features and power structures that urge conformity to chosen identities and norms of the genre, country music 108 continues to struggle with being so restrictive in nature that it excludes audiences that are diverse and more inclusive. Cindy Mabe, President of Universal Music Group Nashville, responded to this issue by acknowledging there is indeed a problem. “We clearly have a problem. Our job is to amplify our artists' voices and help them introduce their stories and connect to their audience.

This has gotten increasingly harder and limiting over the last few years, especially for women and it has dramatically affected the perspective, reach and depth of our country music genre”

(Tsioulcas). It takes a large amount of ethos, power, and implementations of different rhetorical appeals that are critical, but not provocative, in order to be resistant in the genre of country, which is why it continues to be the least resistant genre in terms of musicians openly advocating for progressive, diverse, and inclusive views. 109

CHAPTER VI: THE GENRE OF POP

While country music as a genre is the least resistant in the study, pop is a genre with ebbs and flows in terms of resistant messages of music, and yet the genre continues to show its ability to be progressive and resistant when necessary. The definition and categorization of pop music as a mainstream genre tends to be murky due to the way the genre is interwoven and blends into other genres of music. As Hatch and Miller point out in From Blues to Rock: An Analytical

History of Pop Music, in its most basic and traditional form pop music is an offspring of blues, boogie, and soul music. “By this we mean that the pop music tradition has evolved by means of a compound series of developments from the core musical family blues-boogie-soul. This basic musical family contains virtually all the elements out of which the musical types in the pop tradition have been constructed” (Hatch and Millward 5). According to Paul Oliver, what makes pop even more complex and complicated as a genre is that it embodies and signifies a litany of sounds, artists, and cultural experiences, which can all be subjective and depend on the audience, cultural context, historical significance, and mainstream culture of the time:

For innumerable young people in most, if not all, Western countries, and a significant

proportion of those in non-Western countries with access to contemporary mass media,

popular music is the music of today. Perhaps, they may have the expectations of the

popular music of tomorrow, but for the majority it is unlikely that popular music has a

history, or, at any rate, one that has any significance. For their parents, and for those of

older generations, popular music was to a great extent the music of “their day,” whenever

their youth may have been. (15)

Not only does this make pop music difficult to define or to have one specific sound encompass it, but it is also difficult to pinpoint what makes pop music the culturally significant phenomena that 110 the genre has become. “There is thus no explanation for the advent of pop music that is entirely satisfactory” (Dolfsma 1030). However, for this study an explanation of how pop was invented or became a cultural phenomenon is not necessary. What is needed is an understanding of the evolution of the genre and what it embodies as a genre today. In order to analyze this, it is important to briefly survey some of the significant moments and notable artists in the evolution of the genre that make it what it is in the 21st century.

While the exact timeframe for pop’s emergence as an influential genre in the mainstream media is unknown, the 1950s and the popularity of rock as a genre created more signifiers and categories for pop music by establishing a popular sound and music that was more prevalent in the media as well. By the 1960s, pop music coincided with cultural moments and had artists to embody the genre. Pop music was embodied by BeattleMania and the cultural impacts of the

Beattles as musicians. The 1970s saw the emergence of Elton John and the Jackson Five, which made way for Michael Jackson and Madonna in the 1980s. The 1990s was an era in pop music that focused on groups geared toward the youth. The Spice Girls in the UK made feminism and girl power a popular movement through music influencing young girls to embrace their inner strength and the power of sisterhood. Meanwhile in the U.S., boy bands like Backstreet Boys and

NSYNC aimed to replicate the fandoms of the Beattles. The early 2000s in pop music focused more on individuals, but stuck with familiar artists like Justin Timberlake, Brittney Spears, and

Christina Aguilera.

The current trends in the genre embrace individuality, difference, and diversity in ways that differ from the past, but issues continue to arise due to the fine line the genre still struggles with between hybridity and cultural appropriation, plus evolving with shifts in societal norms.

For example, one well-known face of the genre is Katy Perry who has been criticized over the 111 years for some of her songs and music videos. In 2018, the artist said that if she could go back, she would change some of the lyrics of her 2008 hit “I Kissed a Girl” that perpetuate stereotypes about bisexuality and sexual fluidity. “I think we’ve really changed, conversationally, in the past

10 years. We’ve come a long way. Bisexuality wasn’t as talked about back then, or any type of fluidity” (Leight). In addition to issues with her representation of sexuality, the artist had to address and acknowledge past instances of cultural appropriation in music videos and performances. In 2013, she performed at the American Music Awards as a geisha and has culturally insensitive lyrics and visual rhetoric in her popular song “This is How We Do” that she later apologized for, but Perry is not the only pop artist that is criticized for cultural appropriation.

In fact, many popular artists in the genre have been criticized for taking music from other genres without proper acknowledgments and using powerful rhetoric and symbolism from other cultures in order to sell albums. Most recently, Taylor Swift was accused of appropriating the cultural tributes Beyoncé performed at Coachella in 2018 during Swift’s 2019 Billboard Music

Awards performance for her new single “Me.” Beyoncé’s Coachella performance was a tribute to Historically Black Colleges and Universities and included a marching band, elements of

HBCU step shows, and even paid tribute to black activists like Malcolm X and Nina Simone.

Swift’s 2019 performance started in a similar fashion with a marching band, but they were dressed in all pink to go along with Swift’s motif and bubble gum pop aesthetic. Instances like these are tangled and weaved into the history of pop with artists trying to evolve with society while also being in a genre known for borrowing, and/or stealing depending on the perspective, from other genres to create a mainstream, broad appeal. 112

Contemporary pop still embodies these aspects, but continues to evolve to embrace more hybridity, uniqueness, and diversity in cultures by involving new artists to expand pop’s appeal.

Pop still relies on the popularity of Swift and Perry’s bubble gum pop aesthetic, but also taps into

Lady Gaga’s uniqueness and Ariana Grande’s hybrid sound. Pop is also a blending of cultures and languages in the form of K-Pop and the internationally popular group BTS. Another recent trend in pop music is the inclusion of artists openly representing the LGBTQ+ community not only with representation as the faces of movements, but through lyrics openly acknowledging same sex romances and love stories. Songs from popular artists Troye Sivan, Hayley Kiyoko, and Fletcher continue to change the genre and show how pop can be progressive. With all these complex aspects and elements in the nature of pop that ultimately demands that artists focus on appealing to the most mainstream audience possible, the question becomes how does the genre show resistance?

Katy Perry and “Chained to the Rhythm”

As one of the most popular artists in the genre, Katy Perry and her single “Chained to the

Rhythm” became an interesting case study due to the artist’s status in the industry and her attempt at trying to evolve and rebrand as an artist. Perry’s rise in fame began with hit singles like “Firework,” “I Kissed a Girl,” and “Hot N Cold.” She has been a popular, international musician for over a decade and gained popularity due to her range of music from bubble gum pop songs like “Roar” to pop with more serious tones like “Rise.” On social media, Perry is an influential artist with over 107 Million followers on Twitter and 80 Million on Instagram. As an artist, she is the epitome of pop in sound, appearance, and themes. She is known for her colorful aesthetic and catchy, pop sound that tends to cater to young adult audiences and focus on themes of partying, embracing youth, and living in the moment, which is why some of her fans and 113 critics were surprised when she released her most political song to date. “Chained to the

Rhythm” speaks out against the desensitized, blind bubble the artist believes most Americans live in. This song fits the criteria for the study because it was released in 2017 as a response to the election of President Trump. It is one of the most visible, popular songs of the study and the official music video has over 576 Million views on YouTube. Plus, the song includes many messages and themes focusing on apathy, calling for change of cultures and politics, and encouraging the masses to take a stand against the distorted messages and brainwashing the singer believes are cycled through the media on a regular basis to blind people to the truth.

Historical Context and Kairos for “Chained to the Rhythm”

The 2016 Presidential Election was a turning point in Perry’s career as she began to use her platform and influence to speak up about politics and social movements. Perry endorsed

Hillary Clinton for the election and even was willing to put her attention more on politics than her music. “Katy was one of Hillary Clinton's highest-profile supporters last year and delayed her fourth album in the wake of Donald Trump's US election victory, saying she wanted to address the political upheaval in her music” (Savage). After Clinton lost the election, Perry voiced her frustration on social media like many celebrities and public figures that opposed

President Trump. Perry followed up her frustration with the most political song of her career.

“Chained to the Rhythm” played a vital role in Perry reimagining herself as an artist and the purpose of her platform, but the song also brought backlash and criticism for its focus on politics.

