Country music is certainly having a moment this year. Beyoncé surprised everyone by dropping Cowboy Carter, intentionally disrupting the racial politics of Americana. Orville Peck's interrogation of the genre's sexual and gender politics has crossed over into the mainstream. And a singer named Taylor, who started her career as a teen on Music Row in Nashville, has taken over the world. What are we to make of this country music moment? What does it tell us about the USA's understanding of itself and its culture? And is it going to last? Join us, members of the British Associate for American Studies and a panel of superfans and pop-culture experts (detailed below) to discuss more later this month.
Why Country Music Conquered the World in 2024 takes place at the British Library, London, on Thursday 28 November 2024. Book your ticket today.
On the panel will be:
Rachel Sykes: an Associate Professor in Contemporary Literature and Culture at the University of Birmingham, where they lead courses in gender and sexuality studies and popular culture. Their work focuses on confession in contemporary culture and recently published (separate) articles on ‘hot’ priests, Princess Diana, and confessional pop music.
Jon Ward: a Lecturer in Race and Diversity Studies at King’s College London. His research and teaching generally focuses on representations of the body in visual, literary, and popular culture. His recent work examines “misremembrance” of racialized histories and coloniality in popular culture, and the figure of the “White Saviour” in US popular film.
Robyn Shooter: a Ph.D. candidate in English and American Studies at King’s College London. Her current research examines the role of (post-)genre classifications, gender representation, and community formations in the establishment and reception of Americana music (1960 to Present).
Claire Hurley: a lecturer in American and 20th century Literature at the University of Kent. She teaches modules on race, gender and sexuality, with a special interest in Black feminism. She has a chapter in the recently published Bloomsbury collection, The Literary Taylor Swift and organised a conference on Taylor Swift entitled ‘F**k the Patriarchy’ in May this year.
Listen to our event playlist on Spotify: Cowboy Carter to Taylormania!
Beyonce Cowboy Carter Billboard on April 6, 2024 in Los Angeles, California, USA. Photo by Barry King/Alamy Stock Photo
When we hear stories of long, hot summers, decayed and grotesque settings, and flawed or troubled characters – do we think Southern Gothic literature or 21st-century country music? Themes of social climate, gender identity, and sexuality can certainly be seen in both. For those interested in exploring representations of the Southern Gothic, particularly through a lens examining contemporary racial and gender stereotypes, the Library holds Kara Walker’s Freedom: A Fable (RF.2017.a.46). Featuring Walker’s famous silhouettes, the short story tells of a woman granted emancipation from slavery but who can never escape oppression and discrimination; the book speaks directly to the persistence of negative stereotypes that emerged in performances, novels, and artworks of the 18th and 19th centuries in America.
The artistic reinventions of Taylor Swift may have changed over the course of the last 18 years but to revisit her country era beginnings, the Library holds an early edition of Nathaniel Hawthorne’s Gothic Romance The Scarlet Letter (12704.f.15.), published by Ticknor, Reed & Fields in Boston, Massachusetts in 1850. Telling the story of a young woman outcast from society after an illicit affair, the novel is one of the many intertextual references mentioned by the Swift in her songwriting, in this case, 2008’s Love Story. When Swift re-recorded the song in 2021, it marked her eighth number 1 on Billboard's Hot Country Songs chart.
Lana Del Rey’s country album Lasso is set for release in 2025 so it seems an apt time to nod to the Americana that has inspired her creative practice. From A Streetcar Named Desire to the Beats via 150+ years of Walt Whitman; all can be found in various forms at the Library. Along with a first edition of Leaves of Grass, published anonymously in 1855 (C.58.g.4) the Library also holds this place / this hour (2019)*, an accordion-fold artists’ book commemorating the 200th anniversary of Walt Whitman’s birth. Created by Brooklyn-based artist Anne Gilman, the book combines Gilman's own writings with related quotes from Whitman’s works and is a fascinating contemporary interpretation of a piece of classic Southern American literature.
New Directions front cover for A Streetcar Named Desire, designed by Alvin Lustig, BL shelfmark: YA.1996.b.5800, and Pictures of the Gone World (Fifth Printing) by Lawrence Ferlinghetti (San Francisco: City Lights Books, 1955) BL shelfmark 011313.t.3/1.
First edition of Leaves of Grass, BL shelfmark: C.58.g.4
Remember it’s free to get a Reader Pass from the British Library and access materials in London and at our Reading Room in Yorkshire.
“America Now!” is a new series of live events exploring the current state of the USA and its place in the world. See the full events programme on See Tickets and read about the season launch in our blog from September 2024.
*Shelfmarking of this item has been delayed due to the Library’s cyber-attack in 2023; we hope to make it available to Readers as soon as possible.
America Now! is organised by the Eccles Institute and BAAS, and supported by the US Embassy London.