Il ruolo sociale delle popstar

Abstract

Carrying out a careful sociological analysis of pop music, youth culture and expressive languages, this essay emphasises the social role of pop stars in today’s society. Drawing on cultural studies and research on youth subcultures, the paper considers rap music as a modern way of expressing social issues. In a second step, it seeks to analyse the symbolic power of pop stars and the use of digital technologies that transform the creative process. Pop music as a cultural phenomenon is in perpetual mutation; pop culture represents a locus where social transformations play out. Starting with the Birmingham School of Cultural Studies, sociological approaches to pop music have understood musical phenomena as the product of youth culture and examined the ways in which pop music as a cultural factor contributes to the socialization, the acknowledgment and the development of individual and collective identities. Youth from different generations and contexts identify with pop stars whose social role is particularly relevant. The influence of digital technologies on creative processes, on production methods and on ways of exploiting music, is redefining traditional categories of the interpretation of art as well as the perception of the role of the pop star. At the same time, these affect the social role of the artwork, encompassing both artist and recipient.