According to BBC Music’s Mark Savage, Perry embraced the criticism of those telling her to

“shut up and sing” (Savage) and saw it as an opportunity to rebrand herself. “‘Boy, will I do so in a whole new way…Hell hath no fury like a woman reborn” (Savage). What makes Perry and

“Chained to the Rhythm” stand out as resistant music in the genre of pop is the kairos of the 114 release and the particular cultural moment it tackles. As Billboard’s Jason Lipshutz points out, this is what makes the song impactful in the genre:

Of course, Perry has been a political pop star outside of her music for years, serving as

the most visible musical artist to stump for Hillary Clinton during last year's campaign.

And she's hardly the only pop artist making these types of politically charged statements -

- Beyonce's Lemonade era has been a clenched fist for feminism and Black Lives Matter,

while Lady Gaga just used the Super Bowl halftime show to subtly support pro-LGBTQ

and anti-immigration ban agendas. "Chained To The Rhythm" is unique, though, for

doing two things: striking the first anti-Donald Trump blow since the man actually

became president, and amplifying Perry's new musical agenda at a time when she needed

one. (Lipshutz)

Critical Discourse Analysis for “Chained to the Rhythm”

The song is Perry’s first single in what the artist deems “Era Purposeful Pop”

(@katyperry) and is included on her Witness album. It differs in sound to some of her past hit singles and offers “a slower tempo, a heavier synth line and a more contemplative vocal delivery from Perry, whose typically declarative presence is pulled back to underline her worry and frustration” (Lipshutz). The messages within the lyrics are clearly resistant and depict a world that relies on living in bubbles, looking through false lenses, and refusing to focus on real-world issues. In this way, “Chained to the Rhythm” truly is a song that “plays out like a tweet comparing the Trump administration to George Orwell's 1984, in music form” (Lipshutz) and the song has a pointed message from the start:

Are we crazy?

Livin' our lives through a lens 115

Trapped in our white picket fence

Like ornaments

So comfortable, we're livin' in a bubble, bubble

So comfortable, we cannot see the trouble, trouble

Aren't you lonely

Up there in utopia

Where nothing will ever be enough?

Happily numb

So comfortable, we're livin' in a bubble, bubble

So comfortable, we cannot see the trouble, trouble

Ah, so put your rose-colored glasses on

And party on (woo) (Lines 1 - 14)

Perry mocks society’s need to focus on entertainment and guilty pleasure, while also appearing to be disappointed in herself as well. She includes herself in the lines of questioning and involves her own experiences with comfort and numbness in the song. The genre of pop is known for its catchy tunes and ability to make the audience entranced by the rhythm. Perry plays off of this and uses the song as both a way to play into the genre of pop, but also call attention to what the rhythm can do. For Perry, the rhythm is not simply catchy. It also creates a distorted view, blinds listeners to what is happening in the real world around them, and becomes a form of escapism that can hinder people:

Turn it up, it's your favorite song

Dance, dance, dance to the distortion

Turn it up, keep it on repeat 116

Stumblin' around like a wasted zombie

Yeah, we think we're free

Drink, this one's on me

We're all chained to the rhythm

To the rhythm, to the rhythm (Lines 15 - 22)

While Perry never mentions the presidential election, Hillary Clinton, or President Trump in the song, she does use the lyrics to show her disappointment by questioning if the call for attention to troubles in society will ever outweigh the temptation of comfort. The tone of the song is not one of anger, but sadness as the artist questions society’s awareness to the dangers around them and ability to overcome the need for comfort. This is followed by the repeated, rhythmic sound and lyrics of the chorus:

Are we tone deaf?

Keep sweepin' it under the mat

Thought we could do better than that

I hope we can

So comfortable, we're livin' in a bubble, bubble

So comfortable, we cannot see the trouble, trouble

Aha, so put your rose-colored glasses on

And party on (woo)

Turn it up, it's your favorite song

Dance, dance, dance to the distortion

Turn it up, keep it on repeat

Stumblin' around like a wasted zombie 117

Yeah, we think we're free

Drink, this one's on me

We're all chained to the rhythm

To the rhythm, to the rhythm (Lines 31 - 46)

Interestingly, the most resistant verse in the song does not actually come from Perry, but another artist featured on the song. Skip Marley is the grandson of the legendary Bob Marley and, much like his grandfather, believes in spreading messages that move the audience to act, inspire, and engage. In the verse, Marley speaks out against an empire he believes are blinding and exploiting people. He finishes by referring to “the lions” (Line 62), which is also a reference to his popular, resistant song “Lions.” Marley’s “Lions” encourages young people around the world to take a stand and remember that “We are the lions/We are the chosen/We gonna shine out the dark/We are the movement, this generation/You better know who we are.” The song was released in

February of 2017, the same month Perry released “Chained to the Rhythm,” and his verse is an accompanying piece to his song:

It is my desire

Break down the walls to connect, inspire

Ay, up in your high place, liars

Time is ticking for the empire

The truth they feed is feeble

As so many times before

The greed over the people

They stumblin' and fumblin' and we're about to riot

They woke up, they woke up the lions (woah) (Lines 54 - 62) 118

The song ends with Perry repeating the chorus before a group of vocalists join in to warn about how “it goes on, and on, and on.” As the song closes, it plays into the rhythm and relies on repetition to bring the message home. The final lyrics are sung by the group and Perry as they remind the audience to be mindful, “‘Cause we're all chained to the rhythm” (Line 74). “Chained to the Rhythm” is not necessarily a call to action or an overt critique of a specific political party or system of power. Instead, it is a reminder and Perry uses the lyrics of the song to send messages warning listeners about what can happen to a society when it becomes too caught up in the rhythm. In this way, the song is not only resistant, but a critique of the same types of media and art used as escapism that Perry benefits from as a musician.

Music can persuade an audience to be resistant. Music can also persuade an audience to be complicit and Perry is complicit in the systems of power that perpetuate the bubbles and society she is saddened by. The title itself is a message and while one being chained to something is seen as an act against a person’s will, being chained to the rhythm is more complicated. Those chained are kept in line by the rhythm, but they also enjoy the rhythm that chains them. The messages and metaphors within the song are powerful because they critique willful ignorance and obedience of people while also acknowledging how comfortable and safe it is to be obedient and ignorant. Perry highlights this throughout the lyrics of the song, plus uses the music to acknowledge her newfound resistance and attempt to shed her complicity as a pop artist.

Social Circulation for “Chained to the Rhythm”

In terms of the social circulation involved in the song, there are two forms the study focuses on, the official music video for the song and a live performance by Perry and Marley at the 2017 Grammy Awards. The official music video was released on Perry’s YouTube channel 119 in February 2017 and is set in an amusement park called “Oblivia.” The viewer follows the singer into the park as she excitedly looks around and follows the crowds of people.

Fig. 13. - Screenshot from Katy Perry’s “Chained to the Rhythm” music video.

The aesthetic for the video is similar to her past music videos with colorful backgrounds, clothing, and designs and at first glance the video appears to be riddled with the stereotypical bubble gum pop visuals Perry is known for. The clothing seems similar in style to the fashion found in 1950s America, but the technology and rides in the park are futuristic in design. As the video continues, the audience starts to see designs that are familiar for viewers who have seen the popular 1960s and 1980s cartoon The Jetsons. The costumes, technology, and aesthetic are references to the blend of past and future worlds of the cartoon to create the world of Oblivia in the amusement park.

One ride in the park is “The Great American Dream Drop” and the ride consists of people going into small, colorful houses that are swirled through the air in circles when the ride begins before having the houses drop. Perry’s character considers this ride, but bends down to smell the roses and is pricked by a thorn on the stem before she makes her way over to it. The small prick 120 causes her to bleed and she frowns as she senses the world around her may not be as perfect as it appears. She tries to go back to focusing on Oblivia as the lyrics “so comfortable we’re living in a bubble, bubble/so comfortable we cannot see the trouble, trouble” play. Instead of “The Great

American Dream Drop,” she decides to get on the “Love Me” rollercoaster with a handsome young man and becomes immersed in the fun while people below find lines to join and wait to be entertained as well. The tunnel the rollercoaster zooms through is full of animated hearts, smiley face emojis, and symbols found on social media sites such as the Like buttons. While Perry is on the Love Me ride, the Great American Dream Drop malfunctions and when the houses drop, some snap from their chains and crash to the ground. “A metaphor, perhaps, for the US housing crisis, where reckless lending left thousands of people homeless” (Savage). However, the masses of people in the park are unfazed by the incident and continue waiting in their lines, swaying in unison and marching to the same beat all the while.

