Essay: "Belonging to a Minority" ENTRY #8

(This is the first draft of my essay.)

Be yourself with the power of music

     In contemporary societies the expression be yourself is commonly heard, it means to exteriorize your personality that includes the various aspects of a person´s character. To this respect, some basic rights are needed, like freedom of expression, freedom of choice and freedom of worship. These civil rights have been conquered throughout the fights of many generations against the oppressive status quo, especially after the Second World War. The social movements of the 1960s and 1970s claimed the renewal of democracy as a central guiding principle. As a consequence, many artists contributed in terms of expressive freedom, creativity and commitment towards minorities. The emergent songs of this period not only reflected the political context as well as the cultural restrictions that common people suffered, but also contributed to social changes. Musical and social movements are instruments that contribute to social change, by the creation of collective Identity, emotion and social movement culture.

     Collective identity often materializes from ritual events where music can create new meanings or maintain old ones (Taylor and Whittier 1995). Music in the form of song is important in developing a shared identity because singing can bring people together. As an example for the Civil Rights movement, the next song written by Sting called “They dance alone” visibilizes a social protest of the Mothers of the missing people in Latin America during the military regimes of Pinochet in Chile and Videla, Massera and Agosti in Argentina.  .

“They're dancing with the missing

They're dancing with the dead

They dance with the invisible ones

Their anguish is unsaid

They're dancing with their fathers

They're dancing with their sons

They're dancing with their husbands

They dance alone

It's the only form of protest they're allowed

I've seen their silent faces scream so loud

If they were to speak these words

they'd go missing too

Another woman on the torture table

what else can they do…”

     Sting joined Amnesty International Movement and went to these countries with other musicians, like Bruce Springsteen and Tracy Chapman, among others. They shared this song with “Madres y Abuelas de plaza de Mayo” in Argentina , who joined the musicians on stage, giving a clear message against illegal State repression, claiming for Freedom of thought and expression to everybody, and demanding Justice to be done. The identification with a group of people that is suffering crimes develops the sense of solidarity and community. Collective identity needs emotions to be established.

     Goodwin and Pfaff (2008) argue that emotions are key causal factors leading to social movements. To exemplify the idea of emotions over gender identity, that is the way in which somebody considers his own gender, let me illustrate with an example of the famous singer Elton John´s experience of life. He admitted his bisexual condition in 1976. After some years, Elton married Renate Blauel in 1984, and they divorced four years later. In 1989 he confessed he was gay. His lover forced him to check into a hospital for drug abuse and bulimia. His best friend was AIDS victim and died in 1990. Elton married David Furnish in 2014 after gay marriage became legal in England. Exactly nine years earlier, they were one of the first couples in the UK to form a civil partnership after the Civil Partnership Act came into effect. Actually, Elton and David have two sons. Through his own life, Elton exposes his personal struggle against English restrictions over homosexuality. Probably as a consequence of the censorship over race and sex that reigned in England during those years, he even attempted a heterosexual marriage. Despite having passed through demoralizing situations, he´d compromised himself with the gay movement and became an activist. In his song “All girls love Alice”, performed by Elton in 1973, he mentions some psychological torments of a lesbian girl:

“Raised to be a lady by the golden rule

Alice was the spawn of a public school

With a double barrel name in the back of her brain

And a simple case of Mummy-doesn't-love-me blues

Poor little darling with a chip out of her heart

It's like acting in a movie when you got the wrong part

Getting your kicks in another girl's bed

And it was only last Tuesday they found you in the subway dead.”

       This song portrays the severe rules that girls were required to follow to behave properly, and the psychological problems that occur when a person is excluded from a group. Social prejudices conducted Alice to a tragic end. In addition,  discrimination also has a significant impact on LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender)  persons' mental state, with the most common psychological issues that include increased levels of stress and anxiety, depression, lack of self-confidence, drug and alcohol dependency and attempted suicide  (Neary, 2010). Another song that denotes homosexuality is “Englishman in New York, which Sting wrote about his gay friend Quentin Crisp and his experiences as an outcast. Crisp moved from London to New York in 1986, and Sting spent several days with the author.

“If "manners maketh man" as someone said

He's the hero of the day

It takes a man to suffer ignorance and smile

Be yourself no matter what they say

Modesty, propriety can lead to notoriety

You could end up as the only one

Gentleness, sobriety are rare in this society

At night a candle's brighter than the sun

Takes more than combat gear to make a man

Takes more than a license for a gun

Confront your enemies, avoid them when you can

A gentleman will walk but never run”

     Through these lines Sting encourages Quentin to behave in the way he feels, without considering potential discrimination from an ignorant society whose main values relies upon arms and violent conflicts. This song provides an example of how a song shapes collective identity, appealing to the basic problems that homosexual people face, and it offers a solution.

     In conclusion, I can say that minorities have been beneficiated with the power of music especially since the 1960´s Cultural Revolution. Music has been the vehicle for developing and maintaining collective identity, and therefore it has permitted people to share grievances and to express emotions through songs, with the help of lyrics to describe these protests. Furthermore, symbolic influence of music forced politicians to attend social claims. In current societies, we can say that music has helped us to express ourselves with the liberty provided by the rights passed in the Constitution.

Figueroa Marlene.

Bibliography

• Danaher W.F. (2010) – “Music and social movements”  Department of Sociology and Anthropology, College of Charleston Sociology Compass 4/9: 811–823, 10.1111/j.1751-9020.2010.00310.x
• Denisoff R. S. (1968) “Protest movements: class consciousness and the propaganda song.” Sociological Q. 9(Spring): 228–247.
• “How to write a Literary Essay. “ https://www.bucks.edu/media/bcccmedialibrary/pdf/HOWTOWRITEALITERARYANALYSISESSAY_10.15.07_001.pdf
• International Courts as Agents of Legal Change: Evidence from LGBT Rights in Europe(n.d.)http://scholarship.law.duke.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgiarticle=3025&context=faculty_scholarship
• Ron, E. ( 2002)  “Music in Movement: Cultural Politics and Old and New Social Movements“ Qualitative Sociology, Vol. 25, No. 3.
• Songfacts :http://www.songfacts.com/