Music and Politics
The Most Powerful and Dangerous Vehicle: Music
As music has been used in all matters, it has been involved with political issues as well. As Billy Bragg said “All the great political music was made at the height of political confrontations (Bragg).” This quotation manifestly indicates that there has always been political confrontation and it proves that music has been used in both sides. During the war time some authorities especially Germany and USA produced many songs (including anthems) which highly reinforced wars, whereas there were still some movements to enlighten the society to raise people’s awareness for human rights and against wars such as anti-war movement. Popular music has always been used as the most powerful vehicle to lead the society and make some social changes. This essay is going to focus on how this vehicle leads the society and makes people get involved either pro-war movement or anti-war movement.
Protest music influenced many people in the war time. There was an extremely powerful authority that lied to their own people and made them get involved in wars; on the other hand there were many musicians who made efforts to raise the level of consciousness of the people about wars and humanitarian issues. The protest music of the Vietnam War took the children of the 60’s to a different perspective. Musicians of this generation went to any coffee house, plugged their guitars and sent their message with music into the homes of the youth of America. While governments encouraged the people for wars, this generation was not sitting idly and they were trying to take an action. Thus, this social climate and musicians became the foundation of ending a barbaric war (Anderson, 2006).This is a pivotal point because it highlights that music played an enormous role to encourage the young generation to take action in that time. It definitely means that music was a form of communication which gave political messages.
Music can also be used for transmitting
As music has been used in all matters, it has been involved with political issues as well. As Billy Bragg said “All the great political music was made at the height of political confrontations (Bragg).” This quotation manifestly indicates that there has always been political confrontation and it proves that music has been used in both sides. During the war time some authorities especially Germany and USA produced many songs (including anthems) which highly reinforced wars, whereas there were still some movements to enlighten the society to raise people’s awareness for human rights and against wars such as anti-war movement. Popular music has always been used as the most powerful vehicle to lead the society and make some social changes. This essay is going to focus on how this vehicle leads the society and makes people get involved either pro-war movement or anti-war movement.
Protest music influenced many people in the war time. There was an extremely powerful authority that lied to their own people and made them get involved in wars; on the other hand there were many musicians who made efforts to raise the level of consciousness of the people about wars and humanitarian issues. The protest music of the Vietnam War took the children of the 60’s to a different perspective. Musicians of this generation went to any coffee house, plugged their guitars and sent their message with music into the homes of the youth of America. While governments encouraged the people for wars, this generation was not sitting idly and they were trying to take an action. Thus, this social climate and musicians became the foundation of ending a barbaric war (Anderson, 2006).This is a pivotal point because it highlights that music played an enormous role to encourage the young generation to take action in that time. It definitely means that music was a form of communication which gave political messages.
Music can also be used for transmitting
Bibliography: Historical Notes [Internet] Available from <http://www.brandenburghistorica.com/page5.html>[Accessed 27 November 2012] Kater, M.H.,(1997) Williams R. (2009) Is Popular Music an Effective Vehicle for Political Discourse? [Internet] Available from <http://blogcritics.org/music/article/is-popular-music-an-effective-vehicle/> [Accessed 22.03.2010]