Public seminar: Jessica Holmes (University of Copenhagen)

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Abstract

In recent years, "depression" has become an undeniable focal point in Anglo-American popular music in several key ways, including: as a term loosely invoked by pop artists and fans to disclose, destigmatize, and normalize everyday experiences of sadness, loneliness, and despair; as an organizational theme on music streaming platforms in connection with mood and activity-based listening; and as a diverse musical and visual style forming around key musical personae and genres. I ultimately call this phenomenon the musical vernacular of depression, a dynamic expressive category that speaks to the prevalence of clinical depression in young people, widespread destigmatization of mental health among Gen Z, and intense cultural debate over what "depression" is.

This talk treats pop singer Billie Eilish and rapper Princess Nokia's creative output, reception, and fandom as emblematic of the musical vernacular of depression. Nokia and Eilish are alike in confronting the feminization of depression and moral panic around its "trendification" through striking visual appeals to feminine abjection and horror. Yet, their differing musical approaches to mental health reflect on certain racial inequalities: while Eilish tends towards hushed, intimate vocals, atmospheric soundscapes, and abstract lyrics, Nokia's music rather offers a sobering and deeply personal account of sexual assault, depression, and PTSD, while bemoaning the disavowal of black women's pain in her signature deadpan voice. I reveal that fans instrumentalize Eilish's and Nokia's music to emotionally self-regulate and even self-diagnose independent of clinical diagnosis and medical supervision. Eilish and Nokia thus offer insight into how the musical vernacular of depression is transforming the ways young people conceive of, communicate about, and tend to their mental health for better or worse amid a worldwide disparity of mental health care and increasing distrust in public health.

Biography

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Jessica Holmes is Associate Professor of Musicology at the University of Copenhagen. Her scholarship addresses the relationship between music and disability with emphasis on embodiment, vocality, and identity formation. Forthcoming in November 2026 with the University of Michigan Press, her first book, Music at the Margins of Sense, theorizes about deaf ontologies of sound and music. Her talk today draws from her second book project, The Musical Vernacular of Depression (also under contract with the University of Michigan Press). Her peer-reviewed articles appear in the Journal of the American Musicological Society, the Journal of Popular Music Studies, the Journal of the Society for American Music, and the Journal of Interdisciplinary Voice Studies, among other venues.