Doctoral Colloquium (Music) | Lauron Kehrer

Doctoral Colloquium: Prof. Lauron Kehrer (guest, Musicology)

Title: Context Collapse and the Ethics of Queer Sampling in Beyoncé’s Renaissance

Using Beyoncé’s queer sampling of Big Freedia and other Black queer and trans artists on her album Renaissance (2022) as a case study, this talk seeks to complicate our understanding of the ethics of contemporary sampling practices. The album extensively engages with what we might call queer sampling – the sampling of musical work by queer and trans artists or sonic references associated with LGBTQ music cultures in order to create a musical experience that sounds queer. This talk argues that queer sampling in this album situates Black queer and trans artists (and listeners) as central to the project and to Black music practices while simultaneously creating a context collapse in which queer experiences are folded into other minoritized experiences. This use of queer sampling also occurs in lieu of more direct collaboration with Black queer artists that, while entirely legal and somewhat beneficial to queer artists, nevertheless contributes to this context collapse and a lack of visibility and artistic control for those artists.

Dr. Lauron J. Kehrer is an Associate Professor of Music at Smith College and currently serves as President of the International Association for the Study of Popular Music, U.S. Branch. Their research focuses on the intersections of race, gender, and sexuality in contemporary American popular music, especially hip hop. Kehrer has published articles in American Music, Journal of the Society for American Music, Popular Music and Society, Journal of Popular Music Studies, and Popular Culture Studies Journal. Their first book, Queer Voices in Hip Hop: Cultures, Communities, and Contemporary Performance (University of Michigan Press 2022) examines the work of Black queer and trans artists in hip hop. They were awarded the 2024 Marcia Herndon Article Award for exceptional ethnomusicological work in gender and sexuality for their article, “‘Sissy Style: Race, Gender, and Sexuality in New Orleans Bounce Dance” (Journal of Popular Music Studies). They are currently co-editing a volume with Stephanie Jensen-Moulton called “Better Be Good to Me”: American Popular Songs as Domestic Violence Narratives (under contract with University of Michigan Press).

The Doctoral Colloquium is open to all.