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Madonna is an American singer-songwriter, who achieved a social-cultural impact across the world. As one of the most "well-documented figures in modern age" according to Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, Madonna had been understood variously as her footprints, impact and effects encompassed different stages of contemporary culture over decades, which led to be reviewed by a broad number of international social scientifics, and authors, aside media. Accepted as a pop icon, other scholars such as Stuart Sim and Suzanna Danuta Walters labeled her as a cultural icon, while Camille Paglia and others, called her a major "historical figure".

Madonna's semiotics is defined by having attracted strong reactions, generating praise, as well critics while detractors dismissed all of her moves. Often moved into the irony and ambiguity, she polarized views sparking controversies. It intensified while she was aging. Numerous academic studies, however, considered the way she polarized views and she was defined as a modernist and her messages as openness.

Various critics and scholars credited her to help shape the music industry in the 1980s and ongoing decades. Aware of contemporary or previous female performers that paved the way, a vast group of contemporary and newer critics, deemed Madonna as the one who reinforced women's roles, and she was praised for "achieving levels of power and control unprecedented for a woman in the entertainment industry" in a male-dominated society. Despite it depends of different degrees of measures, Madonna attained an established profile of being discussed with euphemism by diverse international outlets and across different decades, as arguably the most influential female artist of popular music. To the extent, she has inspired numberless of artists, from different musical genres, generations and nationalities.

In some estimates, Madonna ranges for being perhaps the most "debated" and "discussed" female performer at some stage of her career or since she burst on the scene, while a 2018 article from The Daily Telegraph summed up she "contributed more to the cultural conversation than any female performer in history". Cultural institutions or reference works from Smithsonian Institution to Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc. and the National Geographic Society (or its subsidiaries) included Madonna among the most significative Americans in modern history. She featured in a number of other publications with wider perspectives, including Igloo Books's 2009 and 2012 releases of "People Who Changed the World" and TV Guide's 2017 serie of 101 People Who Made the 20th Century.

General cultural spectrum
Madonna has been discussed by scholars in a wide range of topics. By 2008, the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame stated Madonna remains one of the most "well-documented figures of the modern age". A decade later, in 2018, Laura Craik from The Daily Telegraph sustained that Madonna has "contributed more to the cultural conversation than any female performer in history".

Madonna transcended cultural boundaries for which Canadian professor Karlene Faith noted as her "peculiarity" the fact she "cruised so freely through so many cultural terrains". British scholar David Gauntlett once stated she "provides a whole world of ideas and experiences", that "can be discussed on their own terms". In 2018, Eduardo Viñuela, a musicologist at University of Oviedo argued that analyzing her is to delve into the evolution of various relevant aspects of society in recent decades.

Madonna's career
A number of authors have condensed the impact she achieved by talking about her "career" as a whole point. Primarily known as a musician, Janice Min, the editor-in-chief of Billboard explains she is "one of a miniscule number of super-artists whose influence and career transcended music". Professor Robert Sickels from Whitman College, made similar connotations in 100 Entertainers Who Changed America (2013), by saying her "music alone cannot tell the full story" of her "colossal success and influence". In 2006, Singaporean magazine GameAxis Unwired claims she "pioneered" a multifaceted career that "encompasses virtually every aspect of contemporary culture", and the staff of The New York Times summarized in 2018, she achieved a "singular career" that "crossed boundaries and obliterated the status quo".

Robin Raven from Grammy.com reminds that "it's often said that Madonna was ahead of her time". Critics such as Ty Burr and Paul Morley cited or explored the claim. An editor commented in a 1998 article in The Independent that many women do, what Madonna does, but the "differen[ce] is that she translates it into a phenomenon". More than a reviewer commented described she attained an "unusual status", including authors of Film Theory Goes to the Movies (2012). In The Art of Seductress (2002), professor Arthur Asa Berger called her an "unique and distinctive icon".

Pop culture symbol


Madonna earned an established position within popular culture studies with a scholar saying "she became an ideal focus for the developing critical resources of popular cultural theory". Abigail Gardner from the University of Gloucestershire goes further, stating in Rock On (2016) that perhaps more than any other pop star, she "holds a privileged place" in the studies of popular culture. In 2019, The A.V. Club editors commented: "Madonna is modern pop's original icon, someone whose music and influence will be shared [...] and debated for decades to come". The pop culture influence of Madonna has been described as "endless" and "immeasurable". With such notable role granted by scholars and authors; in a retrospective assessment, Matt Cain held in 2018 that "today's pop culture landscape would simply not exist as it is". That year, British scholar Ellis Cashmore justified "even allowing for exaggeration, the point is that Madonna changed 'how the game works'". Back in 2001, Noah Robischon from Entertainment Weekly argued she "has defined, transcended, and redefined pop culture".

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Across multiple decades, another significant number of publications and scholars have remarked her pop condition while staying contemporary— without a posthumous value or retrospective recognition. In the 2000s alone, business professor Oren Harari quoted a critic describing her as "the most durable pop symbol of her generation", while Belfast Telegraph columnist Gail Walker, commented in 2008, "not even male icons have stayed at the front of popular culture the way she has". Similar remarks were found in the 2010s, with critics such as Víctor Lenore who summoned in 2012 a panel to discuss her and where she was understood as "the most influential" female performer of popular culture up that point, and in the 2020s, the staff of Rolling Stone talked about her "ability to stay at the center of pop culture for longer than nearly anyone".

Other critics, however, extended the definition of pop icon on Madonna. In her debut decade, music critic Robert Christgau claimed she transcended it. Scholar Kathleen Sweeney, used Madonna and Marilyn Monroe as examples in Maiden USA: Girl Icons come of Age (2008) to illustrate how "some reach a status beyond mere celebrity in public consciousness to become enduring cultural icons". By 2012, Russell Iliffe from PRS for Music, argued she "transcended the term 'pop star' to become a global cultural icon".

On Madonna's socio-cultural impact
Madonna's socio-cultural impact has been much quoted. By the end of the 1990s, Camille Paglia made the suggestion that "historically people will see the enormous impact that Madonna has had around the world". Doru Pop, a Romanian professor at Babeș-Bolyai University, confirms in The Age of Promiscuity (2018), that her cultural impact has been "extensively analyzed by many authors". Even for Billboard editor Louis Virtel, who claimed in 2017, the task of defining her impact is "brutal". Editors of Encyclopedia of Women in Today's World, Volume 1 (2011) defined her "cultural influence has been profound and pervasive". In 2008, William Langley from The Daily Telegraph went on to say, "Madonna has changed the world's social history, has done more things as more different people than anyone else is every likely to".



At the height of her influence, during the late twentieth century, Madonna was seen by some as sign of her times. A scholar proposed her as "hero of our time". Cultural critic Greil Marcus defined her cultural appeal stating "she is undeniably part of our culture", and Suzanna Danuta Walters commented "she circulates constantly in the cultural practices of everyday life". From academy to popular media, agents like American professor Marjorie Garber suggested she "read the temper of the times" perhaps more than other, while French editor of Vogue France, Martine Trittoleno held in 1993, "more than a witness of the epoch, she is an active reflection of it". American poet Jane Miller even stated that "Madonna functions as an archetype directly inside contemporary culture". In his Madonna biography published in 2002, Andy Koopmans defined her as a "cultural obsession".

She continued to left her mark in the next decades, and while aging. By 2008, Bob Batchelor, an assistant professor at Kent State University believes that "no artist of the 1980s had a larger effect on the cultural landscape than Madonna". Authors in Ageing, Popular Culture and Contemporary Feminism (2014), mentioned her "status as a cultural icon is acknowledged" in press accounts, while Cashmore comments even in her sixties she is "recognized as a genuine cultural icon".