Another ride in the park called “The Greatest Ride in the Universe” consists of people waiting their turn to race on a wheel that resembles a hamster’s wheel. The line for the ride is quite long and the people seem eager to take their turn, so Perry’s character decides to go to the

Inferno H2O station for a drink, which is fashioned like a gas station. The light blue drink is poured from gas nozzles and is on fire when she goes to take a sip. “The pumps are supplying

‘inferno water’ - a reference to the West's dependency on oil, but also to the looming crisis over the world's water supply” (Savage). Perry is from California, a place known for droughts and fires, so it is not surprising she uses visual rhetoric in the video to bring attention to these issues in such a way.

From there, the scene cuts to Perry’s character in a theater with an audience. She looks around her and seems to be out of place as the rest of the audience put on their 3D glasses in 121 unison. She hurries to put hers on as well, but is not entertained by the show of a white woman ironing clothes while her husband reads the newspaper and their daughter colors in a coloring book.

Fig. 14. - Screenshot of Perry without 3D glasses.

The audience is nodding their heads in synchronized movements to the rhythm of the song as they stare at the stage, but Perry’s character is not impressed. Behind the family is a massive television and on the black and white screen Skip Marley appears. This catches Perry’s attention and she takes off her 3D glasses as he steps out of the television to say “they woke up, they woke up the lions.” This inspires her to see the world in a different way and as the audience begins dancing around her in perfect synchronization to the rhythm, she does not fall in line. She sings to them about being chained to the rhythm as realization dawns on her, but they continue to ignore her words.

Fig. 15. - Screenshot of Katy Perry and Skip Marley. 122

The last scene of the music video shows her on the wheel of “The Greatest Ride in the

Universe,” but she stops running as she sings “Cause we’re all chained to the rhythm.” She looks at the camera in shock as the video cuts to black. The music video is an example of Perry’s reimagined version of pop, the “purposeful pop” that Perry rebrands her music as, and it is full of metaphors and visual rhetoric critiquing the state of society and lack of attention paid to the world’s issues. It is also an example of an artist blending the visual rhetoric prevalent in the genre with messages of resistance. Perry takes the bubble gum pop aesthetic she is known for and uses it to make the audience comfortable enough with her messages of resistance due to the similarities of the appearance of the video to past, popular videos like “California Gurls.”

Live Performance at the Grammys

The visual rhetoric in the music video differs from the visual rhetoric implemented in

Perry’s live performance at the 2017 Grammy Awards though. As mentioned in the previous chapter, award shows tend to like to control the narrative of the live performances of artists and the organizers are wary of acts deemed too political even outside of the genre of country and its audiences, but this did not stop Perry from putting on a performance with resistant visual rhetoric. In the case of the live performance at the Grammys, the resistant visual rhetoric was in the form of using the U.S. Constitution to support the rhetoric in the lyrics. The performance begins with Perry singing behind the white picket fence she speaks of being trapped in during the song. She eventually emerges from the fence and is in an all-white pant suit, which could be a nod to the political candidate she endorsed, Hillary Clinton. The stage itself moves in a circular motion with a house inside the picket fence. Once Perry is out of it, she spends the performance dancing around the house and fence. Throughout the song, Perry speaks of the bubble being full 123 of distortion to blind people and the fence during the performance reflects this by becoming staggered mirrors that reflect distorted images of Perry back to the audience.

Fig. 16. - Screenshot of Katy Perry and Skip Marley’s live performance.

The most impactful moments of visual rhetoric occur when Marley joins her on the stage and pieces of the stage become distorted, shifted, twisted, and altered behind them before eventually changing into a backdrop with words from the U.S. Constitution. “We the People” is scrolled in the familiar text as Perry and Marley finish the performance with their hands joined together. At the end of the performance, as the audience cheers and the stage goes black, Perry is heard saying one final message, “No hate!” The Grammys would have been a platform Perry could use to tone down the message if she wanted to change the narrative or focus. However, at one of the biggest award shows in the music industry, the singer continued to tap into her music to spread messages of resistance. In addition to the performance and visual rhetoric on stage,

Perry also showed this through her attire by wearing an arm band with the word “Persist” written on it. This was a reference to “Nevertheless, she persisted,” which was Senate Majority Leader

Mitch McConnell's justification for silencing Senator Elizabeth Warren the week prior. Perry tapped into the social circulation and kairos occurring on social media leading up to the performance and used part of the popular hashtag as rhetoric and a message to place on her 124 clothing as well. “Chained to the Rhythm” is Perry’s most political and resistant song to date and the artist tapped into multiple rhetorical strategies to spread the message.

AJR and “Burn the House Down”

While Katy Perry is a well-known artist in the genre, AJR was chosen not only because of how the pop band fits the criteria, but their status as artists in the genre. The main labels in the genre of pop focus on producing mainstream music with a wide appeal and while artists like

Perry have enough power, influence, and wealth to push back against the systems of power established in the music industry, this study also analyzes the way musicians with less power and influence enter into these spaces with intentions of producing music with resistant messages.

AJR has been active in the music industry as an indie pop band since 2005, but did not gain recognition by bigger, mainstream audiences until 2017 with the release of their hit song

“Weak,” which was featured on their album The Click. In 2018, the band released a deluxe edition of the album and it included “Burn the House Down,” a song that became one of their most popular and a summer pop hit. AJR’s “Burn the House Down” fits the criteria for the study because it was released in 2018, responds to political and cultural tension in the U.S., has over 28

Million views on the band’s official YouTube channel, and is one of the theme songs used for the March for Our Lives movement and tour in the summer of 2018.

Historical Context and Kairos for “Burn the House Down”

Much like grandson’s “thoughts and prayers” from the genre of rock and alternative in

Chapter Three, AJR’s “Burn the House Down” gained popularity when it was used in a video promoting the March for Our Lives movement. During the summer of 2018, the organization started by students from Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School organized the Road to Change tour and the extra exposure gave the song a platform the band did not expect. “Little did 125 members Adam, Jack and Ryan Met know that the song would end up becoming part of a greater cause. The energetic track, meant to reflect the current American political climate, has been adopted by the March for Our Lives campaign, appearing in the announcement video for the organization’s ongoing Road to Change tour” (Kaplan). Kairos played a pivotal role in the song’s success as it was played during the campaign tour the entire summer. This coincided with the song’s popularity and play on the radio, making the song a summer hit that climbed the

Billboard charts. The song was not originally written as a song for the campaign, but the band embraced the chance to use the platform for their music:

That was very cool. We wrote the song observing this strange thing happening in our

generation where regular people have so much power. Regular people can get TV shows

shut down, and they’re making amazing political change as well, thanks to Twitter. …

We wrote “Burn the House Down” from a very personal, honest place. Then March for

Our Lives reached out to us and they saw a connection between their cause and what we

were writing about. Now it’s their theme song, which is really cool. (Kaplan)

While AJR gained momentum earlier in the year with their hit song “Sober Up,” the band recognizes how the movement gave them access to a broader audience that may not have been aware of their music beforehand. This was especially significant considering how aware the band was of their political messages and tense cultural and political times the band found themselves in during the song’s release.

Critical Discourse Analysis for “Burn the House Down”

“Burn the House Down” is an intriguing case study due to the song’s political lyrics, but upbeat, summer pop hit sound. Unlike Perry’s “Chained to the Rhythm,” “Burn the House

Down” can pass as something other than political. While the lyrics are clearly resistant, the 126 sound relies on the catchiness of the rhythm and beat to entice the listener. If the listener is focused on the lyrics, the message is clear, but if listening to the song simply for the sound, the messages of resistance can easily go undetected. This is due to the song’s upbeat tone and bass, plus AJR’s lack of resistant, political songs in the past. While surveying songs for the study,

“Burn the House Down” was almost overlooked and not selected due to its ability to be ambiguous in nature. During the first listening session for the song, the “house” in question could be interpreted as an actual house at a house party, but after a second listening session paired with interviews from the band and watching the announcement video for the tour on

March for Our Lives’ official Twitter account, it was clear the “house” being burnt down is not a regular house during a party. The house symbolizes a power structure much bigger than originally interpreted and the lyrics for the song reveal the deeper meaning. The song begins with the band questioning how to act and respond to the climate around them and wants to make it clear the band is usually hesitant to resist, to speak out, and to take a stand. The beginning of the song is a reflection about what brought the band to this moment and to this song:

Used to keep it cool

Used to be a fool

All about the bounce in my step

Watch it on the news

Whatcha gonna do?

