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ABSTRACT
The article presents the results of a comparative visual analysis of popular Russian and British music videos. The sample was based on the most viewed music videos on YouTube in 2019. The authors used the modern interpretation of Bourdieu's theory of capital as a theoretical framework for analysis. Bodily capital is considered as an independent type of capital that has physical, erotic, gender, and aesthetic dimensions. One considers that the capitalization of corporeality in a music video is connected with the plot visualization of the accumulation of bodily capital, i.e. the process of body transformation, by working on its physical features, constructing gender identity, modeling erotic behaviour, and aesthetic attributes of appearance. Moreover, the capitalization of corporeality in the video includes demonstration of obtaining direct or symbolic benefits resulting from the conversion of bodily capital into economic, cultural, or social capital. The crucial features of the capitalization of corporeality in Russian videos are the replication of markers of video characters' social status through body attributes, demonstration of aesthetically idealized bodies, and general irony over corporeality. In the British videos, there is less tongue-in-cheek narrative, especially associated with corporeal attributes; more unified body types are demonstrated.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).
Notes
1 IFPI estimates that in Citation2018, music streaming via YouTube accounted for almost half of all online music streaming in the world. See: IFPI Global Music Report 2019, URL: https://www.ifpi.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/Music-Listening-2019-1.pdf.
2 C. Hakim’s idea of considering ‘erotic capital as a fourth personal asset, an important addition to economic, cultural, and social capital’ (Citation2010, p. 499) and ‘a multi-faceted combination of physical and social attractiveness’ (Citation2012, p. 28) is better known. A critique of the concept by Hakim can be found here (Green, Citation2013).
3 To be precise, Hutson (Citation2012) suggests using ‘physical capital’ as an umbrella term. However, we believe that in this case it is more correct to use the term ‘bodily capital’, as it includes not only the purely physical conditions and physical attractiveness of individuals, but also the socio-cultural meanings that people give to each other's bodies. There are also two reasons for this. First, P. Bourdieu used the phrases ‘physical capital’ (Bourdieu, Citation1978) and ‘bodily capital’ (Bourdieu, 1979/Citation1984) as synonyms. Second, the term ‘physical capital’ was understood by economists and political economists ‘as embodied in tools, machines, and other production equipment’ (Coleman, Citation1988, p. 100).
4 P. Bourdieu did not consider sexuality institutionalized enough for being seen as an independent field (Martin & George, Citation2006, p. 125).
5 Among them, five oppositions are distinguished: beautiful - ugly, sublime - base, tragic - comic, poetic - prosaic, deep - superficial.
6 The judgments about the differences between the Russian and UK Music Markets were based on a comparison of the PwC report about the Russian Music Market in 2018 (URL: https://www.pwc.ru/ru/publications/mediaindustriya-v-2019/muzykalnaya-industriya.html) and UK Music research on the British Music Industry in 2018 (URL: https://www.ukmusic.org/research/music-by-numbers/). For example, the estimated profit of the music industry in Russia was 596 million US dollars, and in the UK, it was about 3.03 billion US dollars (all calculations are based on the average currency exchange rate for October 2018).
7 In music video, researchers highlight three basic components: music, text, and visual. In the current work only the visual component was analysed.
8 The analysed videos are understood as ‘popular’ because of their presence in media. This term in case of current work does not necessary refer to the music genre (pop music), as the variety of genres of analysed music pieces include popular (pop), pop-rock, hip-hop tracks.
9 The corresponding classification division of music videos was proposed by us earlier, (see Tkachuk, Citation2017).
10 We focused on the description of somatic types presented in the work of Davis, L.L. (Davis, Citation1985) and modified them in accordance with the observed female and male silhouettes (in Davis's material, there are only female silhouettes).
11 Here and after, see codes listed in table 1.
12 Sam Smith is considered as non-binary / gender queer, and has been categorized as other (URL: https://www.theguardian.com/music/2019/sep/13/sam-smith-on-being-non-binary-im-changing-my-pronouns-to-theythem)
13 Hereinafter, the total number of the main characters who wore certain attributes in the analyzed videos is indicated, RU in Russian, GB in British.
14 Note the average age of Russian musicians in the sample was higher than the average age of British musicians. So that the desire of Russian musicians to embody ideal slender and beautiful bodies may be associated with the need to conceal their age due to fierce competition in the industry.
15 The clips were selected on the YouTube. Views are stated up to December 2019. The list of British music videos includes clips featuring British and Irish musicians, including international collaborations such as ZAYN (UK) and Taylor Swift (USA). There were no such musicians in the Russian sample.
16 Hereinafter, we divided the characters into male and female regardless the gender identity of the musicians.
Additional information
Notes on contributors
A. M. Pivovarov
A. M. Pivovarov graduated from St. Petersburg State University with a degree in psychology, holds a Doctor of Philosophy in Sociology, and is Assistant Professor at the Faculty of Sociology of St. Petersburg State University, Russia. His current research interests include interpersonal and business communications, body studies, social and communication analysis of creativity.
D. V. Tkachuk
D. V. Tkachuk graduated from St. Petersburg State University with a degree in sociology. She is an Associate Researcher in Sociological Institute of RAS, Branch of Federal Center of Theoretical and Applied Sociology of the Russian Academy of Sciences, St. Petersburg, Russia. Her current research interests include music and cultural industries, music tastes formation in the context of social stratification, and body studies.