Country Boys and Redneck Women

New Essays in Gender and Country Music

Diane Pecknold, Kristine M. McCusker

• Publisher: University Press of Mississippi
• Year: 2016
• Print ISBN:
  9781496805058
• eBook ISBN:
  9781496804921
• Topic: Media & Performing Arts
• Subtopic: Music

Country music boasts a long tradition of rich, contradictory gender dynamics, creating a world where Kitty Wells could play the demure housewife and the honky-tonk angel simultaneously, Dolly Parton could move from traditionalist "girl singer" to outspoken trans rights advocate, and current radio playlists can alternate between the reckless masculinity of bro-country and the adolescent girlishness of Taylor Swift.In this follow-up volume to A Boy Named Sue, some of the leading authors in the field of country music studies reexamine the place of gender in country music, considering the ways country artists and listeners have negotiated gender and sexuality through their music and how gender has shaped the way that music is made and heard. In addition to shedding new light on such legends as Wells, Parton, Loretta Lynn, and Charley Pride, it traces more recent shifts in gender politics through the performances of such contemporary luminaries as Swift, Gretchen Wilson, and Blake Shelton. The book also explores the intersections of gender, race, class, and nationality in a host of less expected contexts, including the prisons of WWII-era Texas, where the members of the Goree All-Girl String Band became the unlikeliest of radio stars; the studios and offices of Plantation Records, where Jeannie C. Riley and Linda Martell challenged the social hierarchies of a changing South in the 1960s; and the burgeoning cities of present-day Brazil, where "college country" has become one way of negotiating masculinity in an age of economic and social instability.

INDEX

The index that appeared in the print version of this title was intentionally removed from the eBook. Please use the search function on your eReading device to search for terms of interest. For your reference, the terms that appear in the print index are listed below.

Page numbers in italics refer to illustrations.

Aborigines: desert musicians; “oldfella” country men; traditional values regarding masculinity

AC/DC

Acioly, Sharon

Acuff, Roy

Adkins, Trace; “Ladies Love Country Boys,”

Akins, Rhett

Aldean, Jason: “Amarillo Sky,” “She’s Country,”

Alexander, Arthur

Alice Springs, Australia

Allman Brothers, “Whipping Post,”

Altman, Robert, Nashville

Anderson, Benedict

Anderson, Bill

Anglin, Jack. See also Johnny & Jack

Anglin, Louise Wright

Anglos

Appalachia, rural; accent; models of femininity; traditional music

Applebome, Peter

Arnold, Eddy, “You Don’t Know Me,”

Arthur, Charline

Atkins, Chet

Atkins, Rodney, “Farmer’s Daughter,”

Auratic transference

Australia: Aboriginal rights movement; Central; country music tradition; Northern Territory

Authenticity; as a gendered construct; Charley Pride and; Dolly Parton and; Gretchen Wilson and; Taylor Swift and

Auto-tune

Autry, Gene

Axé

Bahia, Brazil

Bailey, DeFord

Baker, Louise; “Come On Over,”; “Remember That,”; “Some Men Don’t Cheat,”

Baker, Sarah Louise

Bakersfield Sound

Banks, Victoria; “Come On Over,”; “Remember That,”; “Some Men Don’t Cheat,”

Bare, Bobby

Barker, Hugh

Barn dance radio

Basland, Carl

Basore, Stu

Before the Music Dies

Bell, Renee

Bentley, Dierks, “Tip It On Back” (video)

Benton, Brook

Bergeron, Judith

Bergman, David

Bertrand, Michael

Bickford, Tyler

Big Machine Records

Bill Anderson Show, The

“Black Jack Davy [David],”

Black Sabbath

Blue, Ethan; Doing Time in the Depression

Bluegrass music

Blues music

Bourdieu, Pierre

Boys Don’t Cry

Bradley, Harold

Bradley, Owen

Bramlett, Terrence

Brasfield, Rod

Brazil; college country; country cosmopolitan; evolution of country music; rural masculinity

Brooks, Garth; “Friends in Low Places,”; “Nobody Gets Off in This Town,”

Brown, Helen Gurley

Brown, Maxine

Brown, Ruth

Bryant, Audrey

Burke, Ken

Burke, Solomon

Butcher, Sammy

Butler, Judith

Calamity Jane

Camargo, Hebe

Camp

Campbell, Craig, “Family Man,”

Cantrell, Laura; Kitty Wells Dresses

Caramanica, Jon

Carlisle, Cliff, “Black Jack Davy [David],”

Carmichael, Al

Carter, Jimmy

Carter, Sara and Maybelle

Carter Family; “Black Jack Davy [David],”; “Jealous Hearted Me,”; “My Heart’s Tonight in Texas,”

Case, Neko

Cash, Johnny; “Man in Black,”; “Oney,”

Cash, W. J.

Cavicchi, Daniel

Central Australian Aboriginal Media Association (CAAMA)

Charles, Ray; Modern Sounds in Country and Western Music

Chesney, Kenny

Childs, Marlie

Childs, Reable (Sapp)

Ching, Barbara; Wrong’s What I Do Best

Chitãozinho & Xororo, “Fio de Cabelo” (A Little Strand of Hair)

Choate, Bessie

Christgau, Georgia

Church, Eric, “How ’Bout You,”

Clement, Frank

Clement, Jack

Cline, Patsy

Coal Miner’s Daughter (movie)

Coates, Norma

Cobb, Jonathan

Coe, David Allan, “Son of the South,”

Cohen, Paul

Cole, Nat “King,”

Colvard, Jimmy

“Come On ...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Contents
• Introduction
• Why “Ladies Love Country Boys”: Gender, Class, and Economics in Contemporary Country Music
• “Hey! If I Should Grab Ya”: “College Country” and the Ruralization of Urban Brazil
• Act Naturally: Charley Pride, Autobiography, and the “Accidental Career”
• Holding On to Country: Musical Moorings for Desired Masculinities in Aboriginal Australia
• Taylor Swift’s “Pitch Problem” and the Place of Adolescent Girls in Country Music
• Gender and the Nashville Songwriter: Three Songs by Victoria Banks
• As if They Were Going Places: Class and Gender Portrayals through Country Music in the Texas State Prison, 1938–1944
• Negotiating Gender, Race, and Class in Post–Civil Rights Country Music: How Linda Martell and Jeannie C. Riley Stormed the Plantation
• Remarkable Women and Ordinary Gals: Performance of Identity in Songs by Loretta Lynn and Dolly Parton
• “Backwoods Barbie”: Dolly Parton’s Gender Performance
• Kitty Wells, Queen of Denial
• Gender Deviance and Class Rebellion in “Redneck Woman”
• Selected Bibliography
• Notes on Contributors
• Index