I could hit refresh and forget

Used to keep it cool (Lines 1 - 7)

The band is speaking as members of the younger generation and as a band in the music industry trying to make music successfully. The hesitation felt is not only due to a yearning for being able 127 to “keep it cool” in the past, but to the new urgency to write about for a greater cause. “‘We wanted to write an AJR political song, and it comes with a lot of insecurity,’ Ryan tells RS of the track, which chronicles an internal debate about whether to take a stand against injustice or simply ‘keep it light’” (Kaplan). The band ultimately decides not to “keep it light,” but continues to be aware of the consequences of being too political and resistant in the music industry. Such songs do not always become hits and are often limited in play on the radio. They also tend to not be performed and marketed to the mainstream media:

Should I keep it light?

Stay out of the fight?

No one's gonna listen to me

If I write a song

Preaching what is wrong

Will they let me sing on TV?

Should I keep it light?

Is that right? (Lines 8 - 15)

The chorus of the song is a transition from hesitation to an assertive voice as the band decides to no longer keep it line and instead focus on taking a stand. They accuse people in power of being dishonest and hiding the truth and decide to reveal what their call to action will be. “We gon burn the whole house down.” In addition, the music picks up in pace and one of the catchiest parts of the song begins. Background vocalists begin chanting as if cheering on the choice and the sound begins mimicking that of soldiers or people marching along with trumpets:

Way up, way up we go

Been up and down that road 128

Way up, way up, oh no

We gon' burn the whole house down

Watch me stand in the line

You're only serving lies

You've got something to hide

We gon' burn the whole house down

We gon' burn the whole house down (Lines 16 - 24)

The target of the criticism is left ambiguous throughout the song, which appears to be intentional. It could be the government or a public figure. It could be the music industry or the band’s label. It is unclear and that works to the advantage of the song as the band leaves the antagonist of the song up to the imagination. No matter what though, it is someone the band is aware of and has past experiences with:

Yeah, used to let it go

Walk into the show

Gawking at the tricks up your sleeve

Too good to be true

Fool, I'm in a room

Full of entertainers and thieves

Used to let it go

Woah, oh no (Lines 25 - 32)

After repeating the chorus, the band returns to pondering how to act and respond by thinking about a few questions. “Should I hang my head low? / Should I bite my tongue? / Or should I march with every stranger from Twitter to get shit done?” (Lines 42 - 44) The questions are 129 immediately followed by answers and a return to the focus of the song. “Used to hang my head low / Now I hear it loud / Every stranger from Twitter is gonna burn this down” (Lines 45 - 47).

The rest of the song is spent repeating the chorus and amplifying the familiar sounds of the marching band in the background until it sounds like troops being rallied. This is what makes the song rhetorically effective as the theme song for the Road to Change Tour. The goal of March for Our Lives is to rally and encourage American citizens to take a stand against gun violence by voting for gun control measures. “Burn the House Down” is an oddly effective message because while the message of burning the whole house down could be interpreted as ironically violent when used for an organization calling to an end for violence, the catchiness of the song and the call for action to gather like troops fits.

Social Circulation for “Burn the House Down”

While the use of the song for March for Our Lives’s Road to Change Tour is an important part of the song’s success, the use of visual rhetoric in the official music video on the band’s YouTube channel also plays a key role in the social circulation of the song. The band published the video on August 30, 2018 and has accumulated over 23 Million views as of the time of this study. The music video plays with the interpretation of the “house” in the lyrics by starting the music video in a house that looks to have been used for a house party. The first scene shows the band walking through the house and looking around at the empty bottles and trashed room. The space they are in is ambiguous in nature, which is a theme the music video taps into throughout. The band members walk across the room and sit down in a golden cart that resembles an amusement park or carnival ride. As soon as they are seated, three ambiguous figures in all black with black masks covering their faces step behind the band members to place black blindfolds across their eyes. 130

Fig. 17. - Screenshot of AJR with blindfolds.

Once the blindfolds are in place, the cart begins to roll forward and the figures in black pull back the red curtains to allow the cart to pass through. It is unclear what the space they enter is or the purpose of it, but it is a combination of rides one might experience at a carnival or circus. The black figures remove the band’s blindfolds and accompany them as they pass through different phases of the ride. They pass by a sinister figure that appears to be a man dressed in a business suit with a red tie. The figure is holding two knives and sharpening them against one another as the ride passes by him. The man’s face is covered by a beige mask that conceals his identity and there are no significant markers that make the man stand out. The only thing clear is that the man poses a threat to the band as they take the ride.

Fig. 18. - Screenshot of the mysterious figure from “Burn the House Down.” 131

The next phase of the ride has the band pass by distorted mirrors before the sinister figure returns to throw the knives at a person on a spinning wheel. The person is also in a business suit with a red tie, but unlike the other figures, the person is not wearing a mask and she is a white female attached to the spinning wheel as the sinister figure takes their aim. The sinister figure throws two knives at the wheel and they land on each side of the woman’s head. She is unfazed by the knives being thrown at her and the band watches as if viewing a show.

Fig. 19. - Screenshot of televisions from “Burn the House Down.”

Once the show is completed, the figures in black place the blindfolds back on the band members before another set of curtains open to reveal a dark room full of old, cathode ray tube televisions. Some of the televisions have static screens, others are turned off, but a few of the televisions have black screens with the word “truth” displayed in white font. The word is written in different languages on different televisions, which include English, Spanish, Russian, and

Chinese. In addition, instead of just one sinister man in the room, now there are two holding axes and hammers to break the televisions. The black figures remove the blindfolds once again and the ride takes the band around the room as the sinister figures smash the televisions with the 132 words truth displayed. The band remains in the room, spinning and shifting around as the figures destroy the televisions all around them.

The black figures place the blindfolds back on the band’s eyes and they enter another room full of screens with images of city lights and roads racing by in a blur all around them.

While in the room, for the first time in the music video, the band members remove their blindfolds on their own. Once this is done, the ride exits the room and emerges from the foggy darkness before coming to a halt. The band members step off of the ride, walk outside, and are met with chaos all around them as people run around the dark streets with flares and red smoke.

Trash cans are roaring with flames, people are chanting and proudly holding weapons like bats and crowbars in the air as they run around. The band appears to have left the strange, eerie ride and entered a chaotic scene of a riot. The band does not join in on the chaos, but instead calmly walks toward it as the music video ends.

Fig. 20. - Screenshot of the ending from “Burn the House Down.”

In terms of symbolism, messages, and visual rhetoric, AJR’s music video for “Burn the

House Down” is the most ambiguous video analyzed. It leaves much up to the audience’s interpretation. The spaces entered, the figures involved, and end scene all remain unclear, but when paired with the music and the timing of the lyrics with each scene it is clear the band 133 members transition from a place meant for entertainment and distraction to a place meant for action and scenes so chaotic one cannot ignore them. AJR’s “Burn the House Down” is a song about shifting from accepting the situation and blindness around the band to making an intentional choice to take a stand and resist. This message is evident in the music video as well and even if the band relies on ambiguity to allow the audience to interpret the rhetorical situation, the band still guides the audience to certain messages, much like the black figures do for the band members during the ride. Just as the black figures place the blindfolds on the band and remove them at certain moments throughout the ride, the music video reveals certain messages and visual rhetoric to the audience, such as destroying televisions displaying the word truth and making sure the audience sees the band take off their own blindfolds before the ride can end. In an interview with Rolling Stone, the band says they do not consider themselves leading their generation in a movement, but they do want to use their platform to speak up.

“We’re not leaders; I’m not going to lead a resistance. But me as a twentysomething is trying to figure out where I fit in [and] how much of a voice do I actually have” (Kaplan). However, AJR is contributing to movements and resistance through the band’s music. “Burn the House Down” is forever linked to the announcement video for March for Our Lives’ Road to Change and as

Cameron Kasky, an organizer of the movement, states as the song begins “welcome to the revolution” (@AMarch4OurLives).

Rhetorical Strategies for the Genre

Katy Perry’s “Chained to the Rhythm” and AJR’s “Burn the House Down” are two cases that reveal how musicians in the genre of pop use mainstream music to encourage resistance while also acknowledging how pop music operates in these spaces as rhetoric. Pop is a genre that relies on social cues, trends, societal norms, and constructs of cultures to exist in the mainstream 134 media. The genre is malleable and morphs to fit its target audience, while also finding ways to mold the audience. This study finds that in both cases analyzed, this is done through intentional, rhetorical choices in the form of resistant lyrics accompanied by trendy visuals steeped in the traditions of pop to create aesthetically pleasing music videos. Not only does this enable the social circulation of the resistant rhetoric to continue without much pushback from the music industry, but also persuades the audience through the catchiness of the sounds to embrace the rhetoric.

