Return to search

"Taking 'girly music' seriously" : femininity and authenticity in indiepop

Indiepop was, and is, a musical genre that coalesced around UK punk and post-punk in the early 1980s. From punk, indiepop borrowed certain ideas about the politics of cultural production. What differentiated it from punk was its sound: a decidedly pop emphasis on short, melodic song structures and seemingly simple instrumentation. In embracing independent production, indiepop staked a claim for subculture authenticity over the inauthentic mass products of the mainstream music industry. Yet the defining musical elements were characteristic of the historically feminine pop idiom. The result was indiepop, where masculine authenticity and feminine pop forms melded together and created a music scene that fit uneasily within traditional definitions of subculture. This thesis explores the means by which participants in indiepop, through a concerted project to write their version of musical history, made sense of their particular scene and its place within the larger sphere of (masculine) rock culture.

Identiferoai:union.ndltd.org:LACETR/oai:collectionscanada.gc.ca:QMM.29527
Date January 2002
CreatorsWurster, Jessica
ContributorsStraw, Will (advisor)
PublisherMcGill University
Source SetsLibrary and Archives Canada ETDs Repository / Centre d'archives des thèses électroniques de Bibliothèque et Archives Canada
LanguageEnglish
Detected LanguageEnglish
TypeElectronic Thesis or Dissertation
Formatapplication/pdf
CoverageMaster of Arts (Department of Art History and Communication Studies.)
RightsAll items in eScholarship@McGill are protected by copyright with all rights reserved unless otherwise indicated.
Relationalephsysno: 001956438, proquestno: MQ85878, Theses scanned by UMI/ProQuest.

Page generated in 0.0017 seconds