Myth-like modern figure


Her influence was perceived through everyday life forms such as dreams. In 2009, cultural organization MiratecArts commented that "her influence is so powerful that it extends deep into the subconscious world of imagination, fantasy and dreams". For the lattermost point, editors of Mythic Astrology Applied (2004), illustrate: "Many men and women have reported Madonna appearing in their dreams. As she has become a living archetype in our culture, it is no wonder that this is so". Sandra Bernhard expressed in her book Confessions of a Pretty Lady (1989): "I dream about Madonna more than anyone I know (or don't know); somehow she's indelibly written into my subconscious, and the theme is always the same". In Madonna (2001), Andrew Morton talks about an artist named Brent Wolf, who confessed he dreamt of her every night for five years.

Folklorist scholar Kay Turner, devoted a book titled I Dream of Madonna: Women's Dreams of the Goddess of Pop (1993), which tells the dreaming of 50 women on Madonna, whom deemed her variously as a shapeshifter, Aphrodite or Dionysus. Turner's work has been cited by authors such as Lucy Goodison and Alice Robb, with Robb describing some of these woman interviewed by Turner, found "emotional support in their Madonna dreams, waking with a sense of peace of resolution that persisted in their real lives". A number of authors like Kelly Sullivan Walden, in I Had the Strangest Dream... (2009) have made dream interpretations on Madonna.

Popular culture have borrowed the words "myth" and associates. For Virtel, she has "a career that amounts to living mythology". By 2018, Spanish critic Víctor Lenore describes her as "the greatest female myth" in the history of popular music.

American culture
Overseas Madonna has been called an "American icon", and for a long-time, an icon of American identity. Argentine writer Rodrigo Fresán, once commented she is one of the "classic symbols of Made in USA". Gender scholar Laura Viñuela, in a Madonna class at University of Oviedo in 2015, deemed her story and evolution to be comparable and useful to analyze the historical development of the United States. To Gina Arnold, her primary contribution to national culture has been musical. She made a substantial impact in the borders of sexuality.

Historian Glen Jeansonne, in A Time of Paradox: America Since 1890 (2006) wrote that along with Ronald Reagan, Madonna epitomized one of the faces of the 1980s, "the age of diversity". He states Madonna helped "freed Americans from their inhibitions". Scottish author Andrew O'Hagan considered her as a "heroic opponent of cultural and political authoritarianism of the American 'establishment'". To Thomas Ferraro, "no one was more important to the culture as whole than Madonna", at least for young, defending his point by saying she was a "miracle worker, and wonder woman", the faith healer of Reagan's divide and-conquer America. Her influence in American life was compared with that of Elvis Presley by author Gilbert B. Rodman in Elvis after Elvis (1996), considering she matched his impact and calling her a "female version of Elvis" in U.S culture. To media scholars Charlotte Brunsdon and Lynn Spigel, Madonna rivaled Oprah Winfrey's space in the psyche of national culture during the 20th century.

Globalization
According to Viñuela, the musicologist, her career is closely linked to the "consolidation" of globalization. She was an active reflection of it, to the point various lumped her with cultural artefacts in the articulation of globalization as well as westernization and americanization. In sum, pundits hailed her as "an icon of Western society", claimed Third Way. By 2014, CUNY Graduate Center professor, Jean Graham-Jones considered her the "globalization's quintessential femicon". She was also called a "universal symbol" by associate professor Juana Suárez.

The high-profile she commanded was reflected in various pieces. For example, a 1989 article of Micromanía referred the "symbol Madonna" as the "most palpable proof that Western society advances and changes", while a decade later, in 1999 political scientist David Held with other academics stated: "The most public symbols of globalization consist of Coca-Cola, Madonna and the news on CNN". In Israel (2003), historian Efraim Karsh cites an Israeli journalist, whose commented: "Madonna and Big Macs the most peripheral of examples of ... 'normalness' which means, amongst other things, the end of the terrible fear of everything that is foreign and strange".

In International Communication and Globalization (1997), Nottingham Trent University reader Ali Mohammadi lumped her with other examples for paving the way the global economy. Madonna was deemed as a hyperglobalist example as well, being classified as "dominant motifs" of a hyper-globalization thesis from three schools of thought. Douglas Rushkoff was quoted as saying "Madonna brought down the Berlin Wall" in a certain sense. Having cited Rushkoff's view, an author reminds Madonna's prominent role with MTV, further explaining that the network represented one of the challenges faced by the former Soviet Union. Various informants, including koreanist scholar Mózes Csoma have documented references of Madonna in the hermetic culture of North Korea. Evita is the first American film screened in the country.

Associated phrases
A number of scholars, used and coined expressions with Madonna's name in the articulation of globalization.


 * Madonna-economy: Defined at the 1993 International Federation for Information Processing held in Namur, Belgium, under the concept of global cultural industry as "risks to become an aggresive and arrogant phenomenon", for example by imposing the transformation of all cultural activities into cultural "goods". Conversely, the Group of Lisbon, an international consortium of 19 scholars from different disciplines, described it in 1995, as a "process that is unifying (essentially by homogenization) the consumption of information and communication goods" in the same way Coca-Cola did. German scholar Frank Sowa from Technische Hochschule Nürnberg lumped it with other terms such as McDonaldization, McWorld and Cocacolonization.


 * Madonnanization: Economist Tyler Cowen from Forbes used it in the context of the performing arts as a "homogeneous global culture of the 'least common denominator'". French academic Georges-Claude Guilbert, notes that in a postmodern context the definition would not be derogatory, arguing that "there seems to be some sort of equation between the McDonaldization of American and its "Madonnanization", which can both be "celebrated by postmodern critics".

Race


According to Jaap Kooijman from the University of Amsterdam, racial studies are discourses that surround Madonna, and she "provided a challenge views on racial perspectives". An article published by Australasian gay & lesbian law journal in 1993, stated "it is not possible to read/interpret Madonna without a recognition of elements such as race, class [and] ethnicity", which are present in "almost all of Madonna's texts".

Raised in a multicultural environment since her early life, Madonna was called as "the last ethnic and first postethnic diva" by a scholar. Frances Negrón-Muntaner named her the "last century's American transcultural dominatrix". Over the years Madonna has performed in languages other than English, either almost entirely or entirely, such as Sanskrit ("Shanti/Ashtangi"), Spanish ("Lo Que Siente La Mujer" or "Verás"), Portuguese ("Faz Gostoso" or "Fado Pechincha") and French ("La Vie en Rose" or "Je t'aime... moi non plus"), along with verses of other languages like Basque ("Sagarra Jo").

Music critic Ann Powers explains that "her virtual workplace was multicultural long before that was a mandated corporate goal". As an example of cultural globalization, Indian authors, in New Directions in Comparative Literature (2008) virtually describe how "by making culture generally available, Madonna becomes the culture of all social classes". Madonna achieved a notable impact on some subcultural groups; most notably the LGBT community. By 1997, Canadian professor Karlene Faith stated she "has been a 'cult figure' within self-propelling subcultures".

Racial groups and subcultures


Black culture: Madonna is "typically credited as the first to use black gay culture, in a clear and forward way". A 1990 article of CineAction! states that "Madonna's 'blackness' is a common, though poorly articulated theme of popular press literature". Agents like bell hooks extensively explored her relationship with black culture in the 1990s, although she criticized Madonna. Madonna declared she wanted to be black as a child, and many recall how she was subtly marketed as if she were a black singer before her face was revealed to the public. Thomas Ferraro called her the "most accomplished Italian-to-black crossover artist in history". Ferraro believes Madonna was the "white pop star ever owing more to black male productions" and that "no diva has spent more time on camera and off with men of color, professionally and romantically involved" in the twentieth century.