With this trend, it is important to note that the music videos tend to differ from the lyrics they represent in popular music. Perry relies on symbolism in the amusement park, but still depicts a clean, sterile world doused in the pastel aesthetics often used in bubble gum pop music videos. AJR speaks of burning the house down, but at no point depicts the burning of a house in the music video or makes a point to clarify what the “house” actually embodies or symbolizes.

Also in both cases, the artists are passive in the worlds around them until taking a stand at the end of the video, but even the way the artists stand up and resist are tame. Perry literally stands up in the theater. She also stops running on the wheel at the end of the video. The band members take off their blindfolds and walk around as people around them act. I argue that this passive action or inaction is an intentional rhetorical strategy in the genre of pop. While the lyrics may speak of resistance and calls to action, the actions are muted in the visual rhetoric. Resistance through visual rhetoric is carried out in passive, muted ways even when the lyrics are assertive and steeped in action.

The history of the genre and its current status in the music industry suggest this type of rhetorical approach to resistance is due to the genre’s power structure and setup in mainstream music because artists are aware of their roles and the type of resistance they are allowed to 135 encourage in the spaces allotted within the genre. This is clear in Perry’s music video for

“Chained to Rhythm” and AJR’s music video for “Burn the House Down” and this pattern continues in 2019. In order to be resistant in the genre of pop, the resistance must be accompanied with a muted version of rhetoric or in some cases, a chaser. This metaphor of the chaser is like drinking something pleasant to wash away a harsher or bitter taste. Perry chases the resistant messages with an aesthetically pleasing video. AJR chooses to mute the threatening message of burning down the house by muting the violent themes until the very end and not actually engaging in them.

A rhetorical strategy for pop artists after voicing resistance in some shape or form is to rely on visual rhetoric in the form of music videos to return to pop traditions and stick to the pop sounds their audiences find comfort in. In this way, artists are making rhetorical moves to use the spaces the genre confines them to in ways that are not encouraged by the music industry. Pop is a genre that is created, manufactured, and produced to be as mainstream as possible, so artists in the genre must be cognizant of how they tap into rhetoric to distribute messages of resistance.

Artists are aware that the genre is not known for the rebellious tropes of rock and alternative or rap and hip hop. It also has a broader target audience than country. In order to be resistant in the genre of pop, musicians must find ways to be rhetorically effective and aesthetically pleasing as a mainstream and catchy source of music many listeners demand. As a result, pop artists must implement different sets of rhetorical strategies, mask resistance through sound and visual rhetoric, and be aware of the rhetorical situation they find themselves in. 136

CHAPTER VII: FINDINGS, LIMITATIONS, AND IMPLICATIONS

In the previous four chapters, I analyzed eight examples of music used as a mode of resistance in order to identify patterns and trends in rhetorical strategies within four mainstream genres of music. Each chapter dedicated time to analyzing critical discourse analysis and social circulation to focus on this study’s three main research questions. Chapter Three analyzed the genre of rock and alternative music and focused on Muse’s “Thought Contagion” and grandson’s

“thoughts and prayers.” These songs are examples of how the genre is willing to embrace rebellion as a trope, but often with the stipulation that those resisting look like the status quo and can help the labels in power capitalize off of the resistance the artists depict in their song lyrics, music videos, and performances. Music used as a mode of resistance in the genre is often situated in intersections of power and privilege with white males serving as the faces, voices, and gatekeepers of the messages of rhetoric. However, in the two cases analyzed for the study, the artists are at the very least aware of this rhetorical power and their rhetorical strategies indicate their ability to use their status and privilege to send out messages of resistance.

Chapter Four examined the genre of rap and hip hop and analyzed Childish Gambino’s

“This is America” and Eminem’s “The Storm” and reveals how race plays a role in the type of rhetorical strategies, themes, and topics of resistance are approached. Artists in the genre embrace social commentary and are willing to be controversial in order to do so. The chapter also focuses on the correlation of the artists’ music and visual rhetoric to responses about systems of power and social constructs in terms of race. The race of the resistant performer played a role in the response by the listener and the rhetorical strategies implemented. Chapter

Five analyzes the genre of country by exploring Carrie Underwood and Brad Paisley’s parody

“Before He Tweets” at the 2017 Country Music Awards and Willie Nelson’s “Vote Em’ Out.” 137

Both cases reflect how the genre of country is dictated by the gatekeepers in the country music industry and their views on identity, politics, and cultures in the West. The rhetorical strategies of the artists show their awareness to the restrictive nature of the genre and how critical audiences and gatekeepers are to messages of resistance.

The final chapter of analysis is dedicated to the genre of pop and examines Katy Perry’s

“Chained to the Rhythm” and AJR’s “Burn the House Down.” Artists in the genre of pop take social cues from trends, societal norms, and constructs of cultures in mainstream media to decide which rhetorical strategies to implement with their messages of resistance in their music. The ability for the genre to morph, adapt, and be malleable give more options for resistant messages than many of the other genres in mainstream music due to the artists being able to pair messages of resistance with traditionally pop sounds and aesthetically pleasing visual rhetoric. The chapter also explores how the catchiness of pop music plays a role in the willingness of the audience to embrace the music even when it is resistant.

These four chapters are analyzed in such a way to reveal the rhetorical strategies of musicians using their music as a mode of resistance and are structured to assist in examining the following research questions of the study:

 How do musicians in different genres use music as a mode of resistance?

 What rhetorical strategies are at play and are there differences depending on the

genre of music?

 What role does technology play in how musicians communicate messages of

resistance through music to their audience? 138

The final chapter of this dissertation focuses on the findings in relation to the research questions, added limitations of the study, and explores the implications and further research to consider before concluding the study.

How Do Musicians in Different Genres Use Music as a Mode of Resistance?

The previous four chapters reveal how the four genres of mainstream music approach themes of resistance and utilize rhetorical strategies and visual rhetoric to spread messages of resistance to their audiences. While each genre differs in approach and each artist within the genres selects rhetorical strategies and means of persuasion specific to their focus, there are some themes, patterns, and webs of association each genre studied has in common. The following chart outlines major themes and webs of association found while conducting the research in each genre: 139

Table 4

Webs of Association

Song Themes and Webs of Social Circulation Target of Association Resistance “Thought Call to Action, Music Video and Populist Contagion” Muse Propaganda, Social Media Movements in the (Rock and Movements, Truth West Alternative) “thoughts and Gun Violence, Lyric Video and U.S. Gun lobbyists prayers” Desensitization, Call March for Our Lives and legislators grandson to Action, Performance against gun control (Rock and Movements, Truth measures Alternative) “This is America” Gun Violence, Music Video Mainstream Childish Gambino Desensitization, American Culture (Rap and Hip Hop) Racism, Distraction “The Storm” Gun Violence, U.S Live Performance at President Donald Eminem Policies, Racism, 2017 BET Awards Trump (Rap and Hip Hop) Bigotry, Distraction, Show Call to Action “Before He Tweets” Desensitization, Live Performance at President Donald Carrie Underwood Nuclear War, Social 2017 Country Music Trump and Brad Paisley Media Awards (Country) “Vote Em Out” Elections, Call to Live Performance at U.S. Legislators Willie Nelson Action 2018 Beto O’Rouke and Elected (Country) Rally Officials “Chained to the Elections, Music Video and Live Mainstream Rhythm” Desensitization, Performance at 2017 American Culture Katy Perry Distraction, Truth, Grammys (Pop) Call to Action “Burn the House Call to Action, Music Video and Ambiguous Power Down” Movements, March for Our Lives Structure in the AJR Distraction, Truth Road to Change Tour West (Pop) Announcement Video 140

The themes presented in the chart are based on the CDA conducted in the study and overall webs of association and recurring themes within the music lyrics of the selected songs. While each song and genre differs slightly, there are some overarching themes to consider.

One theme is that each genre has some type of call to action. “Thought Contagion” and

“thoughts and prayers” ask the audience to consider actions to take and movements to join in order to face the corrupt powers that be. “This is America” outlines several issues in America’s culture, like desensitization to gun violence, to make the audience question the role they play in perpetuating the actions and how complicit they are in the system. “The Storm” asks the audience to take a stand for or against Trump and Eminem explicit states anyone who supports him cannot also support President Trump. Even though “Before He Tweets” lacks a specific call to action, the call to action in “Vote Em’ Out” is explicit in the title and Katy Perry and AJR use their songs to ask the audience to take a stand against power systems. The calls to action range from ambiguous instructions, like “brace for the final solution” in “Thought Contagion,” to specific actions, like “so if you don't like who's in there, vote 'em out” in “Vote Em’ Out.”

