Music journalism as a hybrid field between politics and culture : Kerrang! and NME's challenging and reinforcement of gender inequality, imbalance, and women's marginalization in 2019-2023

Abstract: This paper discusses the incorporation of socio-political themes in music and music journalism, focusing on the issues of gender inequality, imbalance, and women's marginalization. It investigates how two UK-based media with a transnational audience focus, Kerrang! and New Musical Express (NME), challenge or reinforce gender inequality-related themes in their publications in 2019-2023. The study also asks how the socio-political discussion is positioned in relation to the aesthetic evaluation of music, how the two music magazines differ in their approach, and how this correlates to the audiences they are trying to attract and retain. The study utilises a discourse analysis method, investigating the textual, discourse practice, and social practice elements of the text in fourteen articles (seven from each chosen media), divided into publication types of news articles, new song release coverage, album/artist reviews, and women's rights-related special publications. The analysis concludes that women musicians aremarginalised, especially in the alternative and rock music genres, but also discovers that effort is put into giving women musicians' voices more space to discuss and challenge the issue. Kerrang! and NME appear as media avoiding focusing on women musicians' gender when discussing their music and pointing at specific actions necessary to reach better gender equality and women empowerment in music and society. The findings demonstrate a varying positioning of gender inequality discussion in relation to the aesthetic evaluation of music, concluding that NME as a "lifestyle" publication focuses on the topic to a lesser extent than the "underground", niche-specific media Kerrang!. The study establishes a connection to the intersectionality theory, presenting the intersecting identities of "women" and "musicians" related to the inequality in the music industry. The research contributes to understanding cultural journalism's influence in mediating and inspiring social and political debate, providing updated findings on women's representation in two contemporary music media. It proves the importance of music and music journalism for enriching modern society and serves as a foundation for future research that can expand the findings by employing a quantitative approach for more generalizable findings.