The  Anti-War Voice of Buffy Sainte-Marie

Guilherme  Feitosa de Almeida

doi:10.5937/newso2158161F

Guilherme Feitosa de Almeida Baylor University https://orcid.org/0000-0001-8411-9858

DOI: https://doi.org/10.5937/newso2158161F

Keywords: Buffy Sainte-Marie, Anti-War Art and Performance, Protest Song, Transindigenous, Native American Representation, Feminine Representation, Native American Assimilation, Aesthetics and Poiesis

Abstract

Universal soldier (1964), Soldier Blue (1970), and The War Racket (2017) represent some of Buffy Sainte-Marie's most prominent anti-war songwriting, where she demonstrates her poietic process as an artist and activist. Considering her anti-war utterance, I will analyze these selected songs and place them in Buffy Sainte-Marie's work as an activist and performer. Additionally, I intend to interpret her musical production through semiotics and hermeneutics that center her contemporary voice as an artist of First Nations descent. By charting the contemporary landscape of her work in both the 1960s to 1970s and the 2000s, I will seek relationships between the process of representation (of the feminine and indigenous identities) and assimilation (mainstream music and the media) within her anti-war utterance.

Author Biography

Guilherme Feitosa de Almeida, Baylor University

Guilherme Almeida, He/Him, is a Rio de Janeiro-born and Waco-based creator, performer, and teaching artist. From pop rock and folk music for Shakespearean productions to flamenco-inspired scores for Lorca, Guilherme’s compositions instill the dramaturgy with rich vernacular and ethnomusicological energy. Guilherme works as Senior Lecturer in the Musical Theatre at Baylor University. Recent composition projects: Camelia (Documentary Theatre crafted from interviews from the Communist period in Romania – Rogue Media) Goethe’s Faust (co-creation with director Raphael Parry at UT Dallas, new translation by Zsuzsanna Ozváth and Fred Turner,) Oscillating Realities (inter-media performance piece, ZHdK – Switzerland,) durezieh und... (winner of the Créatrices composition competition – Switzerland.) Research interest includes Interdisciplinarity in the Arts and Humanities – connections between justice, spirituality, and performance theory. Recent workshops include Introduction to Theatre of the Oppressed (Beteli Center, Tbilisi – Georgia) and Documentary Theatre – Interview to Radio Drama (Southeastern Theatre Conference).