Sounds of Dissent: Popular Music and Politics in Brexit Britain

In this research I explore sounds of dissent in Brexit-Britain in contexts of authoritarian populism and post-truth.

I look specifically into the liberal and conservative poles of British dissent vis-à-vis the UK’s decision in 2016 to withdraw from the European Union.

I do this through various music-related discourses that range from discussions on Brexit’s effects on British music industries and musicians, through to its coverage in social media, albums and collaborative music projects, to the intertwining of its discursive and sonic dimensions in Britain’s three festivals combining politics, arts and music; namely, Glastonbury Festival, The World Transformed Festival and Big Tent Ideas Festival.I accordingly pose the following research questions: What specific kinds of musical and music-related forms of discourses does dissent take in contemporary Britain in relation to the Brexit debate and wider political concerns?

How can these popular music discourses inform our understanding of the past, present and future of Brexit-Britain, and what are the wider global implications of this?I build an interdisciplinary framework that draws on prior studies of popular music and politics in combination with perspectives from anthropology, sociology, human geography, critical theory, and feminism.

Using the said approaches, I conduct a textual and discourse analysis with reference to eclectic sources, including art-based and ethnographic evidence.Critically, PoPoliBB represents the first major study to map out the discursive field of popular music and Brexit, and to point out to the complexities as well as paradoxes of political meaning-making, identities and collectivities associated with it.

PoPoliBB’s outcomes will open up new avenues for studies of popular music and politics, notably through the use of art-based research methodology. They will also be exploited for the promotion of academic activism and intersectoral cooperation.