Moderator: Eddy Francisco Alvarez, Jr., California State University, Fullerton
Emma Jensen, “Dressing Fat: Gertrude ‘Ma’ Rainey, Sophie Tucker, and Willie Mae ‘Big Mama’ Thornton”
Willie Mae Thornton hated wearing dresses. Sophie Tucker insisted on expensive dresses that accentuated her body type. Despite being known for extravagant gowns and weighty jewelry, a popular image of Gertrude Rainey features her wearing a suit in an advertisement for “Prove It on Me Blues.” How did dressing for, or around, fatness influence the perception of a musician’s gender in the early nineteenth-century United States? Furthermore, how did the fashion choices of a fat performer affect their positionality in a rapidly changing music industry?
In this presentation, I argue that the fashion choices of fat, nineteenth-century femme musicians in the United States allowed, and occasionally forced, fluctuation in their perceived genders, genres, and social desirability. Such fluctuations largely depended on a performer’s body size, race, and class, as I demonstrate with case studies of Rainey, Tucker, and Thornton. Comparisons among these three fat femmes showcase how fashion choices enabled them to assert autonomy over their bodies, cement their legacies through specific sartorial choices, and influence how audiences heard and engaged with their public personas.
Ellie Martin, “Radicalizing Pregnancy: Black Femininity, Fashion, and the Reclamation of Bodily Agency in the Public Eye”
In recent years, Black female musicians have transformed pregnancy into a radical and empowering form of self-expression, rejecting societal norms that historically silenced and concealed maternity. Artists such as Rhiannon, Beyoncé, and Cardi B challenge traditional expectations by celebrating pregnancy through fashion and art, reclaiming agency over their bodies. In her 2022 Vogue interview, Rhiannon redefined maternity as an integral aspect of her artistic identity, using fashion to highlight her pregnant belly rather than conceal it. These artists position pregnancy as a visible, empowering act, challenging the historical pressures of the entertainment industry to maintain a polished, unaltered professional persona (Gimlin, 2007; Harrison, 2014).
This paper explores how Black women use pregnancy as a creative rebellion, reshaping cultural narratives of beauty and motherhood. Beyoncé’s iconic 2011 MTV Video Music Awards performance and Cardi B’s unapologetically pregnant SNL appearance in 2018 are pivotal moments where pregnancy became a statement of strength, creativity, and defiance. These acts reflect broader societal shifts, as Black women confront systemic inequities while redefining their public identities.
The 2022 overturning of Roe v. Wade complicates this reclamation of bodily autonomy, disproportionately endangering Black women, who are 3.5 times more likely to die during pregnancy or postpartum than white women due to systemic racism in healthcare (PRB, 2023). These public celebrations of pregnancy by Black artists not only reject societal expectations but also amplify awareness of racial disparities in maternal health. Through an analysis of Rhiannon’s Vogue interview and other iconic examples, this paper examines how Black women challenge traditional norms by transforming pregnancy into an act of empowerment. Ultimately, these artists use their visibility to celebrate motherhood, reclaim agency, and resist societal and systemic limitations, asserting their creative and personal autonomy as acts of radical empowerment.
Aliyah Martinez, “BIG MAMA: How Women in Hip Hop Take Up Space”
Whether a woman is strutting towards a private jet in a 30-inch middle part “bussdown” or infamously walking the red carpet with one exposed breast covered with a dainty purple pasty, women in Hip Hop, like many of their round-the-way counterparts, consistently challenged the status quo. Female rappers in a male-dominated industry use intersectionality to challenge notions of femininity, invisibility, and autonomy. This paper examines how female rappers take up space through their style and dominating personalities. I will visually analyze music videos, red carpet footage, and performances from artists Lil Kim, Nicki Minaj, Megan Thee Stallion, and Latto. All four women have notably been centered in conversations regarding hyper-sexuality and respectability.
In contrast, many discussions revolving around female rappers in the past engage in finding a balance between modesty and bashfulness. This study will highlight the cultural shift from women finding empowerment through emulating a baggier style towards figure-hugging garments, colorful hair, bold makeup, and decorative accessories. It is imperative to understand further the intentionality of how many female rappers choose to position themselves by emphasizing their sensuality and taking hold of the male gaze within their parameters. To widen the scope of research for women’s fashion practices is crucial to understanding how embodiment and adornment can challenge subversive societal ideas.
Furthermore, I find it increasingly necessary to deepen the scope of research on Black American women’s beauty and fashion practices as much innovation within the past decades become globalized, risking an erasure from their historical markings. Subculture and sexualized historical caricatures aimed towards Black women serve as foundational theoretical concepts that continue to be at the forefront of the politics in female rap. This paper unpacks Black women’s desire to be unapologetically themselves while challenging their worthiness through derogatory perceptions contrasting notions of modesty and respectability.
Melanie Ptatscheck, “From Heroin Chic to Shape Wear. Body Images, Fashion Trends, and (Mental) Health in Popular Music”
Concepts about the body, health, and illness are socioculturally and historically variable; they represent social constructions that reflect cultures, politics, and moral ideas of a society at a particular time. Popular music and its diverse cultures may also have a decisive impact on those constructions and thus contribute to the social definition of a ‘normal’ and ‘healthy’ body. Health-threatening effects can also accompany this notion: The (re)production of toxic fashion trends (e.g., ‘heroin chic’ in grunge or ‘size zero’ low-rise pants) and unrealistic ideas of norms (e.g., flawless, overtrained bodies of pop stars) can lead to distorted perceptions of self- and body images and even to mental illnesses such as depression and eating disorders. Especially in the last decade, however, it has become apparent that popular music can also function as a health-promoting tool, make diverse body performances visible, and challenge ‘unhealthy’ fashion trends. In particular, female pop musicians such as Lady Gaga, Billie Eilish, and Lizzo broke with heteronormative ideas of the body and mental health stigmata by personally addressing issues such as self-love and body-positivity. The latest with Ariana Grande’s statement on TikTok about body shaming over her ‘unhealthy’ look, a ‘healthy’ discourse around body images was initiated against the background of self-determination and subjective wellbeing. Based on an interdisciplinary research project, this paper is located at the interface of popular music studies and public health. It provides a discourse-analytical approach to the ‘healthy turn’ in popular music relating to prevalent body norms and fashion trends at the intersection of the music/celebrity industries and contemporary self-improvement culture. Body- and health-related transformation processes will be reconstructed by focusing on body images and fashion styles of selected pop musicians and their (self-)representations, discussing how these trends shape/are shaped by (gendered) discourse and power dynamics.
