AUT LibraryAUT
View Item 
  •   Open Research
  • AUT Faculties
  • Faculty of Culture and Society
  • School of Language and Culture
  • View Item
  •   Open Research
  • AUT Faculties
  • Faculty of Culture and Society
  • School of Language and Culture
  • View Item
JavaScript is disabled for your browser. Some features of this site may not work without it.

What’s Be Happen? The discourse of reggae lyrics thirty years on

Turner, E
Thumbnail
View/Open
Turner_9_2_final Sites article.pdf (240.3Kb)
Permanent link
http://hdl.handle.net/10292/4983
Metadata
Show full metadata
Abstract
This article discusses What’s Be Happen?, New Zealand’s first reggae album, released by the band Herbs in July 1981. The lyrics and adopted ‘message music’ constitute a nexus that connects, marks and speaks of salient political and social events and issues in the 1970s and early 1980s. These issues divided New Zealand society at the time, and have helped shape both opinion and many New Zealanders’ sense of their identity. The lyrics refer in particular to protests against the loss of Māori ancestral lands; the struggle to end apartheid in South Africa; the conflict between loss of Pacific Island roots and material ambitions in New Zealand, as well as the day to day experiences and police treatment of urban Māori and Pacific Island people. Analysis of the lyrics in this discussion draws on Bakhtin’s (1981) theories of heteroglossia and the dialogic responsivity of texts.
Keywords
Lyrics; New Zealand; Culture; History; Bakhtin
Date
December 2012
Source
Sites: A journal of social anthropology and cultural studies, vol.9(2), pp.23 - 38 (15)
Item Type
Journal Article
Publisher
University of Otago
DOI
10.11157/sites-vol9iss2id184
Publisher's Version
http://dx.doi.org/10.11157/sites-vol9iss2id184
Rights Statement
The contents of this journal will be available in an open access format 18 month(s) after an issue is published.

Contact Us
  • Admin

Hosted by Tuwhera, an initiative of the Auckland University of Technology Library

 

 

Browse

Open ResearchTitlesAuthorsDateSchool of Language and CultureTitlesAuthorsDate

Alternative metrics

 

Statistics

For this itemFor all Open Research

Share

 
Follow @AUT_SC

Contact Us
  • Admin

Hosted by Tuwhera, an initiative of the Auckland University of Technology Library