Zach Castle

5/9/15
Gender and Music Final Essay
Part One
Throughout history, there have been many cases of men doing manly (stereotypically
manly) things, i.e. lifting heavy things, taking control of situations, bringing home the money
while the woman stays at home and cooks for him, and so on. In the article Gender and Politics
in the Early Islamic Courts, the first two italicized sentences set the mood for the rest of the
article, putting into perspective that it was the role of a woman to play musical instruments, and
males did not play instruments unless they adopted feminine dress, crossing stereotypical gender
boundaries by doing so. At this time in history, music was gaining popularity throughout
literature, helped by the growing court culture and middle class. Islam being a spiritual place,
they naturally questioned music. That is, they asked how appropriate the music that was being
played was, especially focusing on the effect of music on the listener. The rest of the article
discusses the beginnings of musical discussion, focusing on the traditional gender roles at the
time in relation to musical identity. Honestly it was a dull read for me, and I feel that playing
instruments is not solely for females, and that men can play them without having to dress
femininely. In my opinion, playing instruments is just as masculine as it is feminine, and in the
course weve discussed how some instruments are looked at as more feminine than others,
whether it be due to the pitch, size, or shape of the instrument. Any instrument can be masculine
or feminine, and for me it is about what is played, not who plays it. The Romantic era is my
favorite part of musical history, and the one I enjoy performing the most, such as works of

Brahms, Schubert, Chopin, and others. Some would say this is feminine music, but it does take
hard work and vigilance to learn the more difficult of these works. There are many virtuous
sections to their works, which could be considered a masculine feat to grapple with and
overcome the difficult sections. Overall, I believe that musical instruments are both feminine
and masculine, and should not be judged just because of the music or instrument being played.
In the next article I looked at, 'Alluring the Auditorie to Effeminacie': Music and the
Idea of the Feminine in Early Modern England, femininity was based around masculinity; that
is, masculinity was the gender norm that determined the roles of what was stereotypically
feminine. On page six there is a sentence I find very interesting: Music, too, was often
perceived by theoretical writers as a vain sensual delight and enemy to masculine rationality or
as a potential physical harbinger of spiritual delight This quote exemplifies how throughout
both Eastern and Western musics, music itself was seen as a threat to masculinity, in both
performance and literature. What surprises me is how difficult and time consuming music can
be, and yet the women were the ones performing instead of men. This surprises me because in
the past, it was the stereotypical role of women to stay at home and not worry herself with
worldly pursuits, and yet music, one of the most expressive and difficult forms of expression,
was deemed feminine.
The previous article highly contrasts to the last article I will reference, The Castrati as a
Professional Group and a Social Phenomenon, 1550-1850. To summarize, the castrati were
revered by both males and females. Even though they were castrated and literally emasculated
by this during their childhood, causing them to sing very highly pitched, they were the stars of
opera for hundreds of years. This is such a contrast with the two previous articles discussed, and

not only are they males performing, they have also been feminized in a way. However, they
were still regarded as masculine, and there were even myths of their sexual prowess even though
they had no testes and would probably have erectile dysfunction during a time where no
testosterone replacement therapy was averrable to combat their loss of naturally occurring
androgynous hormone. It is the opposite of what one would think, an emasculated and
essentially feminized male stealing the spotlight.
For rock and pop culture music, both masculine and feminine forms of expression are
seen regularly, and stereotypical gender norms are being broken daily, much in contrast to the
first two articles.
(724 words)

Part Two
For the next part discussing gender (and sex) and class in todays pop music, I will use
the following definitions for the terms gender and sex. Gender: the state of being male or
female (typically used with reference to social and cultural differences rather than biological
ones). Sex: either of the two main categories (male and female) into which humans and many
other living things are divided on the basis of their reproductive functions.
The first article I will discuss is Selling an Image: Girl Groups of the 1960s. Girl
groups in the 1960s were dressed innocently, as if they were the good girls of the town, and they
did not sing about sexually explicit topics (at least not outright). They were all about modesty,
and promoting a good image for the people. However, this changed throughout time, as one can
visibly see and hear throughout the evolution of girl groups across genres, including rock,

