Kayla Leland
EN-003
Professor Santos
Blog entry #9
April 1st,2016
Dolly Parton
This week in class we have discussed Dolly Parton and how she took ownership of her body and took back power by owning her image. Dolly Parton was born dirt poor in a very large Appalachian family where there were 12 children in a one room cabin in the Smoky Mountains. Dolly learned to trust herself when it came to her music and I think it is interesting that as a result she became the only artist to ever earn a number one record twice with the same song as a singer and three times a writer. Another thing that stood out to me about Dolly Parton was that she never used drugs or alcohol unlike many other musicians and she managed her own career with great success. Throughout Dolly Parton's career she stayed true to herself and didn’t forget her home. She broke the stereotype about where she was from and showed the world what it's like to be a true "Southern, Appalachian, working-class, female". This can be seen to represent her image as she is not afraid to represent her background and let everyone know where she came from. Dolly Parton took control of how she looks and chose to be her own person that represent her background. She created herself this way and played up her persona to take her power back. This relates to what we have discussed earlier this semester that no one should have control to tell musicians how to look or what to wear. Nowadays women are seen as trying to be pretty for men when they can do it for themselves and celebrate their body. Although I think it is great that Dolly Parton was able to embrace herself I think there are other ways for Dolly to embrace herself that showing off her image or body.
Kayla, I liked how you talked about her roots and that she wasn't getting into drugs and alcohol and still made great music throughout it all. Some of the greatest musicians have trouble with both drugs and alcohol but make good music, Dolly was always Dolly.
ReplyDelete