Latinos (and Hispanics): Is "perhaps the most influential and revisited 'ethnic' style in her work" according to professor Santiago Fouz-Hernández. With Madonna making references to Latinos since burst onto the scene, Fouz-Hernández and Latin academics in Bitch She's Madonna (2018) deemed her an early precursor of the so-called "Latino boom" started in the 1990s that various American pop singers replicated. In Boricua Pop (2004), Negrón-Muntaner explored her impact in the community during the 1980s and 1990s, stating that "Madonna's nod created the illusion of insider status for Latinos of all sexualities in U.S. culture".

Boricuas: Various reviewers, including Carlos Pabón in De Albizu a Madonna (1995) and Carmen R. Lugo-Lugo in The Madonna Experience (2001) have commented on her impact in Puerto Rican society. Negrón-Muntaner also detailed her early influence, describing Madonna as "the first white pop star to make Boricuas the over object of her affections". By doing so, she believes Madonna produced a "queer juncture for Puerto Ricans representation in popular culture", making also Boricua men desirable to an "unprecedented degree (and through) mass culture".



Italian-Americans: Madonna is Italian American, and Ferraro said she "never stops talking about her background". Her early influence as a public Italian American figure is commented on by D'Acierno in The Italian American Heritage (1998), who says she served as a "vehicle for the expression of many of the qualities that are exclusive not only to Italian" but to Italian Americans. In Colored White (2003), historian David Roediger referred to her as "the most popular United States Italian American entertainer of our time", and the author of The European American Experience (2010) referred to Madonna and Lady Gaga as the most famous examples of the Italian American musical tradition in modern times. Leah Perry from Empire State College, notes "Madonna's legacy" and influence on other American female pop artists with Italian roots such as Gaga and Gwen Stefani.

Other ethnicities: Many reviewers have noted Madonna's usage of some Asian cultures elements in her fashion and religious overtones works. Various academics including Gayatri Gopinath, Douglas Kellner or Christopher Partridge explored how Madonna's figure aided and reinforced the introduction to the West and mainstream culture, numerous of these elements for various generations. Others observed the influence of England heritage in her work, particularly when she was living in the United Kingdom; however, her exploration of intra-Caucasian identities has received "little academic attention". José I. Prieto‐Arranz, in The Journal of Popular Culture (2012) commented that various critics agreed that rather than export American music, she has imported new (mostly European) trends into the nation at some stage.


 * The position of the beautiful, white, middle-class woman, such as Madonna, in cultural representations is double-edged. The power of her image can obscure and effect the disenfranchisement not only of women who are not white or middle class or straigh, but of women who are. | Film Theory Goes to the Movies, 1993, pag 162

Business



 * WITH Madonna's spurt to fame and her determination to avoid massive publicity, new heights have been scaled or new depths plumbed m... | madonna — or monster? 30 March 1986, The Sunday Times of London
 * Live Nation
 * Warner Music’s Madonna Complex

Over years, Madonna's semiotics extended to business and marketing community for many reasons, with Andrew Morton commenting her "success has certainly impressed the business community".

Justified points include scholar Douglas Kellner whom declared "one cannot fully grasp the Madonna phenomenon without analyzing her marketing and publicity strategies". A member of the Kelley School of Business deemed her more than a "pop cult icon" describing "she is someone every can learn from—though the lessons run counter to conventional marketing wisdom of the 4Ps variety". Stephen Brown, a professor of marketing at University of Ulster, seen her case as "relevant to the consumer research community", while in her sixties, a member of AARP wrote an article for business magazine Campaign and presented her as a "relevant" example for marketing community about other visible targets like women over the age of 60. In 2006, business theorists Jamie Anderson and Martin Kupp for London Business School, studied her case concluding she is a "born entrepeneur". Brown as do others, called her a "marketing genius".

Madonna is the first female entrepreneur on a Forbes cover (October 1, 1990 ) according to themselves. In Profiles of Female Genius (1994), editor commented the fact Forbes deemed her as "America's smartest businesswoman" was an unusual treatment at that time, as he considered the publication as part of the bastion male capitalism system. The advent of Madonna usher "the phenomenon of star as multimedia impresario" according to Gerald Marzorati. Latin academics in Bitch She's Madonna (2018), grant an important role to Madonna for shaping music businesses as "we know it". Referential works such as Encyclopædia Britannica categorized Madonna for "achieved levels of power and control unprecedented for a woman in the entertainment industry".

Businesswoman role
Madonna is one of the first female stars to have ever established an entertainment company and a record label. When Maverick was created, she was one of the first female CEOs in the industry. Aside Maverick, she started other enterprises. "Madonna is herself a corporation, and a rather diverse one", wrote professor Robert Miklitsch in From Hegel to Madonna (1998). American accountant Sharon Lechter summed up that over her career, Madonna "has received acclaim as a role model for businesswomen in media". In 2007, Madonna was included in Billboard's Power Players which recognized music industry women that "have made an important mark on the music business" with staff commenting Madonna's CEO "has a reputation as being a tenacious executive as ubiquitous as her music".

She debuted in a era where according to a 1992 article of The Canberra Times most entertainers avoided labels of "manager" or "businesswoman". In his Madonna biography, Andy Koopmans cites her as saying: "Part of the reason I'm successful is because I'm a... businesswoman. But I don't think is necessary for people to know that". Dan Bigman, an editor from Forbes reminds they declared in 1990 her to be one of the "shrewdest businesswomen we'd ever seen", but "much to her irritation". Her business profile became so massive, that an editor explained her entrepreneurial talent were becoming "legend". At first, she earned a reputation of being a "calculating businesswoman", and The Canberra Times noted a "crucial difference" between Madonna and her other American industry fellows, as she only endorsed products she thinks will "enhance her, more than the product". In-control with her business deals, Madonna was labeled as a "workaholic". In 2000, Warren Allen Smith describes that many people from the 1990s spoke of Madonna as "the lady who work". In 2002 Jennifer Egan, explains there is a "popular answer" from critics about her that "she's done (all about her life and work) it through sheer business savvy".


 * Xtramagazine

Financial and patronage acumen
The advent of Madonna's financial triumph, led the feminist scholars Cheris Kramarae and Dale Spender comment she achieved "the kind of financial control that women had long fought for within industry". Unusual when Madonna debuted, by 1993, professor E. Ann Kaplan contextualized she "has entered the public sphere as an entrepreneur earning a lot of money, something that is not considered natural for women". In comparison, Forbes pinpointed the "rise fast and fade fast" of female artists like Whitney Houston or Cyndi Lauper, while praised Madonna for nearly reach the top for consecutive years in their Forbes 40. Up to 2022, Madonna has been the top-earning female musician a record 11 times across four decades (1980s–2010s). Professor Roy Shuker once commented, she "must be viewed as much as an economic entity as she is a cultural phenomenon". Her overseas numbers were also remarked by American business writer Tom Peters in 1993, overall commenting she runs a "positive trade balance". By 1992, Spanish newspaper ABC even named her as the "most prolific, profitable and universal consumer object since the commercialization of Coca-Cola".

Madonna's figure was also of a significance for Time Warner corporation for years to the point various observers called her as perhaps "their most effective corporate symbol", or person. An author describes they "usually feature[d] Madonna's picture prominently in its annual report", while in Electronic Publishing on CD-ROM (1996), Judson Rosebush and Steve Cunningham commented she accounted for something like 20 to 33 percent of all record sales from Warner Communications, as well pointed out her figure was an influence for their stock. Michael Ovitz called Madonna the Warner Music's "hit machine".

