The purpose of this study was to examine the sexual content found in music lyrics of different genres and their relationship to specific sexual cognitions. The study included 902 participants, both male and female, belonging to various ethnic backgrounds, ages 18 and up. It was hypothesized that listening to music containing frequent sexual lyrics will have an affect on men and women’s sexual cognitive beliefs. Results indicated that there was a relationship between frequency of sexually explicit lyrics and views on sexual cognitions. The breakdown by genre shows a more detailed relationship between the lyrics and sexual cognitions. Overall, the results supported the notion that frequent exposure to sexually explicit lyrics has a significant relationship to sexual cognitions.

This essay researches the prevalence of Gnostic influences in contemporary music lyrics, more exclusively within the context of the extreme metal scene. A resurgence of such topics has also been evident in contemporary music; not surprisingly, as music in general is part of the foundations of culture, and in a wider aspect, of society at large. The essay is performed using a hermeneutic method, interpreting music lyrics and discussing them from a background of cultural and religious theory. The purposes of researching the influences of Gnosticism in this environment are to determine the presence of Gnostic thought in extreme metal lyrics, research the eventual re-interpretations of historical sources of Gnosticism, and to discuss the acknowledged Gnostic influences in the displayed art form in a contemporary cultural perspective, related to cultural aspects such as secularization, modernity and globalization. Sources include music lyrics appropriate to the subject matter at hand as well as previously published interviews. The results of the investigation demonstrate that there are multiple interpretations of Gnostic thought apparent in extreme metal lyrics, varying from slight re-interpretations to more extensive ones, as apparent in what is identified as a chaos-gnostic current. The Gnostic material has in the latter scenario been integrated into an originally satanic worldview and as a result has become a major part of the chaos-gnostic belief system. The chaos-gnostic current has appeared in a highly secular surrounding, and the results of the essay propose that a secular surrounding can breed elements of trangression within individuals, leading to the resurgence of oppositional counter-cultural characteristics and an awakening of alternative spirituality with oppositional overtones.

Sometimes students struggle to interpret literary texts because some of these texts do not lend themselves to the deduction of the interpretative processes with which they are familiar, but the same is not true when students pull interpretations from songs. Is it possible that students’ familiarity with songs might enable them to connect a song with a book and aid interpretation that way? This study attempted to explore the possibility of bridging songs to literary texts in my Community College English classroom, to ascertain if or how the use of song can support or extend students’ interpretive strategies across different types of texts. I investigated how songs might work as a bridge to other texts, like novels, and, if the students use songs as texts, to what extent do the students develop and hone their interpretative skills? Because of this, how might including songs as texts in English writing or English Literature curriculum contribute to the enhancement of students’ writing? The students’ responses disclosed that the songs appealed to their cognition and memories and helped them to interpret and write about the novels they read. Moreover, the students’ responses revealed that pairing or matching songs with novels strengthened interpretation of the book in a plethora of ways, such as meta-message deduction, applying contexts, applying comparisons, and examining thematic correlations. When a novel is bridged or paired with a song, interpretation can also be derived by examining different perspectives, characterizations, personal connections, and life experiences. Exploring emotional connections as well as signs and symbolism can also enable interpretation. Another way to deduce interpretation, according to the students, is to locate a reoccurring issue or thread in a song and transfer the analysis from the song to the novel. However, although a few students might not use songs to interpret literary texts, they might still be able to recognize that the possibility exists to grasp meaning that way.

While some research has been done on the influence of music lyrics on sexual behaviors in general, none has explored the lyrical influence on sexting. The goal of the current study is to explore the longitudinal influence of sexual and sexually objectifying lyrics on adolescent sexting behaviors. Participants were 125 14-year-old adolescents who were recruited from high schools in Texas. Participants completed questionnaires on music preferences, sexual behaviors and impulsivity and were given BlackBerry devices through which frequency of sexual text message utterances was obtained. Music preferences were then quantitatively analyzed using the Linguistic Inquiry Word Count (LIWC) software. Logistic regression analyses were conducted to explore the influence of both sexual and sexually objectifying lyrics on sexting behavior. Additionally, biological sex and impulsivity were explored as moderators. Analyses revealed that 40.65% of adolescents participated in some form of sexting at Time 3 (42.81% at Time 1) but that music lyrics had little direct influence on sexting. However, biological sex appeared to moderate the relationship between sexual lyrics and sexting such that males were much more likely to participate in sexting when exposed to sexual lyrics where females were not. These and other results are discussed as well as implications for parents and the need for further research on sexting and the behavioral influence of musical lyrics.

