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Caribbean Vaporwave: The Internet as Social Amplification

Mercado Méndez, Jorge L
http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=kent1658420600133629

Abstract Details

2022, MA, Kent State University, College of the Arts / School of Music, Hugh A. Glauser.
Previous research on vaporwave has had a narrow focus on the most successful artists from the early period of vaporwave thus characterizing the genre’s aesthetic features as globalized music with nostalgia towards North American popular media from the 1980s to the early 2000s. In this thesis, I study the perspective of Caribbean Hispanic vaporwave producers by analyzing the music scene through subjective spatiality as a new form of space on the internet. Drawing from online interviews with four producers from Puerto Rico, Dominican Republic, and Cuba, I will discuss the cultural materials that are used in Caribbean vaporwave music from producers like Bloomstrad, S.a.x, 悲惨な forever, and Cubalibre.exe. I argue that Caribbean Hispanic vaporwave producers are great examples to understand how cultural context is reflected in vaporwave according to their geographical experiences. The preliminary findings of this research challenge defining vaporwave as drawing from nostalgia based on aesthetic features from North American popular culture. With these data, the outcomes are used to argue that Caribbean vaporwave is an example of how the internet is an amplification of reality and a social lived space.
Janine Tiffe (Advisor)
102 p.
Music
Ethnomusicology; vaporwave; Caribbean; internet; virtuality; Caribbean vaporwave; Phenomenology; virtual music; Latinwave Records; Caribbean Ventures LLC; Latinwave

Recommended Citations

Citations

  • Mercado Méndez, J. L. (2022). Caribbean Vaporwave: The Internet as Social Amplification [Master's thesis, Kent State University]. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=kent1658420600133629

    APA Style (7th edition)

  • Mercado Méndez, Jorge. Caribbean Vaporwave: The Internet as Social Amplification. 2022. Kent State University, Master's thesis. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center, http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=kent1658420600133629.

    MLA Style (8th edition)

  • Mercado Méndez, Jorge. "Caribbean Vaporwave: The Internet as Social Amplification." Master's thesis, Kent State University, 2022. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=kent1658420600133629

    Chicago Manual of Style (17th edition)

kent1658420600133629
292
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This open access ETD is published by Kent State University and OhioLINK.