Kesa Research Paper

In today’s society, music controls the way we live our lives. The influence that music has on society has broadened throughout the years and with social media being one of the world’s top priority, the fan base and spectrum for music in general has expanded significantly. Music is used to express feelings, moods, circumstances, experiences, knowledge, and so much more. With this being the case, the lyrics of any song can be interpreted differently by each and every listener. Many song lyrics give positive messages, promoting well-being, whiles others give negative messages, promoting violence, criminal behaviors, sexual contents, and disrespect towards others. With this being said, music reflects what the public demands, and in many cases the negative messages are often times what sells more than those music giving positive messages.

Music has a dynamic ability of influencing emotions, from mood regulation to rumination and self-expression. The presence of political and social messages in popular music is frequently seen across cultures, in particular focusing on social issues and racism (Back, 2000, 127). This paper attempted to explore the political and social messages in popular music, more specifically it investigated the relationship between Soul music and civil rights movements in the United States.

Music is a creative art form that allows the artist to construct something that expresses a purpose. It evolves over time and changes as the world changes, taking on many different motivations behind the melody and lyrics. In today’s society, anger, oppression, racism, and negative opinions rule the media and popular culture. I believe that African Americans need to show their self worth and not let white people hold them back. With the music in white culture often mocking African American culture and portraying negative stereotypes, African Americans have to find ways to gain respect. In acknowledgement of the negative portrayal of their culture, African Americans respond by creating songs and videos that express their pride in their culture and heritage, react to white oppression, and communicate their independence.

Beyoncé Knowles, a well-known singer, songwriter uses two of her songs: “Freedom” and “Formation” to tell the story of herself. “Freedom” is the beginning of her story where she is searching for freedom and equality showing that there is still much inequality and injustice for African Americans in America today. The song slowly transitions to a more positive tone when she seems to have made something beneficial out of her difficult situation. “Formation,” however, has a completely different tone. While she does address negative situations from the past at the beginning of the song, she quickly transitions to a more positive tone full of pride in where she came from, who she has become, and what she has overcome. Together, the two songs

In this essay, Joan Morgan talks about how the hip hop allows African Americans to articulate their pain. She considers that the beauty of hip hop comes from is its ability to express all kind of feelings, but many feels that hip hop lower women to just a sex object. In her journey to understand what is happening to men in the black community, she exposes herself to the music of famous male rappers. To her surprise, she discovers that the macho appearance is just a disguise to hide how hopeless they feel when it comes

The audience may think the top of their heads might blow off, when first hearing the song “Mystery of Iniquity” by Lauryn Hill. The album that the song was on (MTV Unplugged No. 2.0) went on to sell 5 million copies. Sure, there are females that rap, sure there are other ground-breaking studio productions that were a work of art in and of itself, and sure rappers use lyrics that connect to relationships, politics, faith, and cultural criticism, but not like the famous Lauryn Hill. The poetic devices in Lauryn Hill’s “Mystery of Iniquity” reveal society’s inevitable self-destruction through societal stigmas and stereotypes, justice system flaws, and religious references. To all the people who said that hip-hop had nothing important to say, and had not a lick of musical bone in them, this song was a smack in the face to all the haters.

Working Thesis: Music, especially hip-hop, in the black community has been long considered terrible music to the white mainstream media, and while, to a degree, this can be arguably true, certain types of music have played key roles in overcoming or thriving against systemic racism especially in America.

In the first chapter of her book Hip Hop and Religion, Monica Miller compares hip hop to "dirt" to underscore societal opposition to this cultural art form (Miller 26). She claims that since those in power believe hip hop is disorderly, hip hop is often perceived as a cause of social unrest instead of a criticism of societal faults (Miller 27). Throughout this discussion of hip hop as a "matter out of place", Miller describes that the distinction between socially acceptable and unacceptable cultural forms is made intentionally by those in power (Miller 32). While reading this chapter, I kept thinking of Iggy Azalea, the Australian rapper who in popular culture has been exiled from hip hop (Drake 2). Similar to Bill O'Reilly's attack on hip hop as a motivator for societal disorder, some from the hip hop community such as Azalea Banks and T.I have claimed Iggy has exploited the black experience for profit (Miller 24, Drake 2). Others celebrate Iggy Azalea for her ability to succeed albeit momentarily in a black, male dominated rap industry (Hope 1). Understanding the contradictory perceptions of Iggy Azalea allows for a discussion of the power structures and motivations inherent to hip hop. Throughout this essay, I will use Miller's depiction of "dirt" to describe Iggy Azalea's rise and exile within the hip hop community.

