August 12, 2010

Domestic Violence Is More Than Just a Burning House (trigger alert)

Trigger alert (thanks, Sarit).

“Love the Way You Lie” by Eminem featuring Rihanna is certainly not the first song to discuss domestic violence and intimate partner abuse. From the first recording of “Banks of the Ohio” – a 19th century “murder ballad” in which a man drowns his girlfriend after she refuses to marry him – in 1927 by Red Patterson’s Piedmont Log Rollers to Lesley Gore’s outright “You Don’t Own Me” released in 1964, the “Golden Oldies” are rife with lyrics discussing sexism, abuse (Both physical and emotional), and domestic violence. More recently, I recall from my own adolescence the music videos of Paula Cole’s “Where Have All the Cowboy’s Gone?,” Jewel’s “Foolish Games,” and – what might be seen as a precursor to “Love the Way You Lie” – Shawn Colvin’s “Sunny Came Home.” Released in the later 90s, these songs and their accompanying videos may be seen as the mainstream’s cooptation of the Riot Grrrls’ brand of music and feminism.