<p>Tema ovog rada jeste poezija britanske popularne kulture dvadesetog veka, odnosno, stihovi pop i rok pesama britanskih muzičkih autora. Polazna teza disertacije jeste to da se tekstovi popularnih pesama mogu smatrati poezijom, te da se uobičajene metode koje se koriste pri analizi tradicionalnog pesničkog stvarala&scaron;tva mogu upotrebiti i kada je reč o pop i rok tekstu.<br />Iako se popularna muzika odavno posmatra kao bitan činilac u kulturi dvadesetog i dvadeset prvog veka, i kao takva jeste predmet brojnih kritičkih studija, primećuje se iznenađujuća činjenica da se te studije uglavnom bave njenom kulturolo&scaron;ko-sociolo&scaron;kom ulogom, zbog čega je i istražuju upravo iz tog ugla. Za razliku od njih, ovaj rad se usredsređuje na pesničke elemente popularne muzike (poetika), i to tako &scaron;to ih tumači kao i svaki drugi književni tekst (hermeneutika). Ponekad se ovoj analizi dodaje i muzikolo&scaron;ka, jer se značenje popularnih pesama stvara kombinacijom tekstualnog i muzičkog aspekta.<br />U odabiru bendova koji su postavljeni u sredi&scaron;te analize od velike koristi bila je teorija Kira Kitlija (Keir Keightley) o romantičarkoj i modernističkoj autentičnosti popularne muzike. S obzirom na to da su studije popularne muzike uglavnom posvećene romantičarsko autentičnim stvaraocima, predmet istraživanja ove disertacije jesu tri modernističko autentične grupe, a to su Bitlsi (The Beatles), Kvin (Queen) i Mjuz (Muse). Njihovi tekstovi su tematski podeljeni u četiri grupe: pesme o ljubavi, narativne pesme, pesme o unutra&scaron;njem svetu i pesme o spolja&scaron;njem svetu; i analizirani su u skladu sa takvom podelom.<br />Nakon izvr&scaron;ene analize, izveden je zaključak da se tekstovi rok i pop pesama uistinu mogu smatrati poezijom, čak i kada stihovni element neke pesme služi pre svega kao pratnja muzičkom. Na ovaj način, utvrđeno je da pop i rok poeziji i te kako pripada mesto u &scaron;irokoj i raznorodnoj oblasti pesničkog stvarala&scaron;tva.</p> / <p>The topic of this research was the poetry of 20th century British popular culture, i.e., the lyrics of pop and rock songs written by British authors. The basic thesis of the dissertation was the idea that popular music lyrics can be considered to be poetry, and that the usual methods used to analyse traditional poetry can thus also be used in the analysis of pop and rock lyrics.<br />Even though popular music has long been considered a valuable factor in the 20th and 21st century culture, therefore being the topic of numerous critical studies, most of these studies have, surprisingly, been focused almost exclusively on the culturological and sociological importance of popular music and have thus approached it accordingly. This research is instead focused on its poetical elements (poetics), interpreting them as it would any other kind of literary text (hermeneutics). Sometimes, musicological element is also added to the analysis, given that the meaning of popular songs is created by the combination of both text and music.<br />Keir Keightley&rsquo;s theory of Romantic and Modernist authenticity in music has been greatly helpful in choosing the bands on which the research was to focus. Since popular music studies mostly deal with Romantic authenticity, three bands which display Modernist<br />vii<br />authenticity &ndash; The Beatles, Queen, and Muse &ndash; were here chosen as subjects instead. Their lyrics were divided into four thematic groups: songs about love, narrative songs, songs about the inner world, and songs about the outer world; they were analysed according to these thematic focuses.<br />After the analysis was done, the following conclusion was drawn: pop and rock lyrics can indeed be considered poetry, even when the textual element is only secondary to the musical one. It has thus been proved that pop and rock texts should be regarded as part of the vast and varied area of poetry in general</p>

Are there any gender differences in how profanity is used in modern pop music in 2019? The purpose of this study was to analyse music lyrics with particular attention paid to frequency and profanity profiles between female and male artists. The corpus used in the investigation contains a total of 34 music lyrics equally divided between the genders and was collected from a Billboard chart called “Hot 100 Songs”. Although this sample was small and may not be representative of all modern pop music lyrics, trends in this data show that the female artists sampled from the Billboard chart actually use profanity more frequently than male artists, which is in contrast to previous research. Furthermore, the result shows that male and female artists have distinctive profiles regarding the types of profanity used. Female artists use the swear word bitch more frequently whereas male artists tent to use nigger with a greater frequency.

