"Can't make a wife out of a ho" : Konstruerande av kvinnor och män i Spotifys låttopplista ”Top 50 – Sverige”

Sammanfattning: Listening to music is a frequent activity in 2021 and access is easy through a variety of different streaming platforms available today. But do we know what messages the songs we listen to are sending us? Researchers such as McDowell, Werner and Gauntlett all agree that media texts, such as music, affect the users through images of how they should be or act. This study explores what themes can be found in some of the most streamed songs in Sweden, and how men and women are constructed within these themes. The material for this study consist of lyrics from 30 of the most streamed song on Spotify in Sweden, over the past three months (February, March and April 2021). This study was conducted through thematic analysis where four major themes were identified - “Love”, “Reactions”, “Ways of living” and “Narration”. How men and women are constructed within these themes are discussed through Gender system theory. This theory addresses the difference between women and men as constructed by society. A construction that put men and women into different boxes and grants men more power than women. The result show that even if men and women are portrayed as equal in a few cases, men are still constructed as superior to women in several ways. This is most visible within the theme “Narration” where it is shown that men address women in a condescending way and speak about women as their property.