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MIDDLE CLASS MUSIC IN SUBURBAN NOWHERE LAND: EMO AND THE PERFORMANCE OF MASCULINITY

Aslaksen, Matthew J
http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=bgsu1147712034

Abstract Details

2006, Master of Arts (MA), Bowling Green State University, Popular Culture.
Emo is an emotional form that attracts a great deal of ridicule from much of the punk and indie music communities. Emo is short for “emotional punk” or “emotional hardcore,” but because of the amount of evolution it has undergone it has become a very difficult genre to define. This genre is well known for its almost whiny sound and its preoccupation with relationship problems and emotional instability. As a result, it is seen by many within the more underground music community as an inauthentic emotionally indulgent form of music. Emo has also very recently become a form that has gained widespread mainstream media appeal with bands such as Dashboard Confessional, Taking Back Sunday, and My Chemical Romance. It is generally consumed by a younger teenaged to early college audience, and it is largely performed by suburban middle class artists. Overall, I have argued that emo represents challenge to conventional norms of hegemonic middle-class masculinity, a challenge which has come about as a result of feelings of discontent with the emotional repression of this masculinity. In this work I have performed multiple interviews that include both performers and audience members who participate in this type of music. The questions that I ask the subjects of my ethnographic research focus on the meaning of this particular performance to both the audience and performers. In an attempt to further clarify the meaning of this form of expression, I draw upon the works of gender theorists such as Judith Butler R.W. Connell as well as several popular music theorists such as Mimi Schippers. Overall I hope to show the greater significance of emo as a shift in masculine expression by that is very thoroughly based in the middle class.
Jeremy Wallach (Advisor)
Music
punk music; emo music; masculinity; popular music;

Recommended Citations

Citations

  • Aslaksen, M. J. (2006). MIDDLE CLASS MUSIC IN SUBURBAN NOWHERE LAND: EMO AND THE PERFORMANCE OF MASCULINITY [Master's thesis, Bowling Green State University]. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=bgsu1147712034

    APA Style (7th edition)

  • Aslaksen, Matthew. MIDDLE CLASS MUSIC IN SUBURBAN NOWHERE LAND: EMO AND THE PERFORMANCE OF MASCULINITY. 2006. Bowling Green State University, Master's thesis. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center, http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=bgsu1147712034.

    MLA Style (8th edition)

  • Aslaksen, Matthew. "MIDDLE CLASS MUSIC IN SUBURBAN NOWHERE LAND: EMO AND THE PERFORMANCE OF MASCULINITY." Master's thesis, Bowling Green State University, 2006. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=bgsu1147712034

    Chicago Manual of Style (17th edition)

bgsu1147712034
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© 2006, all rights reserved.
This open access ETD is published by Bowling Green State University and OhioLINK.