Last modified on August 4, 2023
This week we’ll learn how to analyze the structure and poetry of lyrics. This goes beyond the kinds of meaning-based lyric analyses you see on sites like Genius.com and looks instead at how the lyrics are written and what kinds of subtle messages might be present there. We will learn through Lori Burns’s excellent approach and then you’ll do your own analysis.
Table of Contents
Lyric analysis: Lori Burns
Introduction video
Watch my video summarizing . I know it cuts off suddenly at the end, but don’t worry, I was almost done anyway!
Note: This video uses interactive technology. The picture-in-picture can be swapped or even viewed side-by-side. The video also uses a menu so you can quickly navigate to certain portions of the video. For more explanation, see this video from Kaltura.
download slides – download transcript – link to video
Here is a link to the song in the model analysis:
This diagram (Example 7.2 in ) summarizes the important terminology introduced in this article.
Concept check
Optional: Complete the Concept Check quiz on Blackboard to see if you are understanding these concepts.
Due Thursday: Response
In the Reading Responses channel on Teams, post a message with some type of response about the readings/videos. You may either make a new post or reply to someone else’s post (both count for this participation grade). You can approach this in a bunch of different ways! You might ask clarifying questions about the reading, summarize an important bit of it, share a related personal anecdote…anything counts, as long as it relates to the reading in some way.
Here are some optional prompts:
- Lyric analysis relies a lot on intertextuality, which you studied back in Week 1. You are not meant to be uncovering the “true meaning” when you analyze lyrics, nor are you uncovering the “true meaning” when you analyze poetry! Related to this: you cannot know the identity of the “real author” and the “real reader,” which is why Burns places those terms outside the flowchart in her diagram. What are some reasons why the “real author” is unidentifiable?
- A big issue that recurs in pop music scholarship is the notion of “authenticity.” Authenticity is a trait that is prized in many pop genres. Country, rap, folk, rock, metal—the list goes on and on, and includes a wide diversity of genres, if not close to all of them. How does the issue of authenticity relate to lyric analysis?
Due Sunday*: Student Choice Assignment
* Student Choice Assignments are not required for everyone. You only need to complete this week’s analysis if this is one of your three chosen assignments. Student Choice Assignments are explained further on the syllabus.
Using Burn’s analyses that you read as models, perform a lyric analysis of “Sorry” by Beyoncé.
Instructions
- Listen to the song several times while looking at the lyrics.
- If you have trouble understanding the meaning of the lyrics, feel free to look at the interpretations on Genius.com. If you click on a lyric, a sidebar will appear with various users’ interpretations.
- Keep in mind that the info on Genius.com is crowd-sourced and are not necessarily authoritative—you may disagree, and that’s okay!
- Looking at Genius is totally optional.
- Work through each step of Burns’s paradigm for lyric analysis and apply it to Sorry. This means addressing narrative agency, narrative voice, modes of contact, and listener engagement. (You will not turn this in—this is your own personal work.)
- Using Figure 7.2 as a guide, create a succinct outline that directly addresses each aspect of Figure 7.2. Who is the implied author, narrator, etc.? Addressing the agency of the implied author, what is the implied author’s sensibility, values, ideologies? Addressing the voice of the narrator, what is the narrator’s status, identity, etc. etc. etc.
- Finally, write a short paragraph similar to the “Interpretive Summary” at the end of each of Burns’s analyses, which highlights the most interesting aspects of your analysis and creates a coherent interpretation.
Grading
- You will be assessed on the following concepts:
- Understanding of implied author and agency
- Understanding of narrator and voice
- Understanding of narratee and modes of contact
- Understanding of implied reader and listener engagement
- You will be given detailed feedback through the rubric. Click “View rubric” in the gradebook to access this.
- Assignments are always graded pass/fail, with a threshold of 70% to pass.
Submission
- Submit both your outline and your interpretive paragraph.
- Submit your assignment on Blackboard.
- Upload your assignment as a .pdf attachment. Please do not use other file types.
Bibliography
Bibliography
If articles are not available online, you should be able to find them in the Readings folder on Teams.