The author Jennifer McLune analyzes the standards of black women in hip hop and how the industry feeds of the degrading of women and women hating for their own personal success. She is trying to convince the fans of hip hop that this genre of music is sexist & degrading. McLune reasons for this is simple and that is to justify the fact that artists need to stop making songs like this and for women to take action against these songs, because the only thing these songs do is continue to give women a bad name. She continues to stress her point to the industry as well as acknowledging conscious artists by saying “they appear to care more about their own acceptance by mainstream artists than wanting to make positive changes in the culture” (McLune 222). But the

Rather than conforming to societal ways, female rappers and blues women work within and against dominant sexual and racial narratives in American culture to exposed the stereotypes and explored unfair contradictions. By so doing, they redefined women’s “place”. They forged and memorialized images of tough, resilient, and independent women who were unafraid neither of their own vulnerability nor of defending their right to be respected as autonomous human

Rihanna’s songs are engineered to target the largest, broadest audience, as they use everyday phrases, repetition, and an attitude to drift our attention away from the raunchy meaning of her lyrics. Most teenagers appreciate Rihanna for her swagger and sexual, feminine attitude as the girls find it empowering and the boys find it attractive. However, parents may appreciate Rihanna in the same way, but they may not fully comprehend the directness of her lyrics. Adults, rather, dance along to the upbeat and catchy beat of her songs, for which the meaning of the lyrics become null as they work alongside the rest of the

As the day is coming to an end, cell phones rumble with a text here and there. Each question was always answered with confidence and enlightenment. As she visualizes each moment, she sends each message with a slight smile. After every question, she is still very eager to answer another. She remembers her high school experience to be incredibly tiring and enjoyable.

Music has been around for as many as 55,000 years. The Egyptians, Ancient Greeks, Romans and African slaves all had different forms of music. Much like today, we have several different types of music, country, rock, soft rock, gospel, jazz, pop, R&B; one of the most controversial genres would be Hip-Hop and Rap along with urban black pop. Today, music is still pivotal. Music can personify people, by giving voice expressions to those who otherwise may not be heard. At the Super Bowl 50 halftime show in Santa Clara, California at the Levi’s stadium, actress, mogul and singer, Beyonce performed her newest single since her 2014 album, self entitled, “BEYONCE” called, “Formation.” This marked history as Bey’s most straightforward, controversial

Recently, there has been an upsurge in varying representations of femininity in popular music. Taking three prominent female popular artists as exemplars, articulations of their gender can be explored and compared. Taylor Swift, Miley Cyrus, and Beyoncé are three incredibly influential popular artists. The way they each portray femininity in their music demonstrates that there is no longer just one way for women in the music industry to depict themselves. While Taylor Swift can be described as a stereotypical version of femininity, Miley Cyrus reclaims her sexuality in her shift from her previous Disney persona, and Beyoncé demonstrates that women can achieve everything they set out for.

Do you ever wonder what is the meaning behind what you so proudly sing whenever you hear it? Music is an art form of culture which organizes sound with times It first came around in prehistoric times, however, as times passes, music is drastically changing. As a result, in the last decades music has experienced drastic changes in the themes they are talking about. These changes are due to the generations and what they are living, political and social actions of the time. For example, the decade of the 80s was the rise of hip-hop and rap music from a local phenomenon to a worldwide known genre of music. Previously, a crack cocaine epidemic had stroke major cities in the USA and it coincided with the rise of hip-hop in black communities as these