Music in Youth Culture: A Lacanian Approach

by j. jagodzinski

Overview

Music in Youth Culture examines the fantasies of post-Oedipal youth cultures as displayed on the landscape of popular music from a post-Lacanian perspective. Jan Jagodzinski, an expert on Lacan, psychoanalysis, and education's relationship to media, maintains that a new set of signifiers is required to grasp the sliding signification of contemporary 'youth'. He discusses topics such as the figurality of noise, the perversions of the music scene by boyz/bois/boys and the hysterization of it by gurlz/girls/grrrls. Music in Youth Culture also examines the postmodern 'fan (addict)', techno music, and pop music icons. Jagodzinski raises the Lacanian question of 'an ethics of the Real' and asks educators to re-examine 'youth' culture.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781403965301
Publisher:	Palgrave Macmillan US
Publication date:	04/21/2006
Edition description:	2005
Pages:	321
Product dimensions:	5.98(w) x 9.02(h) x 0.03(d)

About the Author

Jan JAGODZINSKI is a Professor in the Department of Secondary Education, University of Alberta, Canada. Currently, he teaches visual art education and media education as well as curricular issues as they relate to postmodern concerns of gender politics, cultural studies, and the media-specifically film and television. He is author of many titles including: The Anamorphic I/i, Postmodern Dilemmas: Outrageous Essays in Art & Art Education, Pun(k) Deconstruction: Experifigural Writings in Art & Art Education, Pedagogical Desire, and Deconstructing the Oral Eye.

Table of Contents

PART I: THEORETICAL CONSIDERATIONS The Figurality of Noise and the Silence of the Death Drive The Uncanny Figural Voice PART II: PERVERSIONS OF THE MUSIC SCENE: THE BOYZ/BOIS/BOYS The Perversions of Gangsta Rap: Death Drive and Violence Gangsta Sadomasochism: Tails Yo' Good, Heads Yo' Bad Plummeting the Gothic Depths of the Soul The 'Grunge' of Punk Rock: Slacking Off Serial Connections: The MM Show Beyond the Law: The Anti-Slacker as Mass Murderer The New Castrati: Men II Boys PART III: THE HYSTERIZATION OF THE MUSIC SCENE: THE GURLZ/GIRLS/GRRLS Postmodern Hysterics: Playing with the Virginity Card The Dilemma of Gurlz' Desires: Perverting the Post-Patriarchal Order The Good Witch-Bitch: Grrrl Power as the Desublimated Ugly Aesthetic The New Virginity: The Nostalgic Return of the Veil PART IV: INTERLUDE The Fan(addict): The Sinthome of Believing in the ONE Let's Rave not Rage! Conclusions: The Ethics of the Real An Ethical 'Act': A Brief Meditation to Close

Editorial Reviews

"It is hard to think of a cultural phenomenon that is more emotionally compelling and socially significant, or less understood, than youth music and its attendant subcultures. It has long been a truism that rebellion is central to this music, but the deep and complex nature, the social and psychological roots, and the ethical, social, and political consequences of the transgressions this music embodies have remained obscure. Now comes jan jagodzinski's remarkable Musical Fantasies of Youth Culture, revealing heretofore unrecognized forms, dimensions, levels, and folds of the significance this transgression has for subjectivity, sociality, politics, and ethics. For anyone who has been intrigued or baffled by the mesmerizing and transformative power of youth music, this book offers profound and dazzling insights. With this, the second volume of his analysis of youth cultures, jagodzinski establishes himself as a cultural theorist and critic of the first order."-Mark Bracher, founding editor, Psychoanalysis, Culture and Society.

From the Publisher