Another theme prevalent in each genre is entertainment as distraction. This theme in particular is fascinating due to music’s function as part of entertainment. Distraction is a significant theme in 4 out of 8 songs analyzed and in each case, the artist warns about the power of entertainment as a type of distraction. Childish Gambino refers to “slime” in the song and does specific, trendy dances in the music video as chaos ensues behind him. Eminem raps about how the president uses his tweets as attacks against the NFL and others as a form of distraction from his policies and actions. Katy Perry sings about “bubbles” and how music is used to distract from what is happening in the world in “Chained to the Rhythm” and AJR talks about how they used to be distracted by “entertainers and thieves” (Line 30). In each case, distraction as 141 entertainment is deemed a negative, even dangerous notion and the artists try to bring awareness through their lyrics and the visual rhetoric they provide to the audience.

Two final themes prevalent in many of the cases are the uses of symbolism and ambiguity as rhetorical tools. Muse, Childish Gambino, Katy Perry, and AJR all rely on symbolism and ambiguity to assist in their resistant messages. These two themes are linked because often symbolism is used in order for the actual target of the resistance to remain ambiguous. For example, Muse never explicitly calls out a power system, government, politician, or leader in “Thought Contagion.” Instead, the band states “you’ve been bitten by a true believer.” This line is repeated in the song and the music video depicts vampire-like figures and other masked figures as the sinister forces trying to infect the audience. The music video for

“This is America” is the most rhetorically significant in terms of loaded visual rhetoric and symbolism, but the artist leaves the interpretation of the visual rhetoric up to the audience. AJR and Katy Perry use symbolism throughout their music videos, but AJR is even more ambiguous about the target to resist because the band never states what “house” they are going to burn down. Ultimately, these artists implement these strategies in order to overcome any issues their labels or gatekeepers may have with the message. In this way, not only are they showing they are aware of how their rhetoric impacts their audience, but also how to be rhetorically effective in their approach in terms of acting against power structures in the music industry.

What Rhetorical Strategies Are at Play and Are There Differences Depending on the Genre of Music?

The rhetorical strategies of each case and artist are outlined in great detail in the previous four chapters, but it is important to consider how the strategies differ based on genre. This study finds that there are in fact differences in rhetorical strategies and approaches to themes 142 depending on the genre of music. Each genre relies on the tropes and perceptions of their genre in order to create resistant music. The genre of rock and alternative is known for its rebellious nature, so artists in the genre embrace concepts about rebellion, resistance, and revolution in their music. Like rock and alternative, the genre of rap and hip hop historically is rooted in pushing back against systems of power. However, rap and hip hop artists use racially charged rhetoric, explicit language, and the trope of embodying the voices of the disenfranchised in predominantly black neighborhoods to send messages of resistance. A main difference in approach between the two genres is that rap and hip hop choose to focus on social injustices rooted in race and poverty, while rock and alternative tend to focus on broader issues that impact a demographic not focused primarily on racial injustices. The artists surveyed in the genre of country music steered clear of mentions of race or a specific social movement altogether. The genre is not known for its political commentary, especially against conservative ideals, so the artists tapped into rhetorical strategies to resist with this in mind. Finally, the genre of pop differs from each of the other genres due to its ability to be malleable, embrace hybridity, and mold into different forms based on social norms and cultural trends. The artists rely on the catchiness of pop music for the listeners, but ultimately have fewer restrictions due to pop’s ability to evolve in visual rhetoric and aesthetic. Therefore, this study finds that pop is one of the least restrictive genres even though it is not always the most resistance.

Each genre differs in rhetorical strategies and the strategies evident based on the genre depend on the perceptions, traditions, patterns, and histories of the genre. These factors help to determine how receptive the audience is to resistance as well. These four mainstream genres have parameters and systems in place based on their status and reputation in the music industry.

In this way, the genres are part of a bigger power structure creating popular culture and also 143 smaller power structures within their own sectors of the music industry. As a result, this study finds that the type of resistant rhetoric in the music relies heavily on the genre the music is in and the parameters of that genre in the music industry. In order to investigate these findings further, two terms are considered, resistant and restrictive.

This study uses the term resistant in reference to several different types of rhetoric outlined in the research and in terms of this section the word resistant also refers to the scale or ranking of the genres when it comes to actively engaging in overt resistance. With this in mind, this study finds that country music is the least resistant genre, rock and alternative compares to pop music as a genre with resistant music, and rap and hip hop as a genre is the most resistant.

This finding is based on the rhetorical strategies, rhetoric, and overt resistance conveyed in the genres. Unlike country, rock and alternative, and pop, rap and hip hop as a genre does not rely on ambiguity to the same extents and each examples shows overt resistance through explicit lyrics, visual rhetoric, and clearly resistant messages. “The Storm” is the most explicitly resistant song in the study and the music video for “This is America” is the most explicitly resistant visual rhetoric studied. Rock and alternative ranks right below due to the overt resistance in the lyrics of the two songs and visual rhetoric of the music videos, but pop is tied in rank due to its surprisingly resistant messages. Country is ranked at the bottom as the least resistant and this study finds a correlation for each genre with the restrictive parameters evident in the genres surveyed.

The term restrictive refers to the standards, unwritten rules, and parameters set forth by the sector of the industry and the gatekeepers involved in the genre, plus the perception of the openness of the audience to receive the messages of resistance. As a result, the genre of rap and hip is the most resistant and least restrictive genre of the study. Rock and alternative ties with 144 pop and have fluctuations in how restrictive and resistant the genres are, usually in response to the cultural norms and social constructs the genres align with overall. Country is the least resistant and also the most restrictive genre due to the lack of focus on resistant messages in the genre overall, the rhetorical strategies implemented by artists when they want to send messages of resistance to audiences, and the factors impacting if the audiences are receptive to the music.

Most Resistant and Least Restrictive Genre Rap and Hip Hop

Fluctuations with Resistance and Restrictions: Rock/Alternative & Pop

Least Resistant and Most Restrictive Genre: Country

Fig. 21. - Chart of genres based on resistance and restrictions.

The type of resistance differs from other modes of resistance due to the type of rhetorical strategies and visual rhetoric evident in music as an art form and this is then compounded by the different types of rhetorical strategies available based on different genres of music. This is impacted and relies heavily on music’s ability to be experienced as a mode of art and 145 entertainment, but more importantly for this study the way music is distributed, experienced, and shared in the 21st century.

What Role Does Technology Play in How Musicians Communicate Messages of Resistance through Music to Their Audience?

The final research question takes into consideration the way music operates, how resistance operates within music, and how technology plays a role in the way music is used as a mode of resistant rhetoric. Each genre shows resistance through the rhetoric the artists believe can work alongside the rules and standards of that genre in both lyrical and visual rhetoric. And yet these examples are simply the beginning of a new wave of resistance in a current flashpoint of cultural tensions and political division, which is why many musicians are speaking out through their music and implementing new modes of technology to do so.

Therefore, the analysis makes it clear that technology impacts the way meaning-making occurs in this current flashpoint. In a time of such cultural and political tensions in the West, the construction, production, and distribution of ideas, concepts, and rhetoric is being overlooked due to the information overload and toll taken on the consumers. In Literacy in Times of Crisis,

Susan Florio-Ruane states “we often do not recognize how our interpretations and actions have been shaped by powerful social rhetoric. We can see evidence of this in the ways that we readily assimilate ideas and situations into our vocabulary and take them for granted as ‘the way things are’” (160). This study finds that not only is powerful social rhetoric shaping meaning-making in the current flashpoint, but social media, digital streaming sites, and the infinite possibilities of constructing meaning in online spaces are altering the way messages are communicated, perceived, and their influence. 146

One of the most impactful findings of this study is that musicians in the 21st century use online, digital spaces to create meaning in a feedback loop with their audiences. This feedback loop differs from previous modes of communication and rhetoric for musicians and listeners due to new devices and the availability of digital spaces. Social media, YouTube, and streaming sites like Spotify alter the way musicians impact their audiences and not only does this change the interaction between musicians and listeners, musicians are aware of the shift. Social media sites such as Twitter and Instagram are used by musicians to communicate directly with their listeners, promote their songs, address questions about their work, and bring attention to topics and causes important to the musician. This in and of itself alters the rhetorical power and impact of musicians in an already changing digital space where anyone with a device and internet access can connect to the outside world instantly. Social media allows these artists to connect with fans and blur the private and public spheres music already muddied. Music has always been a blend of the public and private spheres due to music’s ability to be a shared experience and a personal one all at once. The listener can listen to a song on their own in a secluded environment or they can experience the music with a group of people at a concert or music festival. Technology complicates this function of music in fascinating ways because now a listener can stay at home and watch a live concert as it streams from their computer. This functionality also impacts the rhetorical power of music to connect, affect, and reflect multiple spheres at once.

