Gender Cement

This was a very interesting post to read, partially because I am very interested in the evolution of indie music, but also because I can see how dated this piece is. Nowadays, females are prevalent in indie rock music, especially in relation to some of the stuff currently coming out of Britain. I think it’s very important to study the history and to note these changes, and I hope that these issues will be brought up in class tomorrow.

I think that the fact that family life was such a huge limitation for women, as there was a large amount of “focus on the domestic and kinship networks of…musicians” (21.) This fact, coupled with the locational difficulties that held women back from going to, let alone participating in, the indie rock scene.

That being said, this brings up a very interesting contradiction as Cohen points out. While there were defined domestic relationships based on the biological sex roles, the actual gender roles were slightly blurred as the men often played a role of “masculinity that is rather soft, vulnerable and less macho…than that promoted by” (29) the more traditionally masculine types of music such as heavy metal. If a woman were included in this image as a member of the band, she would radically alter this illusion of sensitive male. If she was sensitive as well, the audience would not believe he has been harmed by her, but if she is an “outspoken and sharp-tongued” (21) Liverpudlian woman, as most were portrayed as at the time, the man would be at risk of looking like a “‘cissy’[, a familiarly harsh nickname given to them] by their male peers” (31) when they were younger.

These very defined gender boundaries changed what roles men and women had in this era; however, I am left wondering how/when/why did the shift begin toward the roles of today?