The Presentation of Identity in the Work Songs of Johnny Cash

Abstract

This paper approaches music lyrics as a delivery system for the presentation of identity and reports the result of a content analysis of the work songs recorded by Johnny Cash. Beginning with a discography of 684 songs, the analysis found that 115 mention jobs, of which eighty concern work, and eight pertain to factory work. The study provides a detailed description of the factory work songs and categorizes them in terms of four themes: (1) going to work; (2) being at work; (3) after work, and (4) post-employment—after one no longer has a job. Cash's work songs illustrate that identity is a polysemic construction connected to work in various ways. These songs reveal both the multiple realities of manual labor and the temporal variance of laborers' constructions of self.

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