Music is such an influential piece of society. Music can empower how one feels, thinks, dresses, or communicate with others. From ones birth to death music is present in some form to humankind. The music industry has found many avenues into the media such as commercials, movies and television, making music part of our daily lives. While music has various genres, many of the artists in these genres address similar themes through their music. I have selected to examine how two genres of music address issues regarding gender, sexuality, and violence. I discovered that Today’s Country and Hip Hop have an unexpected number of comparisons along with some remarkable differences with regards to these topics. Furthermore, this paper discusses specific…show more content… Gender can be defined as what it means for a person to portray masculine or feminine qualities (Holtzman, 2014). Country music has historically had an affinity for old-fashioned gender roles with the strong male role being the protective and committed romantic who falls in love with the gentle young woman in need of a strong man to care for and love her. However, in modern country music, though this historic theme still exists in some songs, more influence of pop music is being heard, with driving rhythms and lyrics that describe encounters based more on sexual attraction than the romantic ballads of old. In hip-hop music, both historically and today, most songs portray men as dominant, bold, reckless and sometimes dangerous, whereas females are shown as submissive sex icons, readily available to men. Through lyrics and music videos, gender roles are portrayed in evident and graphic ways that can impact our interpretations of the standards of the…show more content… This song depicts gender role and sexuality. The song starts off with a spin of Sir Mix-A-Lot’s “Baby Got Back” singing “My Anaconda don’t want none unless you got buns hun” (Minaj 2014). Sir Mix-A-Lot’s song objectifies women. Though her lyrics are explicit, I perceive Minaj uses “Anaconda” as her method of reversing the stereotype and exploiting men. Minaj states in the song, “Was a shooter with the law, but he lives in a palace; bought me Alexander McQueen he was keeping me styling” (Minaj 2014). Although she dances and dresses provocatively in her music video, Minaj is also showing the world she is fulfilled with her sexuality and her physique. In her own way, she is attempting to show women to acknowledge their sexuality and be comfortable with their body. In the music video, Minaj is revealed giving a lap dance to rapper Drake. Drake reaches out to touch Minaj’s behind. Instantly, she slaps his hand and walks away. By doing so, Minaj is showing that her body belongs to her. As stated by Derrick Clifton, “women can and should own their curves, their sexuality and how they choose to express that in any way, whether it's overt or subtle. She's showing that it's not only men who should be allowed to show themselves as sexual beings, in and out of their music”