In addition, the social circulation of music and the way it is distributed online are altered by these digital spaces in ways that give more power to musicians and listeners and less power to gatekeepers in the music industry and beyond. This aligns with Florio-Ruane’s argument that

“this state of change can reinforce hierarchies but it can also be revolutionary, opening up possibilities of new action. As such, crisis can be a powerful catalyst for the making (or re- 147 making) of society and identity” (164). The more spaces available to spread the rhetoric, create the feedback loop, and navigate, the more options allotted to the musicians and listeners as they contemplate messages of resistance. This aspect of music and resistance plays a pivotal role in the way rhetoric is implemented and constructed, how rhetoric is carried out as a meaning- making activity, and how we are consumers and scholars experience, perceive, and consider rhetoric moving forward. It also changes the way musicians engage in performativity, embody rhetoric, and negotiate digital spaces due to how power structures and the gatekeepers residing within them use digital spaces as well.

Even when the music is resistant, musicians still must find ways to work within the power structures and system in order to gain visibility. For example, while Muse speaks often about the threat of capitalism, technology, and the manmade machines doing the bidding of powerful oppressors, they also promoted Microsoft Virtual Reality during their world tour. On the band’s official twitter, a tweet posted on March 1, 2019 states, “Technology powers more than just our immersive live shows. See how we're bringing fans into the world of ‘Simulation

Theory’ with help from @microsoft #VR.” The post includes a video of the band speaking about the tour, their music, and the game they created to accompany the album. A few fans picked up on the irony of the band speaking against corporate powers, capitalism, and technology, while promoting Microsoft at the same time. @FooledbySecrecy posted lyrics from the band’s 1999 song “Showbiz” to counter the post “another corporate show/a guilty conscience grows” was the response followed by a gif of someone sipping tea. The irony fans allude to relates to the irony of contemporary activism that Radhika Gajjala describes in Digital Diasporas: Labor and Affect in

Gendered Indian and Digital Publics when the scholar states “the irony of the contemporary moment of activisms is that capital, branding, and resistance are all interwoven” (20). This is 148 evident in the above case because while Muse’s endorsement of the massive tech corporation is ironic due to the resistant messages the band creates about technology, it also points to the tricky cycle musicians must navigate in the music industry while implementing rhetorical strategies in digital spaces.

Technology alters the way musicians use rhetoric to impact their audiences and examples of resistant music highlight this throughout the study. Music has always disrupted the separation of public and private spheres by allowing musicians to engage in meaning-making, social, and rhetorical activities throughout history. However, advancements in technology and the inclusion of more people in digital spaces changes the impact of rhetoric through music. Therefore, music is now cultural, rhetorical, and interactive in ways that do not allow for a small group of gatekeepers to control narratives, experiences, and the rhetoric disseminated. This is what allows for music in the current flashpoint to impact, fuel, and reflect cultural shifts, social movements, and digital sites of investigation in ways that differ from past eras and flashpoints. In addition, the added emphasis on rhetoric’s power to affect people in digital spaces through the role of technology also significantly impacts the way genres of music are utilized to create groups based on communities and/or identities and how these formulations of genres allow for certain rhetorical strategies to become more powerful and impactful based on the chosen genre.

This study finds that different genres of music tap into different rhetorical strategies and artists are aware of the available means of rhetoric in their genre, which impacts the way music acts as resistance and how musicians target their audiences in rhetorically effective ways.

Therefore, I argue music is not only the “humanly organized sound” John Blacking theorizes in

How Musical is Man? Music is rhetorically organized sound, constructed intentionally beyond the sonic resonance and nostalgia experienced by the listener. It is intentional rhetoric with 149 specific positionality, intersectionality, identity politics, and ethos in mind. These concepts not only drive musicians, but also form the genres of the mainstream music currently consumed and this study finds it is important to be mindful as consumers of how impactful and intentional music is as a powerful, rhetorical tool.

Limitations of the Study

The aim of this research is to examine how music operates as a mode of rhetoric, specifically when artists use music as rhetoric to spread messages of resistance. As stated in

Chapter Two, there are a few acknowledgements to recognize with this study, such as the study focusing solely on English-speaking audiences, the subjective nature of music, and the dependence of the music on social interpretation. There are two other limitations to recognize with this study as well. First, defining music genres is a complicated, layered, and highly subjective practice that continues to be challenged even after the study concludes. Even when using one, consistent platform like Spotify, the blurring of genres within the music industry makes it difficult to place some songs in specific genres. This is not only evident while surveying music for the study, but also currently in the music industry as controversies over what charts, awards, and records should be attributed to which genre of songs. An example of this is the popular 2019 song “Old Town Road” by Lil Nas X. The artist categorizes the song in the genre of country, but his song was rejected as a song in the genre by the country music industry and organizers of the Billboard charts. The inability for the music industry to create steadfast criteria based on sound and aesthetic to qualify genres makes it difficult to pinpoint what fully embodies a genre in music and could be its own study.

Second, while a deep analysis of each song selected is carried out for the research, the litany of symbols and interpretations through CDA and social circulation are vast and range 150 depending on the interpretation. By studying the social circulation involved in all of the cases, the overall meanings and messages of resistance were identified. However, some cases, like

Childish Gambino’s “This is America,” involved a spectrum of symbolism and the smaller details with ambiguity were left up to the interpretation of the audience. An entire study applying

CDA and social circulation could be conducted for each song independently, but the purpose of this research is to reveal how genres of music showing resistances implement rhetorical strategies and technology in order to work as a mode of resistance and method of rhetoric.

Implications

This research finds that music is rhetorically organized sound, constructed intentionally beyond the sonic resonance and nostalgia experienced by the listener. It is intentional rhetoric with specific positionality, intersectionality, identity politics, and ethos in mind and is a powerful, rhetorical tool. As Hatch and Millward assert, “most unequivocally of all the arts, music is a social activity” (viii) and this study reveals the way music is a method for rhetoric that should continue to be explored as such in the 21st century. Scholarship rooted in analyzing how musicians use their art as a form of resistance and the implications is necessary in the discipline of rhetoric and composition because music continues to play a powerful role in the way humans perceive, interpret, and respond to languages and cultures. Researchers must continue to assess frameworks and methodologies rooted within the field and those that allow venturing outside of it through interdisciplinary practices like the ones conducted in this study. This work is imperative because it is already being done in other fields, such as ethnomusicology and communication studies. In these works, theories of rhetoric are implemented, but the discipline is on the periphery of ongoing conversations. Musicians are rhetorically effective through music and implement intentional, rhetorical acts to persuade listeners. This dissertation aims to explore 151 how this is carried out in mainstream genres of music in the West and there are three areas of research this study can be significant in for the discipline.

First is the subfield of cultural rhetorics, which is a field in the discipline that interrogates sites of power and relationships to systems in order to expose colonial practices and work in decolonial methods of research. According to Bratta and Powell in “Entering the Cultural

Rhetorics Conversations,” there are four points to emphasize in the field: decolonization, relations, constellation, and story. Each of these is prevalent in studying music in the methods outlined in this research. In addition, cultural rhetorics relies on “stories from the perspective of colonized cultures and communities that are working to delink from the mechanisms of colonialism” (Bratta and Powell). Music is a site of investigation for collecting data to understand the stories, narratives, and experiences of cultures often marginalized and colonized.

