Music, Gender And Identity

Choose a song that has been influential in your formation of identity. It can be related to gender, sexuality, ethnicity/race, or class. In this discussion, discuss freely:

1. how gender, sexuality, ethnicity/race, or class is represented in the song (including lyrics, the visual representations in the music video, etc.).

2. how such representations influence your identity.

Here is an example:

I think one of the songs that have significantly impacted my understanding of gender and sexuality is Faye Wong’s I Do (ch. wo yuanyi). The lyric of the song is quite traditional in terms of gender and sexuality representation: women are passive, emotional, and irrational (I will forget my name for the sake of you. If you can hold me one more second, I will not regret if I lose the whole world). In the lyric, “you” is written 你 rather than 妳 (according to the complicated Chinese script), the latter referring to females. Therefore, the song also conforms to heterosexuality in which women desiring men. However, in the MV, Faye Wong wearing very short hair and loose dress, which kind of breaks gender stereotypes of women with long hair (especially given the era when the MV was shot) and present a sort of degendered image. Her non-stereotypical look was especially influential for me as I realized that women could look “different” and beautiful, while adhering to conventional sexuality.