Madonna's patronage garnered mostly positive comments during the height years of Maverick Records. Having an important role approving with Freddy DeMann their signed artists, it would became a "highly profitable" label with moderated to successful acts like Alanis Morissette. She contributed to assist their signed musicians like Morissette to helping make them stars. By 1998, Ingrid Sischy from Vanity Fair deemed the label as one of the "few artist-involved entities in the business to have moved into big-league status". That year, it was recognized by Spin as "the most successful vanity label", while under Madonna's control, it generated well over $1 billion for Warner Bros. Records, more money that any other recording artist's label up that point.

Advertisements and contracts


Madonna's advertising debut was made in Japan, with a campaign for Mitsubishi Electric. It helped to erase the corporation's image of being "safe but bland" after researchers noted most Japanese no longer considered them a "conservative company". Beyond that, Madonna's campaign led to Japanese agencies and advertisers to feature more musicians, also invigorating the overall interest in using foreign celebrities in ads.

While she made her national advertising's debut campaign with the first ever Rock the Vote in 1990, her first worldwide ad became a year earlier with Pepsi in 1989. It introduced new connotations in the industry, representing the first time a pop single had debuted in an ad, and the first time a TV commercial had been giving a special around-the-world satellite premiere. The event was reportedly to constitute the single largest one-day media buy in the history of advertising. Spanish critic Víctor Lenore, believes that with this ad, she helped "opened the door" to major endorsements and multiplied the global impact of pop music.

Madonna has made various contracts, and some of them were deemed influential for helping shape music businesses. Despite for a short period her $60 million deal with Warner in 1992, represented the highest sum for a woman and the highest rate equaled only by Michael Jackson a year earlier with Sony, BBC Worldwide commented in 1994, that the deal "was seen by many as the symbol of the kind of new relationship between a global media star and the moneymen". Madonna became the founding artist in Live Nation's "Artist Nation" division with her 120-million contract in 2007. Analyst Mike Saunders, in HumanCentric (2020), deemed that 360 deal as a "milestone" that clearly helped change the way of many regards in the concert industry.

In the lens of capitalism
Madonna became a central image in the studies of commercialism for many academics during years. According to professor Suzanna Danuta Walters, she was understood by many as a "personification of commodity capitalism".

Madonna epitomized the consumer ethos of the 1980s, and beyond. In retrospect, Helen Sheumaker from Miami University writes in Artifacts from Modern America (2017), Madonna "seemingly epitomized a 20th-century American superficiality". However, in 1994, after an observer suggested to Sheikh Kabbani that "Material Girl" reflected "the deterioration of Western values", he argues, "you have to be both material and spiritual [..] Madonna is giving people a kind of joy in their material life. You cannot say she is wrong". As her image was heavily linked as the "Material Girl", with discourses surrounded of consumer culture or materialism, that constant conversation was commented by Kristen Marthe Lentz, saying when it comes to Madonna, "suddenly everybody is a critic of capitalism".

Branding concepts


New Zealander academic Warwick Murray, as do others, deemed Madonna a "global brand". David Bruenger a professor of Ohio State University, held that "she pioneered [various] brand management strategies". She was one of the earliest celebrities to protect her name as trademark in the 1980s; Jane Shaw and the others scholars in Gen Z, Explained (2022), held that "the 'selfmark' trend can be traced back to Madonna in the 1980s".

Over the years, Madonna's brand was dissected and recognized by various industry experts. In The Experience Effect (2010), author Jim Joseph considered her a "quintessential brand" further arguing she is "perhaps the epitome of celebrity marketing and celebrity branding". Reviewing her then 20-years-old career in 2003, Michael Levine praised her by saying she has "bucked every rule of branding and still manage to become the most well-known, well considered brand in the entertainment business". Around those years, marketing executive Sergio Zyman and author Armin Brott agreed in The End of Advertising as We Know It (2003), "unlike almost anyone else in her business" she has an "uncanny ability to retool" her brand further adding "no one repositions herself as well —or as frequently— as Madonna". A decade later, in 2015, business magazine Fast Company labeled her "the biggest pop brand on the planet".

Trends
During decades, Madonna's image was associated of being recognized as a trend-setter and "widely perceived to be on the cutting edge" for this. Writing for The Baltimore Sun in 2008, Rashod Ollison called it as her "career hallmark". Roger Blackwell thus describes "she becomes the conduit for its introduction and acceptance" setting trends in areas like fashion, exercise, beauty, expression, dance, spirituality or lifestyle.

Jamie Anderson and Martin Kupp remind she is "one of the world's first artists to bring this approach to the music industry". Editor and professor Popy Belasco, even called her the "first coolhunter in history". MuchMusic named her "the world's top trend-maker" (c. 2006). Lecturer Susan Hopkins at University of Southern Queensland was less impressed, who held in 2016 for The Conversation, that she "pioneered a lot of cultural trends that didn't do average working women a lot of favour". A turning point of this condition of her career, was after the release of Hard Candy as various critics considered her a "trend hopper than a trendsetter".

Expressions coined



 * Madonna effect: Business professor Oren Harari used the phrase inspired in her business tactics and changes while deems its use for both individuals and organizations.


 * Madonna-curve: According to Doctor Peter van Ham from think tank Clingendael Institute in an article for NATO Review, is a phrase used by some business analysts to describe the "adapting to new tasks whilst staying true to one's own principles" and "businesses use Madonna as a role model of self-reinvention". The usage for NATO was no well-received by analyst Robin Shepherd from Chatham House, as argued that "an ageing pop diva is not an exccelent analogy for NATO". Canadian educator and designer Bruce Mau, refers "it's named after the pop star for her capacity to alter her image and stay popular. However radical the visual difference, she is always Madonna".

Musicianship


By 1996, music critic J. D. Considine stated Michael Jackson and Madonna redefined our notions of "artistic impact". To historian Glen Jeansonne, both artists represented "the triumph of image" during the videography age of the 1980s, and which revolutionized the way recordings and artists were sold to the public. Music critic Robert Christgau, in Is It Still Good to Ya? (2018), referred to "the world Madonna made—a world in which female vocalists are obliged to be far more glamorous".

By some estimates, Madonna is arguably the female artist to exploit "fully" the potential of the music video format. She is credited as arguably the "first female" to have a "complete control" sense of her music and image according to various critics, including Stephen Thomas Erlewine and Edna Gundersen. Having mentioned other previous examples before her, Roger Blackwell recognizes this claim but at the same time, says her "personality usually overshadows her musical product". In Girl Heroes (2002), Susan Hopkins writes that her music is more about accompanying visuals rather than technical complexity.

In 1986, Dr. Karl Podhoretz from University of Dallas called her a "revolutionary voice who has altered the very meaning of sound in our time". In 2013, Rolling Stone referred Madonna as "the most important female voice in the history of modern music". Dutch linguist Theo van Leeuwen cited her as perhaps "the first singer who used quite different voices for different songs".

Songwriting


Recognized as one of the 100 Greatest Songwriters of All Time by Rolling Stone, some writers and producers estimate she is a much "underrated musician and lyricist". By 1995, Spin praised her consistency and called her "a great songwriter". In Madonna, Andrew Morton describes her as a "musical poet in motion" saying she has "an organized schedule to work on lyrics and future projects". Biographer Carol Gnojewski calls her a "prolific writer" as her many songwriting credits can attest. Listed for a while as "the most successful female songwriter in Britain" by the Guinness World Records, she was also the songwriter with most number-one songs in the Billboard Hot 100 until the release of "Human Nature".

