Activity: Participating in or organising an event types › Participation in conference
Description
'Popular Music and Human Rights: If the world is speaking, is anyone listening?'
Abstract:
Historically music has been the outlet for people and their troubles. For time immemorial it has been used as an avenue to voice prevalent community struggles as well as those struggles faced in solitude, but has the international community been listening? This paper seeks to explore the link, or lack thereof, between the international human rights agenda and popular music over the past six decades. It is not difficult to recall popular songs about overcoming oppression (Bob Marley), alleviating poverty (Tracy Chapman), eradicating hunger (USA for Africa) and, more recently, the raft of pop music focused on championing gay rights. This research will plot the primary rights on the international agenda and assess them in relation to rights themes prevailing in popular music. This paper is the initial output of larger project that proposes to create an anthology on the subject of human rights in music.