Essay Example on Gender Parity: From Traditions to Equality

Introduction

Gender parity measures a balance between men and women in a given situation. For example, in musical lyrics, there is an imbalance in gender-specific patterns that appear in both male and female artists' songs. In many hit songs, it is arguable that the lyrics lean towards the objectification of women. It is agreeable that women have come a long way. In the past, women did not have the right to vote and work outside the home as many of their activities centered around the home. Those traditions, however, are now in the past as women now have rights. Nevertheless, in the modern world, some artists still feel the need to center their lyrics on the objectification of man and the masculinity of men. The female gender has earned the label of sluts, whores, money-centered maniacs. As the young generation continue to grow, they pick lines from the lyrics, which they use to formulate their ideas on both genders. In their book Composing gender: A Bedford Spotlight Reader, Groner and O'Hara discuss the binary concept of gender as well as its stereotypes and expectations. The purpose of this paper is to explore how gender manifests in music lyrics by scrutinizing the objectification of women, masculinity of men, gender-specific lyrics characteristics, and the power dynamics between the men and the women. Song lyrics that gravitate towards the objectification of gender affect society adversely.

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The Evolution of Gender Roles in Music Lyrics

In music lyrics, artists always spread their messages of what is expected in different genders. Moody-Ramirez and Scott (55), who discussed about rap music, indicated that both male and female rappers share their definitions of independence for both males and females. According to the authors, on one hand, female rappers define independence by rapping about financial independence and sexuality. On the other hand, men rappers sing about the independent woman versus the gold digger to define independence (Moody-Ramirez and Scott 55). One of the songs that portray women as gold diggers is Ludacris and Bobby Valentino's. Female rappers try to challenge men by singing that they should be more involved in relationships (55). Evidently, singers today write their lyrics to pass a message of what is expected of both the male and female genders. Gallee (22) agreed that lyric, especially love songs, are lyrically gendered. The author indicated that the way artists portray a song, influences a listener's perception of the content. The perception of independence from men and women in song lyrics' affect society because the younger generation draw the message from the songs. As the younger generation grows up into adulthood, they must formulate their perceptions of independence. Artists, however, have their definitions of independence, which confuses the society and results in stereotypical behavior towards difference genders.

Gendered Messages: Objectification and Empowerment in Song Lyrics

Music lyrics are gendered as most of them focus on the objectification of women. One of the songs that has been the most controversial and has now been banned from radio airwaves is "Baby It's Cold Outside." The original song lyrics imply that women should be sexually available for a man's pleasure and should not hold her expectations too high more than men (Sullivan 1). In the #MeToo Movement era as well as in a society, which has a rise in sexual harassment, the lyrics of the song "Baby It's Cold Outside" is evidently controversial, and suggests that women are sexual objects. Artists like Beyonce and Rihanna have released various tracks praising women about their success and the need to make wise decisions about their actions, but other males artists still define women by their lack or presence of sexual prowess.

Shaping Perceptions: Music Lyrics as Cultural Influences

Some of the music lyrics are centered towards the masculinity of men. In their research about the objectification of gender in popular music from different genders, Flynn, Craig, Anderson, and Holody (164) indicated that men like to objectify their bodies. According to the authors, visual messages in music suggest that men feel more masculine. They mentioned that since music lyrics are mimicked and sang aloud by listeners, the music has a greater potential of influencing social bonding (Flynn et al. 165). More so, they added that when it comes to music content, men portray women as those who were created to pleasure men. Such content from male singers is what gives rise to the issue of masculinity. Men musicians often feel like they are entitled and empowered to sing about anything as long as it benefits the male gender.

Challenging the Status Quo: The Call for Accountability

Power dynamics between men and women is conspicuous in men and women. Cravens (1) affirmed that there is a power rift between men and women when it comes to song lyrics. As the authors explained, song that are written by men about sex have been applauded and when women sing the same songs defending their sexuality, they are being labelled as "filthy whores." In the music industry, men have been regarded as powerful, cool, and heroic, while women have received the title of being "whores" (Cravens 1). Artists often defend their lyric content by indicating that it is a work of art where they talk about their feelings and emotions. What these artists fail to understand is that their lyrics that are centered towards gender affect society adversely because the labels of men being powerful and women being inferior continue to be patent in society. The struggle for power creates a gender bias, which is harmful in society.

Conclusion

Overall, music plays a significant role in the lives of many people. From the research, it is apparent that the objectification of gender in music lyrics is a problem that is causing rife in society. It is high time that music artists be held accountable for their disparaging words in their lyrics. In music, it is evident that there is a struggle for power. Truth be told, the world has come a long way to continue with stereotypical behavior in gender. There is the need for gender parity to create that balance between men and women when it comes to lyrics. Most importantly, the younger generation needs to be protected from corrupt content in music lyrics.

Works Cited

Cravens, Alyssa. "Gender bias clearly exists in hit song lyrics." Daily Eastern

News. 2019, www.dailyeasternnews.com/2019/05/29/gender-bias-clearly-exists-in-hit-song-lyrics/Flynn, et al. "Objectification in popular music lyrics: An examination of gender

and genre differences. Sex Roles, vol. 75, 2016, pp. 164-176. doi: 10.1007/s11199-016-0592-3Gallee, Jeanne, "Are Love Songs Lyrically Gendered? A Content Analysis of

Gender-Specific Speech Features in Song Lyrics." Honors Thesis Collection. 392, 2016, repository.wellesley.edu/thesiscollection/392Moody-Ramirez, Mia., and Scott, Laki, M. "Rap music literacy: A case study of

millennial audience reception to rap lyrics depicting independent women. Journal of Media Literacy Education, vol. 7, no. 3, 2015, pp. 54 - 72. pdfs.semanticscholar.org/3e11/3b01be68e2dca47d15836bd03aaf487eded3.pdf?_ga=2.218648863.729625061.1589546261-2117243293.1572819700Sullivan, Rebecca. "Baby, it's cold outside - but it's heating up on social

media." The Conversation. 2019, theconversation.com/baby-its-cold-outside-but-its-heating-up-on-social-media-127490