Effectiveness of Popular Music in Political Discourse

To what extend is popular music an effective medium of political discourse? Popular music is a term for music of all ages that appeals to popular tastes. It reflects the features and events of the time period. That is, society affects the music and music reflects the social climate. When we look at the importance of music for society, it has political contents and political aims inevitably. Music has been voicing people’s concerns for many years. When we take this feature of music into consideration, we can not escape the effect of music on political discourses since political discourse is the talk and debates of politicians or political events and it is basically the basis of democracy that interests all people. If we consider the power of music that can inspire and mobilise movements, popular music is an effective medium of political discourse for two reasons; it raises people’s awareness of political and social issues and move them; and it makes people feel united. The connection between music and politics is seen as political expression in music. This expression can use protest themes which includes anti war content and criticism of the current policies. Many events that happened in the past and happening now have been reflected in songs. And also, there are many musicians who are really care about world’s and people’s problems. They try to attract people’s attention to these problems by questioning current policies. There are lots of things to say against war, and musicians have a word to say anti war ideas of people. For instance, Frederic Weatherly’s song, Danny Boy, is about a boy who was serving in war and a person, his girlfriend or mother, who has been waiting for him. This song make people more aware of brutality of war and impact on people who serve in war and wait for servers. Many songs include anti war content like Eric Burdon’s “Sky Pilot” asked how pilots could bomb and kill and ignore the horror

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