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The Feminist Movement Through Song

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I will be looking at the timeline of the feminist movement through song; the new rights being fought for across each time period.

Early 20th Century:
There wasn’t much feminist music prior to the 1960s, but a good example is Ma Rainey’s “Cell Bound Blues”; the tale of a woman in jail after killing her abusive husband in self defence. Women were objects belonging to their fathers and husbands, and finally trying to stand up against that fact.


1960s:
With the beginning of second-wave feminism, women started to fight for equality between the genders.

“I don't tell you what to say
I don't tell you what to do
So just let me be myself
That's all I ask of you”  - Lesley Gore’s “You Don’t Own Me”


1980s:
The women’s movement was still going strong. Feminists were trying to emphasize their unrecognized abilities and value, and they began fighting for lesbian rights as well.

“I've got to show the world
All that I want to be
And all my billities
There's so much more to me
Somehow, I have to make them
Just understand” –“I’m Coming Out” by Diana Ross


1990s:
The Third Wave of feminism was all about abolishing gender-role stereotypes and incorporating women of all classes, races, ethnicities and cultures.

“This is reality, we need to turn our minds
Brothers talking revolution but leave their babies behind
Well sister, he's a sucker, just leave'em be
The revolution is now up to ‘brothers’ like me”
 - “Mama’s Always on Stage” by Arrested Development, sung from the viewpoint of a ‘black’ mother to a ‘white’ one.


2010s:
Finally, in 2010, the Fourth Wave of feminism began, bringing issues like the income gap and workplace harassment into the spotlight.
Some songs made around these issues include “Hyrrs: Festive Tunes Made Feminist”, such as the parody of “Once in Royal David’s City” below.

“More than half of working women
Have been sexually harassed.
Such a scary a** statistic
Surely belongs in the past.”

---

This course should be interesting, and I can’t wait to see the changing views through famous texts. Thank you.

Comments

  1. Virginia Plas6 February 2018 at 06:49

    Nice post! It was interesting seeing the development through music. I like how you've used lyrics to demonstrate the different aspects of each wave of feminism. It makes me wonder if the suffragette movement (first-wave feminism) was also referenced in song.

    Do you think songs not so strongly associated with feminism would reflect changes to a woman's role in society and topical issues to do with women in the same way these ones do?

    ReplyDelete

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