Radical Feminism Analysis of Taylor Swift’s Song Lyrics “The Albatross”

Mohammad Adi Nur Wakhid, Mujiono Mujiono, Nara Sari

Abstract


This paper applied the theory radical feminism (RF) to understand Taylor Swift’s song “The Albatross” lyrics by with qualitative content analysis and close reading techniques to uncover how she criticizes the systematic system of patriarchy and emphasizes women’s resistance. Swift used metaphors in the song, presenting women as threats to society, using the term “wise men” to deliver false ideas to justify men’s actions of suppression. The gap in this study is obtained through the previous studies, which often move to liberal feminism (LF) without showing the process of eliminating patriarchy, using music as feminism movement to challenge the overlooked patriarchal ideologies. This paper is limited to only one song in the album and the researchers’ subjective interpretation of the lyrics, yet the findings give an expanded analysis of lyrics for patriarchal system critiques.


Keywords


Radical feminism, taylor swift, the albatross, song lyrics

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DOI: https://doi.org/10.31004/jele.v11i5.3105

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