This type of work also investigates what music does in specific cultures, how it is used in the forms of activism, and how meaning is made, practiced, and negotiated in these spaces. A pattern found in the study is the way identity politics was perpetuated, constructed, and imagined in the genres of mainstream music by the music industry. Most of the genres are situated in spaces taken up by predominantly white bodies in an attempt to present genres as allotted spaces for specific races of people. This is carried out through narratives perpetuated by the music industry, on the radio, and in mainstream media. And, if listeners are not aware of the rhetorical strategies and power systems at play, music can be used to box people into genres based on race, perpetuate stereotypes, and create social identities. Further research in this area can be done to interrogate how music as a method of rhetoric is colonial, how it can also be decolonial, and the way music is rhetorically effective and used by various communities of peoples to share narratives, stories, and experiences. 152

Second, this study can contribute to the subfield of sonic rhetoric because while it does not focus solely on sound and instead chooses to analyze music lyrics as a form of rhetoric along with visual rhetoric, this research can provide modes of analysis and another approach to investigating how music is used rhetorically in different genres and mainstream culture. In

“(Re)Educating the Senses: Multimodal Listening, Bodily Learning, and the Composition of

Sonic Experiences,” Ceraso emphasizes “sound as an embodied event, as opposed to something that is heard exclusively through the ears” (103) and such an embodied event “can help students develop a deeper understanding of how sound is manipulating their feelings or behaviors in different situations” (103). This research assists in moving the conversation beyond the sole focus on sound to discuss not only how students listen, but what is perceived, experienced, and interpreted during the listening experience. In this way, the study can serve as a bridging of the gaps between music as primarily sound and music as art with lyrical content.

The final area of study to consider implications for this research is the area of pedagogy in rhetoric and composition studies due to multimodality being an important emphasis in the discipline with the evolving status of the writing classroom. In “The Movement of Air, the

Breath of Meaning: Aurality and Multimodal Composing,” Cynthia Selfe states, “anyone who has spent time on a college or university campus over the past few decades knows how fundamentally important students consider their sonic environments—the songs, music, and podcasts they produce and listen to; the cell phone conversations in which they immerse themselves” (617). Selfe observes how music can be a useful tool in the classroom to connect with students and the field of rhetoric and composition continues to conduct research on sonic rhetoric and music’s effect on students and pedagogy. This dissertation is another example of how studying music as rhetoric can be quite helpful in pedagogy as well. By thinking of genres 153 of music as sites of research and spaces to analyze, educators can offer students more opportunities to explore different genres of writing, while also thinking about composition as more than text. An example of this work in an undergraduate writing course would be to focus on the methods of data analysis to give students the chance to analyze a song with CDA, apply examples of social circulation, and discuss how the rhetoric plays out in the music, performances, and/or online. For a graduate course, more emphasis could be placed on the theories and applications of the methods and methodologies presented from the study. In both cases, this research serves as evidence of how music can be used as a site of investigation for the discipline and the current technological boom creates new avenues for this type of research. In the past decade, research has shown how technology changes the way people communicate and spread rhetoric. This research contributes to these ongoing conversations in the discipline, along with connecting the implications to beyond the discipline with an interdisciplinary approach in mind.

This research assesses how musicians act as rhetors in order to gain a better understanding of how music is used as a form of resistance in this current flashpoint and reveals how themes in music influence our culture, language, and interactions with one another, especially in messages of resistance. An additional goal of this research is to experiment with methods of research that can be used while analyzing rhetoric and music. The field of rhetoric and composition lacks a vast variety of scholarship focused on how musicians act as rhetors and what music is, was, or can be rhetorically. This type of research takes an interdisciplinary approach, but instead of allowing ethnomusicology or communication studies to dominate the scholarship, the aim of this research is to move beyond these fields to reveal how rhetoric and composition can lead the way. 154

Conclusion

When first imagining this research, I did not expect the words of Nina Simone during the

Civil Rights Movement to be reflected so clearly in the contemporary artists surveyed for the study. As a musician and activist, Simone tried to convey the importance of the artist to embrace their duty and yet the words also fuel this study in terms of exploring how rhetoric is used when musicians utilize art as a mode of resistance:

I choose to reflect the times and the situations in which I find myself. That, to me, is my

duty…..and in this crucial time in our lives when everything is so desperate, when every

day is a matter of survival, I don’t think you can help but be involved. Young people,

black and white, know this and so that’s why they’re so involved in politics. We will

shape and mold this country or it will not be molded and shaped at all anymore. So I

don’t think you have a choice. How can you be an artist and not reflect the times?

(Garbus)

The way Simone reflected her times was controversial and not always embraced by audiences in the 1960s. The rhetorical strategies she used were not always effective due to the way the music industry and gatekeepers of the power structures at play refused to allow her message to be fully received. In past research, I have studied the way musicians like Simone used their music to reflect the cultures they were a part of and even used Simone’s work as a case study of communication breaking down between the artist and the listener. These cases are even more important now as the current flashpoint in the West is studied as research continues to link technology like social media to studies in activisms.

Current social and political movements tap into online spaces to mobilize in ways researchers continue to study due to the rapidly-evolving strategies, techniques, and trends in 155 activism through social media. Activism takes place in spaces not solely private or public, offline or online, but in a blending of worlds used strategically to collaborate and co-produce movements, thoughts, and conversations on a multitude of platforms. As Naisargi N. Dave reminds us, “activism begins, then, precisely as the virtual in the actual world, the previously unthinkable that is now a flickering possibility, just on the verge of entering upon the world of norms. To study activism is to study the relationship between the virtual and the actual, the as- yet-inassimilable and the assimilated” (10).

This dissertation encounters similar trends in resistant rhetoric as the way musicians utilize rhetorical strategies in online spaces is analyzed throughout. By viewing musicians as activists participating in movements as individuals and as parts of collectives, this study finds that musicians using music as a mode of resistance to spread a focused type of rhetoric are indeed intentional activists in this regard. Musicians are aware of the way their target audience will respond based on the specific audience they deem as their listeners and the genre they situate themselves in. As a result, artists actively trying to spread messages of resistance must be mindful of the power structures and gatekeepers involved in order to engage in rhetorical strategies that will give them the best opportunities to reach their audience. In the past decade, musicians have also ventured into digital spaces to use technology to distribute messages in meaningful ways and engage in meaning-making activities in online spaces that at the very least embodies many of the same rhetorical practices as other activists.

Musicians do not simply release albums anymore. They release visual albums online, publish music and lyric videos on YouTube, engage with their listeners on social media accounts, and give their audiences immediate and nonstop access to their work through sites like

Spotify. Musicians acting as rhetors is not a new concept, but the platforms and media that they 156 utilize alter the distribution and efficiency of this type of resistance. Among all the current cultural tensions, there is also a cultural revolution underway globally because of technology.

Therefore, there are two main takeaways from this research. First, music is rhetorically organized sound and should be approached in such a way. Music persuades, shapes, interrogates, and affects cultures. Second, technology in the 21st century alters the way this type of rhetoric exists in online and digital spaces.

The study finds musicians not only use music as a rhetorically effective mode of resistance, but utilize the rhetorical strategies specific to their genre of music to persuade their target audience. This persuasion does not move simply from the musician to the listeners.

Instead, the continuous feedback loop through social media, popular culture, and the use of digital music services, such as Spotify, create a conversation that continues between musicians and listeners. The way these conversations are carried out in the 21st century differs from past modes of communication through art and this research explores the way this impacts the production of resistant music and the rhetoric at play. Music moves us, but more importantly, music fuels movements and when music is used as a mode of resistance, it becomes a powerful rhetorical tool that influences people and cultures during social and political movements. The impact of this method of rhetoric is enhanced by technological devices, the internet, and online spaces in the 21st century, which alters the way music affects meaning-making activities when compared to past uses of music during flashpoints and cultural shifts.

For example, in “The Revolution Will Not Be Televised” Gil Scott-Heron urges the listener to stand up, get out, and not wait on the revolution to come to them because the revolution will not be successful unless protesters unplug from their technology and distractions:

You will not be able to stay home, brother 157

You will not be able to plug in, turn on and drop out

You will not be able to lose yourself on skag and skip

Skip out for beer during commercials

Because the revolution will not be televised (Lines 1-5)

However, while this was certainly true in 1970 when the song was released and remains true to a certain extent today, technology has changed the functions and potential for rhetoric in digital and online spaces.

The revolution has always been in music, but now it is plugged into headphones and streaming on Spotify playlists. It is uploaded in music videos on YouTube and shuffled through social media feeds. The revolution is trending with a hashtag and Twitter Moments page. The rhetoric of revolution is on full display in the eight cases for this study. It is also in Milck’s

“Quiet,” which became an anthem for the #MeToo Movement during the 2017 Women’s March.

It is in Taylor Swift’s music video for “You Need to Calm Down,” which the artist released to show support for the LGBTQ+ community and featured several members of the community resisting the oppression faced on a regular basis. The video also includes a message imploring its

132 million viewers to sign a petition to support the Equality Act. With this study and these current examples in mind, I argue musicians are assuring that the revolution may not be televised, but the revolution will be Spotified. 158

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