Intertextuality in Protest Music

Abstract

Abstract Music in social movements regularly recalls preexisting music, text, and symbols, which can capture attention, resonate with historical memory, enhance participation, or obfuscate under oppression. This chapter considers how intertextuality manifests itself in protest music. Extending Genette and Lacasse, it posits a typology of intertextuality in protest music—including cover songs, contrafacta, hip-hop remakes, remixes, allegories, metaphors, genre adaptation, paratext, and metatext—and considers how these techniques convey political messages, often by combining with contemporary indexes (Peirce) or exploiting intertextual gaps (Bauman and Briggs). The type of intertextuality chosen and how it is received can vary depending on method of censorship, copyright regimes, stage of the protest cycle, performance venue, and status of artist. Drawing examples from this handbook’s chapter and the author’s own research in Japan and elsewhere, the chapter shows the ubiquity of intertextuality in protest music, how it differs by circumstance, and how it communicates or misfires.

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