Musicologist Susan McClary asserts she "writes or co-writes most of her own material". Marissa Muller from W, grant Madonna credit for helping normalize "the idea that pop stars could and should write their own songs". She has influenced other songwriters, and one of them is Kylie Minogue who took some inspiration from her to start writing her own songs.


 * American Songwriter

Vocals


Lucy O'Brien wrote "over the years many have criticized Madonna's vocal ability, saying she is a weak singer". Recognizing that she is not gifted with a wide-ranging voice, a vast group have also gave sympathetic views, with a musician commenting she is an enough "strong interpreter [that] doesn't over-embellish things". Others like Keith E. Clifton, a musicologist at Central Michigan University, recognizes her vocal "metamorphosis" and it has proven to be a central and yet under-theorized aspect of her career, comments.

Ludovic Hunter-Tilney from Financial Times, says that her critics do not understand that "pop singers do not require the vocal technique of Maria Callas", and "an instinct to connect with the public's fantasies are more important". Similar descriptions came from sociologist Stanley Aronowitz, who deemed her as a performance artist who deploys pop music with her singing as a vehicle "for something else going on" and this is a plus or surplus that elicits "the excitement about Madonna". In another claim, scholars in The SAGE Handbook of Popular Music (2014), comment that "for pop singers in the style of Madonna, brilliant singing ability is not of utmost important" in contrast to performers of soul and R&B music "whose considerable vocal skill" are a crucial aspect for them to succeed. She has implemented in some performances techniques such as lip sync and Auto-Tune, but overall, diverse media outlets such as Reuters, Slant Magazine and VH1 have mentioned she "can sing" both live or in studio.


 * The 30 best female singers of all time - Smooth Radio

Production and involving process


More than one scholar have explored how the fact a musical artist like Madonna have worked with various producers and men, many often assume they are responsible for her creative output. Music critic Gina Arnold, by 1995, held certainly she hires "well-producers" but she applauded Madonna's consistency and personal injection, considering her as far the most "consistent than any of other artist of the last decade" with a vision of "incredibly broad". In comparison, producer Stuart Price told in an interview with Peter Robinson for Popjustice in 2005: "You don't produce Madonna, you collaborate with her... She has her vision and knows how to get it". Guy Sigsworth similarly states, Madonna is not one of the artists that hire a producer and expect them to do all the work. She instead, is very "intimately involved in the whole creative process as a collaborator and producer" and is a side "ignorated by people so fixated on her image".

Also a vast group of reviewers have widely commented how Madonna masterminded her own career in many levels, including New Zealander scholar Kerr Inkson. Mary Cross commented on this, "Madonna is not the product of some music industry idea, but her own woman". Michael Campbel in Popular Music in America (2012), recalls: "The most ground-breaking aspect of Madonna's career has been her ascension to a position of complete control of her career: writing her songs, producing her recordings, choreographing her performances, and making the key decisions about every aspect of production and promotion".

Music industry


Over decades an array group of critics, scholars and authors have appreciated her music contributions and long-lasting impact. Constantine Chatzipapatheodoridis, a Greek adjunct lecturer at University of Patras, says "Madonna's cultural impact helped shape the contemporary music stage, in terms of sound and image, performance, sex and fandom", as well reinvention. Author Marshawn Evans similarly stated Madonna has "revolutionized how music is performed, delivered to the delivered to the masses, purchased, packaged, downloaded, and even simulcast across a variety of cutting-edge platforms".

American writer Arie Kaplan, called her a "pioneer" in popularize subgenre of dance-pop. Bob Tannenbaum from The New York Times credits the evolution of remixing from underground to the standard practice (mainstream) to Madonna. She is not the first with an one-single name in the industry, but made her impact. In 1987, Radio & Records noted an increase of female singers of one-name; while recognizing the phenomenon goes back beyond her, they also suggested that "you probably have to blame it on Madonna" with many suddenly aspire to stardom using only their first name. In 2022, American Songwriter magazine said: "If she didn't invent the one-name legacy then she sure made it real".

Women's music, and concert and video industries
Alongside other male figures, some publications placed Madonna with a notable role for reinforce their tour industries in countries such as Mexico, or Brazil; Veja magazine stated Michael Jackson and Madonna's 1993 concerts in Brazil extended their national mega-show dimensions.

A variety of international critics and cultural institutions, have given credit Madonna for raise the modern pop concert tours template, in many ways. Smithsonian Institution gave credit to Madonna as the first performer to use her concert tour as reenactments of her music videos. Fashion editor William Baker states "the modern pop concert experience was created by Madonna really". Matt Cain is another supporter saying she "set the standard". Scholars Berrin Yanıkkaya and Angelique Nairn, relies importance in the female figure, saying that she paved the way of extravaganza in concerts as a theatrical spectacle in which the female music artist is placed center stage.

Having a prominent role in women's music stage, editor of Profile of Female Genius (1994), describes "Madonna has been able to impact her industry as much as any woman in history". Jacqueline Edmondson from University Park, Pennsylvania studied other female artists, but stated Madonna "deserves special attention", describing "her legacy" as "important to understaing issues surrounding gender and the music industry in the twenty-first century". The word 'female' is significant in the assessment of Madonna "because she presented herself in a fresh way for women artists", according to Tony Sclafani from MSNBC. British scholar David Gauntlett, cites another author's view: "Madonna, whether you like her or not, started a revolution amongst women in music". Editor-in-chief of Blender, Joe Levy similarly stated in 2008, she "opened the door for what women could achieve and were permitted to do". Overall, Susan Sarandon was quoted as saying, "the history of women in popular music can, pretty much, be divided into before and after Madonna".

The way Madonna has been reviewed, made its impact. According to a scholar, Madonna is "widely considered to have defined the discursive space for examining female popular music". A Vice contributor similarly describes that "reviews of her work have served as a roadmap for scrutinizing women at each stage in their music career".

Roles
Madonna have made a substantial impact on roles, mainly among women in recording industry. During the late-20th century, and similarly to Dave Marsh's claims, music journalist Everett True sustained that "more than anyone, Madonna has deconstructed the role of the female singer in popular music". By 2021, English author Dylan Jones wrote that "Madonna was genuinely influential as she created a role for herself that had never existed".

When Madonna debuted, Landon Palmer from University of Alabama, recalls she was frequently described as a "rock star" by media outlets and official institutions, with Palmer explaining she served as an example of how the label exceded the distinctions of genre. Ranging from Australian newspaper The Canberra Times describing in 1985, she "nearly reversed the typical pattern of rock idol analysis", to the Encyclopedia of American Social History (1993) calling her "the antithesis of the women found in early rock and roll". Decades later, the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame explains she became an early emblem of "women in rock" and helped dissolve gender boundaries in music to the point "where that catchphrase has become unnecessary and even a bit anachronistic". In Popular Texts in English (2001), scholars said she was also "an atypical female phenomenon in the world of pop", and by 2018, Deutsche Welle credits her as "the first woman to dominate the male world of pop".

By 2008, Sclafani grant Madonna an important role for helping change the paradigm of performers from band to solo act with an emphasis on female. Also giving credit to her in this area, Gillian Branstetter of The Daily Dot recalls how Madonna thrived when she appeared back in the 1980s where "the vast majority of the top artists in the world were men". The same year, 2014, journalist Diego A. Manrique described we are living in a "Madonna era", as many female artists dominate record charts labeling them as Madonna's "heirs". British music journalist David Hepworth held in Uncommon People (2017) that "most of biggest of the pop music" are woman and Madonna "is the person who proved that this was possible, who opened up a new world for them to grow into".

