Abstract: "This mass messaging content analysis study presents several examples of heavy metal lyrics as a form of social protest. The analysis was done by coding using a purposive convenience sample of twenty-four heavy metal songs from fourteen different bands, and spanning eighteen different albums recorded within the last two and a half decades. Furthermore, content analysis for this study was done through the analysis of the lyrical content of the twenty-four songs in relation to four major categories of social protest. These major categories were politics, religion, war, and social problems. The social problems category was divided in six different sections: social violence, media control, drug abuse, materialism, racism, and environmental issues.
The theoretical framework of mass media as a primary site for the construction and dissemination of dominant ideologies, establishes a link with the social protest content in heavy metal lyrics making them a genuine part of the culture industry and one of the principal channels for ideological discourse in contemporary society. After inductively testing the research statement I find that it is consistent with the focus of this study and the theoretical framework presented along with it."
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