Peter Alexander Gokus
| Fachbereich | Anglistik & Amerikanistik |
| Hauptbetreuer | Univ.-Prof. Dr. Ralph Poole |
| Nebenbetreuer | |
| Beginn | WS 24/25 |
| Kontakt | |
| Thema der Dissertation | BETWEEN FAME AND INDIFFERENCE IN A MALE DOMINATED INDUSTRY. OBSERVING FEMALE BLUES ARTISTS: PERSONALITY, PERFORMANCE AND PERCEPTION AS CONSTRUCTED OFFERS OF IDENTIFICATION |
Abstract
Early Blues music was dominated by African American females. Born in the late 1890s or early 1900s they marked the transition from Vaudeville shows to real Blues. Whether as singers, composers, instrumentalists. They were performers trained in bars, clubs, brothels, tents and travelling shows before 1920. What started in the Mississippi Delta moved up North, eventually called Chicago Blues. While New York was another important stop on the list of styles, the early 1960s marked the beginning of the Civil Rights Movement and the end of an era of female Blues musicians.
Still in 2025 there is an industry that ignores their impact on the development of the genre. So far approximately twenty percent of awards in the Blues Hall of Fame went to females since 1980. Hardly any female musician from the early days is honored today. My research looks into the reasons for this weakness of the whole industry, whether it is gender, race, education related or just an expression of business interests in combination with the political correctness of the 1990s. Positively speaking, I am asking what impact the Digital Age and unlimited public access to information could have on decisions eventually favoring a balanced gender ration in the awarding of Blues artists?
Until recently research on those hidden gems was limited to academic literature and research or records of what the elderly had told ethnomusicologists like John and Alan Lomax. Still a lot of information is resting in drawers, attics of private households.
My thesis will try to identify unknown female Blues artists, then create clusters, e.g. by decades for better comparison and eventually do a thorough screening of social media based private knowledge, wisdom and information in Blues fan groups, e.g. organized in Facebook. Hopefully, it will give another perspective away from mainstream media and helps to find answers to the possible underrepresentation of females and LGBTQ+ as awardees and inductees?
Methodologically, I am using a matrix that combines context with exact and hermeneutic research. Here is an outlook: Back in the days several twists of history prevented extended recognition of most of these women while a few went on to stardom, such as Ma Rainey, Bessie Smith or Billie Holiday in the 1920s to the 1950s. But first and simply, many others in the 1920s could not travel due to poverty and obligations at home like taking care of a family or being the only breadwinner. Another important caesura was the introduction of mass production of records and record players in 1922. Still expensive, it limited the group of buyers and listeners and streamlined the music to raise profits of the music industry. Rural Blues remained rural and with it many female artists simply disappeared.
Next, mobility in general and the Great Depression made people from the South migrate in search of a better life. With it their music travelled on the North-bound trains. No surprise, public demand for traditional, often rude Blues music with its expressions of a certain lyrical self has changed in those days. African Americans in Chicago usually looked for a fresh start and music. Pressure from profit-oriented companies played its part too. Blues music from the South was outdated to them. Blues music between 1940 and 1959 developed into Jazz and its different styles.
This thesis is about early female Blues artists of the second or third row, their impact on the genre and the reasons for a longstanding neglect by the industry, starting around 1980. It will analyze what the fan groups discuss, give them a voice, and structure the information. It questions the neglect of what might or might not play along the streamlined profit-oriented industry because it might be too rude, queer or does not meet the political correctness of public taste and sales numbers of record companies.
Foto: © Peter Alexander Gokus