Mentorship and matriarchy-like role


Authors have also explored how she established a matriarchy in popular music, while scholars in Feminism and Popular Culture (2014), explained that "Madonna's status as a pop matriarch [...] has been atomized with exhaustive diligence" in diverse works. Various referred as Madonna's protegé figures like Nick Kamen, or talent manager Guy Oseary, whose credits Madonna "with pretty much everything" in his career, and to put him on the map. Having founding her own record label, Maverick Records, Madonna helped their signed artists such as Alanis Morissette, who later declared to Rolling Stone in 2020, how "generous" Madonna was as a mentor.

By 2005, Christine Sams from The Age commented she "enjoys supporting younger artists". After the advent of teen pop idols into the new Millennium, Zel McCarthy from Grammy.com explains that United States was divided by music genres and generations but Madonna "deftly eschewed" these cultural battles; she was seen wearing T-shirts emblazoned with the names of Britney Spears or Kylie Minogue as her "celebration of other girls in pop music". McCarthy said, "such spontaneous statements of support and admiration are almost boringly common now, but in an era when pop music had been denied entry into the credibility club, the moment held more weight". She supported the release of "new artists", such as Katy Perry and her songs "Ur So Gay" (2007) and "I Kissed a Girl" (2008), contributing in the popularity of the lattermost song thanks to her "good press" according to authors of Queer Media Images: LGBT Perspectives (2013).

Some criticisms came from agents like Chris Richards, a music critic from Washington Post commenting her "post-Gaga" matriarch status by 2012. However, music critic Ann Powers recognizes she reliazes these roles in "complext and sometimes controversial ways", but was overall positive calling her the "Mother of Pop", and a "symbolic matriarch". Madeline Roth from MTV dedicated an article in 2015 titled "9 Princesses Of Pop Who Have Earned Madonna's Blessing", in which Roth asserts: "Madge has voiced her disapproval for pitting women against each other (‘atta girl!), she hasn't made a competition out of it. Rather, she's bestowed her blessing among several pop princesses (plus other performers outside of her genre), giving us an idea of the talent and fearlessness Madonna looks for in her peers".

Influence on other artists
Madonna has been influenced from a variety of performers including painters (artists), musicians, writers and other entertainers. On this, Howard Kramer from the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum expressed: "Although Madonna had her influences, she created her own unmistakable style [...] [she] wrote her own ticket" and follow her formula.

Madonna's influence on others has been extensively detailed as well, and came from her career model, music, attitude and a sort of things. High-profile performers such as Beyoncé, Lady Gaga, Pink, Rihanna or Jennifer Lopez among others have cited her as a chief influence. Within the compendium Madonna: Drowned Worlds (2004), Gauntlett explored her influence on others, exploring four key themes that her "successors (and imitators)" have followed. He also called referred to them as "musical daughters" arguing "many of them are Madonna's daughters in the very direct sense that they grew up listening to and admiring Madonna, and decided they wanted to be like her. Most of them have said so explicitly at some point"

N.B. following an illustrative list of artists influenced by Madonna; men, bands and women from both 20th and 21st centuries


 * Adele
 * Annie
 * Anitta
 * Alesha Dixon
 * Arca
 * Ariana Grande
 * Beyoncé
 * Britney Spears
 * Christina Aguilera
 * Chester Bennington (Linkin Park)
 * Debbie Gibson
 * Dua Lipa
 * Fred Hersch
 * Jennifer Lopez
 * Jolin Tsai
 * Katy Perry
 * Kim Petras
 * Kylie Minogue
 * Lady Gaga
 * Liam Gallagher (Oasis)
 * Lil' Kim
 * LMFAO
 * Maluma
 * Marina Diamandis
 * Miley Cyrus
 * Namie Amuro
 * Nicki Minaj
 * Nelly Furtado
 * Paulina Rubio
 * Pink
 * Rihanna
 * Shakira
 * Spice Girls
 * Taylor Swift
 * Thalía
 * Victoria Justice

She has also been an influence of other entertainers, including painters, writers, film-industry people among others.


 * Canadian artists

Longevity and success
Once deemed as a one-hit wonder, Madonna debuted with critics such as Robert Hilburn, Dave Marsh and Paul Grain (Billboard) "predicting" a rapid decline. In a short span, she earned critics predicting "the end of her career" as she "gone too far" with provocative releases such as "Justify My Love" (1990) and Sex (1992). She out survived that level of critics, and in comparison when Billboard named her the "Artist of the Decade" in 1989, they pinpointed she "has always stayed one step ahead our expectations".

Although there are female artists with more lengthy careers of that Madonna, she herself epitomized other levels including continued success (or better than moderate), without enter into a nostalgia value or "comebacks". The perceptions of her longevity dated since at least 1991 (before having a 10-years-old career). Some contemporary reviewers labeled it as "the equivalent to five lifetimes in rock-star years", and Jon Pareles called her "veteran" in 1991 (with a eight-years-old career). By 1993, media scholar David Tetzlaff aware of the cultural longevity of performers such as Elvis Presley, Liz Taylor or the Rolling Stones, compared how they continued into the public conscience throughout the nostalgia value but Madonna in contrast, still attracted a broad public while staying contemporary, a nearly unusual case within these conditions, claimed. In 2022, Helen Brown from Financial Times commented the "average chart-life of a pop singer was two to six years, generally shorter for women that men".

Various observers also noted on Madonna a self-avoid nostalgia value; from Michael Levine to Thomas Ferraro and Jennifer Egan, they similarly agreed she didn't like does things twice. In 2018, British journalists Bidisha and Matt Cain, commented respectively she has "no interest in nostalgia" and she "never wanted to be seen as a nostalgia artist". At some degrees, others have talked about a minimal implementation.

Attributed efffects on others
Her continual success and longevity sparked conversations among generations of observers. Professor Roy Shuker, defines that "the continued success of Madonna provides a fascinating case study" in popular music. A number of scholars devoted articles or courses about it, with economist Robert M. Grant praising her by 2008, highlighting the context of an "intensely competitive [and] volatile world of entertainment". British sociologist Ellis Cashmore, commented she both epitomized and helped usher in an age in which the epithets "shocking", "disgusting" or "filthy" didn't presage the end of a career. British sociologist David Gauntlett similarly stated she has provided a recipe of "longevity", which many artists, female and male, may try to emulate.

On the whole, Madonna was attributed to embodying "female success in a male-dominated industry", inspiring other young artists after her according to James Dickerson in Women on Top (1998). Professor Thomas Harrison at University of Central Florida, summed up she "had a profound impact" on what artists needed to do to be successful in the 1980s and the decades after. In Sclafani's view, Madonna's successive hit records "opened people's minds as to how successful a female artist could be". After the template she raised, Michael Castillo from Time magazine declared in 2010, that "every pop star" of the past two or three decades, "has Madonna to thank in some part for his or her success". Mary Cross similarly stated in Madonna: A Biography (2007) that many "new pop icons [...] owe Madonna a debt of thanks for the template she forged".

Contradictory perspectives


As she drew praise, Madonna was also blamed from vastly different constituencies in equal parts, in a varied of perspectives. In The Routledge Companion to Postmodernism (2001), social critic Stuart Sim asserts Madonna "attained the status of cultural icon, she is however, an extremely problematic one" because depending on one's point of view, which makes her "exceedingly difficult to categorize". In Cool (2015), authors describe that perhaps no one has sparked more debate than she has, among all cultural icons of the last three decades. In 2019, Matthew Jacobs from The Huffington Post, concurred saying "it's hard to think" of any star with "as many singular achievements and such a durable place in Western media who provokes so much ire and indifference". Back in the 2000s, observers commented her "critics willingly overlook Madonna's impact on contemporary culture".