country, and hip hop. Hip hops promiscuous lyrics coupled with music videos of half naked
women are certainly a contrast to girl groups of the 1960s. Hip hop is traditionally considered to
be a music mostly for and based upon black people, and generally is lower class. Lyrics may
include but are not limited to: guns, drugs, money, rebellion, discussing current political duress,
and so forth. You can see women shaking their derrieres on so many hip hop music videos it is
the norm. Of course, most of what was just said is a stereotype, but often times it seems to be
true for hip hop music. For country, it is also seen as a middle to lower class music. Singing
about trucks, beer, pretty girls, watching the sunset by a barn, being a mans man, it is all about
the daily things in life, nothing ritzy or glamorous. Rock (depending on the artist) also falls into
the category of middle to low class music, stereotypically. Lyrics contain heavy drug use, fuck
the man, loud, driving bass lines, and general rebellion. Now that these genres have been
discussed for their perceived class status, let us take a look at how gender and sex play into these
genres.
Beginning with rap, men certainly have a prominent role in this genre. As stated above,
women are blatantly objectified in this genre. However, women also have a strong presence in
this genre, for example Beyonc and Iggy Azalea. There are even rap songs, such as Ciaras If I
Were a Boy, that show the objectification of women in hip hop and attempt to combat that.
In country music, women are also objectified, wearing little clothing while just being a
pretty face in the videos, usually saying to little or no words. I believe that women and men have
an equal playing field in this genre, meaning there are both well-known male and female artists.
As in hip hop, there are country songs performed by females that parody the objectification of
women, such as Maddie and Taes Girl In A Country Song.

In rock, there are certainly female rock artists and groups, such as the time of Riot Grrrl,
but in my opinion they are not nearly as well known as male rock artists and/or groups.
Undoubtedly there is objectification of women in this genre, as there seems to be in every genre
of music to some extent. I dont know a lot about rock music as a genre, but I do know that Red
Hot Chili Peppers are the perfect example of a rock band that sings about drug use, which
perpetuates the stereotypes of rock music.
As far as gender and sex are concerned, there are famous artists, both genetically male
and female, across all of the above genres. For sex, I think transgendered artists can become
popular in todays society. Yes it would be a challenge, but I believe it is much more likely to
have success than it would fifty to one hundred years ago. Two other articles I utilized in writing
this passage (though not directly discussed) were Redneck Woman and the Gendered Poetics
of Class Rebellion and Women, Pop Music, and Pornography.
(691 words)

Part Three
Throughout this course, I learned quite a bit about gender and music. That is good,
considering it is the name of the course. Having taken all three of your music history classes, we
discussed content that I had heard of before, which kept me more in-the-know about things, but
the content definitely went more in-depth and more to popular music in the end than your Music
History III class. I enjoyed the open discussion that often happened in the course and it opened
my mind to others opinions, as well as freely expressing my own. The course changed some
thoughts I had about both hip hop and country genres, for country the fact that the girls really

dont say much when featured had never occurred to me and I considered it normal. In hip hop I
always thought the women shouldnt be objectified like that, but after class discussion I realized
that someone somewhere would dance half naked on camera so its unfortunate that we cant
completely erase the objectification of women from the music videos in hip hop, or from the
lyrical content itself. It didnt particularly challenge my views on gender and music topics, and I
think thats because I was already pretty open minded about it when I entered the course. I
believe that gender has definitely limited and influenced musical behavior, as we have clearly
seen throughout history, from early Europe to modern pop music. The most amazing gender
norm broken in my eyes were the castrati, due to their literal emasculation but being so famous
and powerful, such stars with the people. This has not influenced my personal music behavior.
When I decided to start learning piano at the age of fifteen, I did not have a single thought about
whether or not it was manly. Nor did I doubt myself when I discovered music of the Romantic
era and fell in love with it, no pun intended. I was not in any musical groups growing up, but I
definitely heard instrument gender stereotypes thrown around and ridicule for playing certain
instruments if youre a guy and your instrument is girly. Overall, the course was enjoyable,
and while the first few readings about very early music were very dry, it quickly picked up and
the articles became more and more interesting to read and become involved in discussions on the
articles. I learned a lot about music in relation to gender, crossing gender norms, and
objectification of both males and females, although historically it is more prominently women
who are objectified. I can honestly say I will look at music differently now that I have taken this
course, with a more keen ear and critical eye in music videos. Thank you for teaching the

course, you always make the topics fun and enjoyable and express your thoughts in a way that
are easy to understand.
(483 words)