MUSIC 26AC Lecture Notes - Lecture 9: Mamie Smith, Genderqueer, Reconstruction Era
Blues & Gender September ,
• Blues: African American style formed in Reconstruction era
o AAB lyrical/melodic form: products of years and years of selection and creation of this form
o Variety of sounds solidifies around downhome image due to pressures of the music industry
• Davis: there was a familial, sexual shift → leads to different types of stories written in blues music
o There is a different subject matter compared to other styles
o Argument for understanding how emancipated shifted what was possible for self-
determining their familial/sexual choices
• Sex: a supposedly biologically determined division of bodies based on sexual organs (male, female,
intersex, etc.)
• Gender: socially and culturally acquired sexual identity (ie: man, woman, non-binary, etc.)
o In various cultures we see different people expressing different gender identities and
articulating what is binary or non-binary
• Sexuality: sexual orientation, sexual behavior, or the public projection of these
o Not always actual sexual practice but how a person presents themselves as a sexual being to
the world
o Blues had greater homosexuality displays than other genres
• Mamie Smith singing
• Patriarchy: rule of the father; political, social, familial, and moral system that places male figures in
central or higher position of power
o Men in a dominant position
o Other genders in a subdominant position
• Ma Rainey
o Song describes a homosexual relationship based on her real-life experience
• Gender and sexuality move together (ie: masculine presenting woman desires men/women)
• Frankie Jaxon: a female impersonator
• Queer: historical usage as a slur against LGBTQ people (coming from the dictionary definition as
strange or odd)
o Reclaimed by some LGBTQ people to mark non-dominant sexual or gender difference (past
20 years)
o Terms has been repurposed and given a different meaning because of the need for a way to
talk more comprehensively about non-dominant identities
• Gladys Bentley: homosexual artist that reworked lyrics to make them more queer
o She dressed in a tuxedo but was an assigned female at birth
o Homosexual and heterosexual content in her song
o Performed in queer clubs
o Part way through her career, she started wearing dresses
• Homophobia: dislike of or prejudice toward homosexual people (also not simply individual actions but
at times systematic disenfranchisement)
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