Pop-Stars mit Klasse. Diversity und neoliberaler Klassismus im zeitgenössischen Pop

Abstract

Focusing on pop culture of the 2010s, this paper explores contemporary discourses on diversity. It provides insights into how, when, and where actors, artists, initia­tives, and institutions are speaking out against identity-based discriminations and exclusions. However, the way these articulations are mobilized obscures the view on structures of ongoing systemic oppressions and inequalities in late capitalism. In re­lation to patterns of representation and identity politics, demands for more diversity and inclusion in popular music have received an enormous boost, though marginali­zation continues to exist in form of neoliberal classism. I posit that the notion of diversity works as an exclusionary mechanism upholding and reinforcing neoliberal power structures. It even goes one step further: neoliberal classism reproduces in­tersectional inequalities in terms of race, gender, and sexuality effectively disguising the persistence of white patriarchy. With reference to works on neoliberalism in contemporary society and popular culture, Beyoncé and Taylor Swift serve as exam­ples for my argument that popular music studies need to pay more attention to pat­terns of classist exclusion in order to further nuance its intersectional research agenda.