McCarthy, Amy ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-2183-3816 (2021) Girl in a Band: Gender inequality and girlhood in women's indie music memoirs. In: Eat Sleep Research Repeat, 8th October 2021, York St John University. (Unpublished)

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Abstract

In the 2010s a resurgence and reworking of the music memoir appeared in UK and US publishing trends, with a notable influx of memoirs written by female musicians. Previously, the genre was dominated by men. In the music memoir genre, specifically women's music memoirs, a collective identity is created with the other women in the scene. Women's music memoirs weave topics of gender and music together and highlight one of the many issues in the white patriarchal norm of the indie music genre. In this presentation, I will introduce the key characteristics of women's indie music memoirs and why girlhood is a dominant theme in the texts. This presentation will focus on Girl in a Band by Kim Gordon (2015) and Hunger Makes Me a Modern Girl by Carrie Brownstein (2015) as case studies and will explore the concept of a 'girl in a band'. Girlhood and the problematising of the term 'girl in a band' appears in several indie memoirs by women and, in particular, first memoirs. Brownstein and Gordon's memoirs highlight how women in the industry are treated by music journalists and how their male colleagues do not have the same experience. These memoirs provide critical commentaries on the scenes the artists occupy but, in doing so, they highlight the gender inequality and sexism in the industry. Ultimately, being a girl in a band cannot be separated from the music experience.

Item Type:	Conference or Workshop Item (Paper)
Status:	Unpublished
Subjects:	P Language and Literature > PN Literature (General) P Language and Literature > PS American literature
School/Department:	School of Humanities
URI:	https://ray.yorksj.ac.uk/id/eprint/6435

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