Some criticisms however, came from a generalized critic of certain aspects of society, and then mixed with Madonna's prominence; as an observer considered the critique of Madonna may be related to "the general denunciation of popular culture as the obedient mechanism of ideology. Once called "the lowest form of popular culture", philosopher Isaiah Berlin lamented about the mass culture exemplified by Madonna. For many, she was a "corrupting influence". In 1991, Boston University President John R. Silber lumped Madonna with Adolf Hitler and Saddam Hussein. An editor of Australian magazine The Music, wrote in 2019, that she has been "successively cancelled", and by some she is a "culture vulture" and a "controversialist". In the 1990s, it was also suggested that zeitgeist in Madonna has become poltergeist.

In Women and the Media: Diverse Perspectives (2005), professors explained that with a series of outrageous personae, Madonna has challenged the American value system, and continues to challenge the limiting ways Americans see themselves and their lives. Others did not gave Madonna some much relevance, as Spanish philosopher Ana Marta González says in a 2009 essay, that doesn't really look on Madonna, a "cultural prominence" but she agreed it depends in each point of view.



In the journey various scholars remarked about strong reactions from public to critics to further describe that many "love to hate" Madonna. Associated professor, Diane Pecknold agreed she was not only an omnipresent figure, but a polarizing one. In the early 1990s, Maureen Orth echoed that people that love to hate her "monitored" her every move. In short, while some have celebrated her, others have "passionately criticized her", remined Leah Perry in The Cultural Politics of U.S. Immigration (2016). More than one published these sentiments towards Madonna in books. An example that various authors have cited is the I Hate Madonna Handbook (1994) by Ilene Rozenzweig, who dismisses Madonna in all ways calling her a "talentless bloodsucker", and criticizes her agenda of "push people's buttons". Scholar Tyler Cowen cites the I Hate Madonna Jokebook (1993) by Joey West; but he uses it as one of many examples that public figures from presidents to members of the British royal family are criticized by millions every day. In West's book, Madonna is labeled as "Hollywood's most controversial star" which "raunchy" reputation's brought her fame and fortune.

Over the course of her career, she has been also called variously by public and critics, such as "man-eater, manipulator, monster, bitch, whore" and more. After the news of Madonna adopting in Malawi in 2006, Nancy Gibbs wrote for Time "Madonna is so easy to revile that you start to wish she'd make it a little harder". A Madonna audience reception conducted by various scholars in the early 1990s, taken from bad press, letters from a newspaper and college students, lumped various as "haters". One of them, stated: "I'm so glad to hear that not all professionals think Madonna is great".


 * 

Critics from capitalism and others
Some critics also viewed Madonna as a representation of the "worst excesses of commercial exploitation", as well labeled her "the ultimate" in crass commercialism and the epitome of banal consumerism. One of them, was Akbar Ahmed who wrote in Postmodernism and Islam that she is the "supreme product of the consumerist culture".

Some reviewers seen Madonna a more related figure to marketing, business and publicity rather than music. Such claims or similarly ones, were made by agents like Christopher John Farley from Time, who commented in 1994, her career has "never really been about music". As a music performer, editors in Representing Gender in Cultures (2004) wrote that she "has been consistently denied a status of a 'real' musician". In Grown Up All Wrong (2000), Robert Christgau describes "Madonna is honored less as an artist than as a cultural force". Summarizing part of these feelings, Ludovic Hunter-Tilney from Financial Times explains that "to her critics" she is "right to describe herself as a businesswoman but wrong to call herself an artist" and many label her as "a triumph of self-marketing". In an ambivalent point, Michael Campbell wrote in Popular Music in America (2012), "neither [Michael] Jackson nor Madonna has been a musical innovator" but recognizes that "their most influential and innovative contributions have come in other areas".

Cultural appropriation charges
Like other artists, she faced a notable amount of criticisms regarding cultural appropriation. British professor Yvonne Tasker, once commented she is an "interesting figure to the extent that her appropriation does at times work to question assumptions". At the height of these commentaries, an observer defined that "Madonna's privileged position and her status as a powerful icon do little to improve the problems of minorities from which she borrows". Academic Douglas Kellner interprets that she has been "attacked" by using "appropriation" for "defuses" elements of its original context. Kellner, remarks that she was "attacked" by various black critics. Most of them, interpreted Madonna of being in a white privilege place; thus as American historian David Roediger reminds criticism from bell hooks on Madonna, who said "the image Madonna most exploits is that of the quintessential 'white girl' and to maintain that image she must always position herself as an outsider in relation to black culture". Barbadian-British historian Andrea Stuart summed up that she "deliberately affected black style to attract a wider audience".

In mixing cultural diversity in her works, as Canadian professor Karlene Faith explains in Madonna, Bawdy & Soul (1997), she have offended those opposing sexism, ageism, racism or classism. Many contemporary observes, argued that United States shows the consequences of multiculturalism with its "guettoized" popular and divisive identity politics. One of these critics was French sociologist Bruno Étienne who invoked with "horror" Michael Jackson and Madonna as "the means by which values are transmitted in such a society".

Cultural criticisms around the world


Madonna has been rejected by some groups of diverse cultures over the course of her career. In Iran's Strategic Intentions and Capabilities (1994), Middle East scholar Patrick Clawson documents that Iranian radicals reject Madonna. An Islamic political party in Pakistan, unsuccessfully demanded in 1995, Michael Jackson and Madonna as "cultural terrorists" for "destroying" humanity. In A Fury for God: The Islamist Attack on America (2004), academic Malise Ruthven cites, a Pakistani religious scholar, calling Michael and Madonna as the "torchbearers of American society with their cultural and social values". She was also exemplified as "junk culture" and "contemporary monstrosities" along with Rupert Murdoch and McDonald's. In Israel, Madonna entered as a notable example under the discourse of Post-Zionism; then president Ezer Weizman criticized the Americanization of the country, arguing a perceiving losing of their identity to further blame "the three Ms (Madonna, Michael Jackson and McDonald's).

In Schmoozing with Terrorists (2007), political commentator Aaron Klein documents that in the Middle East, everyone has heard of her, and the terrorists know Madonna because she is regularly referenced for "corrupting humanity on earth". Klein, further adds, "when sheikhs cite samples of the U.S. attempting to pervert" Muslim, they speak of Madonna. Klein also informed that terrorists referred to Madonna as "prostitute", and cites Muhammad Abdel-Al, a then spokesman from Popular Resistance Committees who was recorded as threatening, he would personally kill Madonna and Spears: "If I meet these whores I will have the honor —I repeat, I will have the honor— to be the first one to cut the heads of Madonna and Britney Spears.

Over the 2000s, she received numerous death threats by extremists for similar sentiments. In 2004, the Australian Associated Press (AAP), informed that Palestinian terrorists threatened to kill her "because she represents many things they hate about the West". As a result, it was reported she cancelled three concerts in Israel. In 2006, it was reported that crime bosses from Russian mafia threatened to kill her when she was on tour. In 2009, received again threats from Muslim extremists in Israel according to Yossi Melman, and same situation occurred in Serbia according to IANS agency.

In 2015, the International Music Council informed that the Islamic State (ISIL or ISIS) classified both her music and performances as haram stating that "represent anti-Islamic values", and specifying that "anyone caught listening to her music will be punished with 80 lashes". It's assumed that her name was also banned by ISIS for "good measure". In 2016, head of British pro-North Korea group blamed Madonna for "the collapse" of the Soviet Union by making people listen to "the most rubbishy aspects of bourgeois imperialist pop culture". Another allegation within the Russian context, came from journalist Maksim Shevchenko, who wrote in 2012 that she is part of a "vivid symbol of everything superficial, deceitful and hateful that the West exhibits toward Russian".

