Always rooting for the antihero: a dive into the evolution of Taylor Swift's poetic persona
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[1] Universidad de Valladolid
Universidad de Valladolid
Valladolid, España
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- Localización: REDEN [Nueva época]: Revista Española de Estudios Norteamericanos, ISSN-e 2695-4168, Vol. 5, Nº. 2, 2024, págs. 96-112
- Idioma: inglés
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Resumen
The aim of this paper is to analyze how Taylor Swift's public persona has evolved over the last years, from her beginnings in the music industry to her latest works. To do so, we have studied some of the lyrics of her songs with the objective of understanding the three phases Swift has gone through in the creation of her personal brand: damsel in distress, hero and anti-hero. We have examined how, in her first albums, Swift protrayed herself as a naïve, young, woman always hoping to be rescued by her prince. Later, we have delved into how she depicts herself as a hero, so we have analized the coincidences between Campbell's hero's journey and some of the tracks in the album "1989". Finally, we have focused on how, since 2017, Taylor Swifts embodies the anti-hero, reviewing the shared traits between Swift's public persona and these characters of questionable morality. To this end, we have used some theoretical tools such as textual analysis or Greimas' actantial scheme and we have considered some of the most relevant studies on damsels in distress, the hero and the anti-hero.
