Images of Women in Selected Songs of Contemporary Gikuyu Secular Popular Artists
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Date
2021
Authors
Wanjohi, Dianah W.
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
Kenyatta University
Abstract
The study focuses on popular songs that were composed and performed by contemporary Gikuyu secular popular artists. The study examines aspects of style and themes that reveal popular artists’ positions as regards the images of women in popular music in Kenya. The study involves the analysis of song-texts selected from popular performing artists who engage the audience on politics of gender and the effects they had on the Kenyan contemporary situation in voicing their concerns on the relationship between men and women in society. This was done through listening to CDs and watching recorded clips video/DVDs produced by four selected Gikuyu popular music artists. The study applies stylistics, feminism and performance theories. Various tenets of feminist and cultural theories were used as interpretive lenses. Transcription, translation and transliteration were done as a means to create poetic data for analysis. This was conceived in fifteen song-texts. The study identified structure and style adopted by the Gikuyu language composers earmarked for this study. Time and space did not allow the researcher to indulge in the analysis of songs by contemporary Gikuyu secular popular artists who performed in the post-independence era. Conclusions were drawn from the analysis and interpretation of data. The work will contribute in the field of cultural studies and literary studies especially on the use of the use of oral literature relay societal sensitive issues in given communities of the world. It will create a road map to the understanding of the paucity of the place of woman in the global arena as conceives through songs composed by male popular secular artists.
Description
A Research Project Submitted to the School of Humanities and Social Sciences in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Award of Master of Arts Degree of Kenyatta University, November, 2021
Keywords
Images, Women, Selected Songs, Contemporary Gikuyu, Secular Popular Artists