Protest Music in Youth-Culture Multi Model Analysis of Music

Combining a critical evaluation of recent work on youth, music and local identity with original ethnographic work, this book provides a wide-ranging study of music and style-centered youth cultures in a local context. Detailed studies of dance music, rap, bhangra and progressive rock examine how these musical styles become part of daily life in different urban settings. In addition, the book features exploration of white hip hop culture in Britain, the socio-cultural significance of local pub venues and the increasing popularity of "tribute" bands.

We communicate multimodally. Everyday communication involves not only words, but gestures, images, videos, sounds and of course, music. Music has traditionally been viewed as a separate object that we can isolate, discuss, perform and listen to. However, much of music's power lies in its use as multimodal communication. It is not just lyrics which lend songs their meaning, but images and musical sounds as well. The music industry, governments and artists have always relied on posters, films and album covers to enhance music's semiotic meaning. Music as Multimodal Discourse: Semiotics, Power and Protest considers musical sound as multimodal communication, examining the interacting meaning potential of sonic aspects such as rhythm, instrumentation, pitch, tonality, melody and their interrelationships with text, image and other modes, drawing upon, and extending the conceptual territory of social semiotics. In so doing, this book brings together research from scholars to explore questions around how we communicate through musical discourse, and in the discourses of music. Methods in this collection are drawn from Critical Discourse Analysis, Social Semiotics and Music Studies to expose both the function and semiotic potential of the various modes used in songs and other musical texts. These analyses reveal how each mode works in various contexts from around the world often articulating counter-hegemonic and subversive discourses of identity and belonging.

Powered by a driving beat, clever lyrics, and assertive attitudes, rap music and hip hop culture have engrossed American youth since the mid-1980s. Although the first rappers were African Americans, rap and hip hop culture quickly spread to other ethnic groups who have added their own cultural elements to the music. Chicano Rap offers the first in-depth look at how Chicano/a youth have adopted and adapted rap music and hip hop culture to express their views on gender and violence, as well as on how Chicano/a youth fit into a globalizing world. Pancho McFarland examines over five hundred songs and seventy rap artists from all the major Chicano rap regions—San Diego, San Francisco and Northern California, Texas, and Chicago and the Midwest. He discusses the cultural, political, historical, and economic contexts in which Chicano rap has emerged and how these have shaped the violence and misogyny often expressed in Chicano rap and hip hop. In particular, he argues that the misogyny and violence of Chicano rap are direct outcomes of the "patriarchal dominance paradigm" that governs human relations in the United States. McFarland also explains how globalization, economic restructuring, and the conservative shift in national politics have affected Chicano/a youth and Chicano rap. He concludes with a look at how Xicana feminists, some Chicano rappers, and other cultural workers are striving to reach Chicano/a youth with a democratic, peaceful, empowering, and liberating message.

Songs, pervasive sonic ephemeral acts that combine words and music, live in a contemporary world of commercialization as commodity. Flowing through our everyday lives as a given and oft-underacknowledged artifact to accompany our shopping, car trips, date nights, and gym days. Yet songs have a history as long as humanity and language. They hold a place, up until recently in our evolution, as an oral history library of the human species. Why then is there limited scholarship about how songs tell stories, and the ways in which those stories come together with sounds? And why is there a disconnect between songwriting as industrial practice and academic thought? A New Philosophy of Songwriting argues that all songwriting choices are storytelling choices and asks the question: how can we think about Song as one of the most memorable, potent, multimodal, and portable storytelling devices ever devised? In doing so, Andy Ward and Briony Luttrell make the case for rethinking the analysis of songs and practice of songwriting with an emphasis on listening. This is a book for songwriters, scholars, and song lovers alike. Ultimately, the authors challenge contemporary thinking on music and song itself and argue for a new theorisation of song as a multimodal storytelling sonic act.

This book explores the impact of globalisation and new technologies on youth cultures around the world, from the Birmingham School to the youthscapes of South Korea. In a timely reappraisal of youth cultures in contemporary times, this collection profiles the best of new research in youth studies written by leading scholars in the field.

The book Youth, Identity, and Re-Fashioning Popular Music in Israel. 1950s–1980s aims to refresh the understanding of the relationship between social power relations, youth culture, and popular music in Israel. The authors discuss various perspectives regarding the axis of youth, popular culture, and music and present additional options for the discourse on these topics in Israel. Among its many new findings, the study discusses new insights relating to the increasing openness of Israeli culture to globalization, the decline of the collective culture of the Sabra, the rise of individual culture, liberalism and neoliberalism, the decay of Israeli consensus, and the melting pot idea and practices. In addition, the authors examine various perspectives on how Israeli culture and music have changed over the years and reacted to historical alterations. It reviews the tensions between modernism and postmodernism, localism and globalism, teenagers and their parents’ culture, ethnicity and class, hegemonic negotiations, and marginal subcultures. This book uses historical methodology combined with the assistance of cultural theories, historical surveys, and first-hand documents.

Understanding Youth: Perspectives, Identities and Practices addresses the changing context and nature of youth, encouraging readers to understand different conceptualizations of youth, issues of identity and the key social practices that give shape to young people's lives in the contemporary period.