This thesis examines the conceptualization of life in the lyrics of Czech popular songs of 1960s. The thesis derives theoretically and methodologically from cognitively and culturally-based approaches to language, especially from the theory of conceptual metaphor and metonymy (e. g. Lakoff and Johnson) and the concept of language as a picture of the world (school of Lublin). At first the thesis analyses the semantics of lexeme life. The analysis is based on the data from dictionaries and it reaches the basics of the linguistic picture of life as it is anchored in common language. Simultaneously the thesis works with the picture of life (in contrast with death) how it is served in the literature about Czech folk culture. The main part of this study consists of almost a hundred interpretations of lyrics from the examined period, which depict human life in its various stages and forms (through oppositions of life - death, youth - old age, etc.). The analysis follows relevant semantic elements which participate on its conceptualization. The thesis describes systematically and in detail particularly metaphors (structural, ontological and orientational), metonymy, and also the image schemes which are associated with life (scheme of JOURNEY, CYCLE). The attention is paid to their specific language...

This study is an attempt to investigate religious perceptions and its development, function and connection to religious practise within the Swedish extreme metal scene. This is performed mainly by a qualitative method of investigation, studying lyrical content published on a number of extreme metal albums, thereafter relating the lyrical progression to the progession of the scene as a whole and also to the development of individual religious belief and practise. The lyrically expressed manifestations of religiosity within the extreme metal scene prove to be related to religious practise in some cases, most visibly in the Christian parts of the scene.The study also indicates that development of religious expression often is evident regardless of religious preference. This development also regularly relates to an increase in musical evolution and prowess often achieved with increased age and maturity. Musically and lyrically, the extreme metal scene displays transgressive attributes which assist both individual and group in the process of creating identity, meaning and individuality.Experiencing extreme metal, in concert or in the privacy of one´s own home, can be one way of perceiving spirituality in this modern age.

This essay investigates interpretations of evil as expressed in contemporary music, focusing mainly on lyrics in contemporary popular music. The purpose is to analyze whether there is acertain aesthetic embracing of risk and innovation on display when discussing such subject matters, and to relate such aesthetic connotations to cultural and religious aspects. Lyrical interpretations of evil in a musical context appear to be existent in different forms andare in various ways attempts to integrate the existence of evil acts, as leading to suffering and pain, by incorporating such themes into lyrical material. There appears to be a possible aesthetic embraced when artists are advocating evil acts, however, not totally separable from the aesthetics of the extreme metal scene. Such forms of creative practice appear as reliant on the dialectic between historical perceptions of morality,modern society as globalized, segmented and restructured and the reoccurrence of religion in a secularized perspective. Themes regarding evil appear in this form of aesthetic in different ways to traditional discourse; making use of historical and contemporary images of evil and portraying them as desirable in various ways. In some instances such creative release is also linked to religious belief and practise, making the artistic performance equivalent of a transcendental event.

Estudo da Música popular Gaúcha como fenômeno característico da década de 1980. Inclui a análise do corpus da MPG mediante a seleção de trinta letras representativas. Abordagem do Tradicionalismo e Nativismo com vistas à verificação da presença do gaúcho idealizado nas letras da música popular. A realidade social é vista como uma construção imaginária em que as ações significativas dos atores sociais, como a linguagem e o discurso, caracterizam suas constituintes. / Submitted by Marcelo Teixeira (mvteixeira@ucs.br) on 2014-05-19T17:32:56Z No. of bitstreams: 1 Dissertacao Agostinho Luis Agostini.pdf: 717091 bytes, checksum: 564b4604e5ee15e568cab8eb447c8380 (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2014-05-19T17:32:56Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Dissertacao Agostinho Luis Agostini.pdf: 717091 bytes, checksum: 564b4604e5ee15e568cab8eb447c8380 (MD5) / Study of the Folkloristic Gaucha Music as a characteristic event in the 80 s. It includes a study of FGM s structure by selecting thirty representative lyrics. Approaching of the cultural and native traditions, searching to find the gaucho characteristics idealized in the folkloristic music s lyrics. Social reality faced as na imaginary construction in which the significative actions of the social actors, such as language and speech, characterize its components.