Women’s Work as a Cultural Representation: Gendered Constructions in 20th-Century Greek Song Lyrics

Abstract

This study examines the representation of female identity and its relationship to the concept of work in twentieth-century Greek popular song from a media and communication studies perspective. Although structural and legal advancements throughout the twentieth century gradually redefined women’s position in Greek society, popular culture often served as a site of ideological negotiation and resistance. Using a mixed-method research design, this study combines quantitative content analysis to map diachronic thematic shifts and qualitative semiotic analysis to decode deeper ideological structures within the lyrical texts across three distinct historical periods (1900–1939, 1940–1969, and 1970–1999). The analysis conceptualises work through an intersectional feminist lens, examining both institutionalised professional employment in the public sphere and unpaid domestic or care-related reproductive labour in the private domain as interconnected facets of women’s socio-economic activity. The findings reveal a persistent cultural lag within mass media discourse: despite women’s increasing entry into formal occupational employment, popular lyricism consistently marginalised institutionalised female labour. Instead, the lyrical archive continually reframed female identity through emotional, relational, and domestic roles, thereby naturalising a gendered division of labour and reinforcing traditional patriarchal structures under changing historical guises. Ultimately, this research offers new critical insights into how popular music functions as a powerful cultural apparatus, illuminating the enduring tension between progressive social transformations and deeply entrenched media narratives of gender and labour.