Goo Goo for Gaga?

Perhaps no pop-icon in the past decade has generated as media much buzz as has Stefani Joanne Angelina Germanotta, or, as she is more commonly known, Lady Gaga. Part of Lady Gaga’s allure is due to the ridiculous spectacle with she presents herself to the public: her costumes are, to put it liberally, over the top; her entrances attention seeking; the amount of electricity that her concert performances draw could most likely power a developing democracy for a week.

In addition to the amount of favorable media attention Lady Gaga has been granted, she has been given equally positive treatment by social institutions and her ever-expanding fan base, who laud her for purportedly using her pop-icon status to effect social change. For example, in her song “Born This Way” (2011), she states:

No matter gay, straight, or bi,
lesbian, transgendered life,
I'm on the right track baby,
I was born to survive.
No matter black, white or beige
Chola or orient made,
I'm on the right track baby,
I was born to be brave.

Or, if you are brave enough, skip to 5:30:




Here, Gaga seeks to empower those who have been marginalized, either due to their sexuality, ethnicity, or race, telling them to be brave and proudly accept who they are as human beings. Although I personally could not agree more with this message, one could pose that Gaga’s message stems not from an altruistic place of wanting to effect social change (as her fans believe it does), but rather as a means of generating profit on songs for herself and her record labels. In paraphrasing the works of Theodor Arno and Max Horkheimer, Julie Rivkin and Michael Ryan state: “mass culture […] is a tool of domination, a way for capitalism to offer ephemeral gratification to people condemned to lives of work” (Rivkin and Ryan, 1026). In short, objects of popular culture—in this case Gaga’s “Born This Way,” are created not for any altruistic social value, but for purchase and consumption. Secondly, Gaga’s creations offer no real social effects, but only give ephemeral release from, in the case of Gaga’s listeners, their possible societal marginalization.

So, is it true that Lady Gaga first and foremost attempts to be a profit machine? As it happens, her financial success is just as equally impressive as her success within the media. Her albums have reached number one chart positions in six different countries, she has had two wildly popular global concert tours, and more recently, her single “Born This Way has had the distinction of “being the fastest-selling single in the history of iTunes,” selling over one million copies in only five days. In sum, Gaga brings in some serious dough.

But perhaps one could argue that Lady Gaga does not have to be either focused solely on generating profit or solely trying to effect social change. Along the lines of Stuart Hall, who I personally happen to agree with on this issue, Lady Gaga could embody more of a postmodern subject: “The postmodern subject involves the subject in shifting fragmented and multiple identities. Persons are composed not of one but of several, sometimes contradictory, identities” (Barker, 220). Although Lady Gaga may well be attempting to draw in large sums of money from her creations, this is by no means mutually exclusive to effecting social change. She can attempt both, and the desires to do both can reside inside her. In sum, we can now blissfully return to listening to Gaga, knowing that both capitalism and the pursuit of societal equality can remain harmoniously in tact.



Works Cited:


Barker, Chris. Cultural Studies: Theory and Practice. 3rd ed. Los Angeles: SAGE, 2008. Print.

"Lady Gaga." Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia. Web. 23 Aug. 2011. .

"LADY GAGA LYRICS - Born This Way." A-Z Lyrics Universe. Web. 23 Aug. 2011. .

Rivkin, Julie, and Machael Ryan, eds. Literary Theory: An Anthology. Malden: Blackwell, 1998.