Responses to criticism


British reader at Roehampton University, Deborah Jermyn wrote that "numerous academic studies have considered the way Madonna polarises views". Many of these observers like Kellner, categorizes Madonna as a set of "contradictions". In Shuker's view, it "provides a range of contradictory readings and evaluations". E. Ann Kaplan argued back in 1993, there is no real Madonna, for she is the site of a whole series of discourses, many that contradict each other, but that together produce the divergent images in circulations.

She was estimated in equal parts, as lecturer John Street from University of East Anglia writes in Musicologists, Sociologists and Madonna (1993), she "has been defended in equally extravagant terms". After the release of her film W.E., Naomi Wolf wrote for The Guardian the theme of "Hating Madonna" has been "consistent that it deserves scrutiny in its own right".


 * The Queen of Pop, Madonna has been so many things to so many people for so many years, it's hard to define her. — From Gay to Z: A Queer Compendium, 2022 pag 117

Discussion
Georges-Claude Guilbert commented in Madonna as Postmodern Myth (2002) that "some journalists enjoy being particularly venomous when writing about Madonna, revealing more about themselves than anything else". Professor of marketing at University of Ulster, Stephen Brown similarly stated in 2003, "what people say about Madonna says more about them that it says about the singer". Audra Gaugler in her 2000 thesis for Lehigh University, believes that "she has faced much criticism throughout her career, but much of it is unjust". Back in the 1990s, social critic Camile Paglia once commented, "most people who denigrate Madonna do so out of ignorance".

In 1997, Stan Hawkins from University of Leeds, expressed that her acts "can only infuriate those who are unfamiliar with the everyday forms of human expression visible in commercials, films, videos, fashion, literature, art and journalism". As reported Deseret News in 1991, historian professor Jesse Nash supports Madonna's "critique of society" and argues that the scandal she creates, proves that "Westerners still uphold values that subjugate women". Critics centered in gender were also suggested by many; for example Naomi Wolf argued in 2012 that much of criticisms on Madonna, relies when she dates to extend her range, which "infuriate" mainstream commentators, contrary when male artists do it, thus "she must be punished, for the same reason that every woman who steps out of line must be punished". In this vein, psychoanalyst Lynne Layton of Harvard Medical School, similarly argued in ''Who's That Girl? Who's That Boy?'' (1998), "you get some idea of the role gender plays in critical responses to her". Layton, compares a scenario when in "a male artist's story, biographers attribute meteoric rises to genius", but on Madonna's side, a biographer can attribute her rise to many important men she slept with, or people she seduced and abandoned from both sexes. "In short, she is famous because she is a bitch and a slut", says.



In a 2005 international congress, Lydia Brugué of Universitat de Vic, concludes she is an artist with multiple messages leading frequently to ambiguity. Certainly, it "provokes", says Brugué but "it goes beyond creating controversy". At the end, she also concludes the overabundant debates on Madonna, came from the nature of contemporary society itself. In 2013, two academics from University of Amsterdam puts the context of modernisation as "the communication of social and cultural tensions embodied in the symbol Madonna explain the unparalleled public and scientific fascination for this cultural phenomenon".

Back in 1992, scholar Cindy Patton labeled her as "a social critic in a certain way", that beyond upset people, could get people thinking. In Media Culture (2003), academic Douglas Kellner summed up that "Madonna takes on demonstrates a courage to tackle controversial topics that few popular music figures engage with her consistency and provocativeness". To Susan McClary, "Madonna is engaged in rewriting some very fundamental levels of Western thought".

Music critic Ann Powers says despite her borrowing have made her suspect to some, "she's never hidden her vision of the word as a place where difference can and must be celebrated [...] She has chosen to cultivate diversity".

About criticism on Madonna's music, scholar Sean MacLeod said "despite the criticisms, many have seen her vast contribution, lyrically, musically, and artistically". Some of them even questioned the attacks. Musicologist Stan Hawkins from University of Oslo, believes that criticisms from Jeremy Beadle fails to acknowledge her musical reflexivity in any critical enough manner. Others brings the context of rockism views, with Paglia explaining that "our minds were formed by rock music". Noting the criticism from the "rock world", professors in Popular Music and the Politics of Hope (2019) explain "Madonna's voice has certainly changed since the 1980s, showing the signs of age, vocal coaching, and rigorous vocal exercises". Jennifer Egan, whose disliked and avoided Madonna, considering being part of the popular critics on Madonna, as well talked about rock influence in her life, notes in retrospective there exist "overused terms" such as that self-promotion is her "only talent". She questioned the "no talent" argument as an old one.

Some Madonna's statements and reviews on them


As is documented in The Gender/sexuality Reader (1997) by anthropologists Roger Lancaster and Micaela Di Leonardo, Madonna claims that part of her creative work, is meant to escape definition: "Everything I do is meant to have several meanings, to be ambiguous". They said, she favors also to irony. As music per se, did not fully encompassed her range of aspirations, Jennifer Egan, found sense in Madonna's statements: "I know I'm not the best singer, and I know I'm not the best dancer. But I'm not interested in that" but in being "political". In a 2015 interview with HuffPost, she addressed cultural appropriation critics, saying: "I'm inspired and I'm referencing other cultures. That is my right as an artist. They said Elvis Presley stole African-American culture. That's our job as artists".

Madonna have responded to her critics in some musical pieces, most notoriously "Human Nature" (1994). According to Irish lecturer Sean MacLeod, Madonna once "often" commented on the attitude of scholars to her work, citing: "They didn't get the joke. The whole point is that I'm not anybody's toy. People take everything so literally".

Professor Becca Levy, cites Madonna complains in a Vogue interview with Decca Aitkenhead in 2019: "People have always been trying to silence me for one reason or another". During the release of her theatrical play Speed-the-Plow (1988), Madonna was quoted as saying: "There are people who are violently opposed to the fact that I exist on this earth". For Lucy O'Brien, "she risks unpopularity" and her style is "confrontational". She calls the singer an "imperfect icon", and notes Madonna's 2016 Billboard speech: "People say I'm controversial. But I think the most controversial thing I have ever done is to stick around".

In 2008, The New York Times critic, Jon Pareles expressed: "Since the beginning of her career she has telegraphed her intentions and labeled herself more efficiently than any observer". A scholar commented in the early 1990s, "as usual, Madonna is at least one step ahead of her commentators". In 2006, Australian public intellectual Germaine Greer, names many weaknesses in the singer, but recognizes that "what Madonna could do better than any other woman I know of was talk" and this makes her a genius. Associate professor Gayle Stever, proposes after the arrival of Madonna in the 1980s, the attention she received from "being controversial opened up an entire new way of thinking" in some audiences, mainly concerning her fandom.

Her quotes, or statements inspired some books about it, including, Madonna in Her Own Words (1990) by Mick St. Michael (ISBN 0-7119-7734-8), Madonna Speaks (1993) by Mike Fleiss (ISBN 0-9412-6383-5) and Madonna: Inspirations (2005) by Essential Works (ISBN 0-7407-5456-4).

Dave Marsh highlights here what he sees as the sexism implicit in much early Madonna criticism

Titles


Madonna is noted for having garnered constant superlatives as well. On this, editors of The A.V. Club held in 2022 "superlatives are a given" while American journalist Meredith Vieira stated in 2006: "She may only need to go by one name, but Madonna is a woman who comes with superlatives attached". Before giving her one, literary critic Bonnie Zimmerman says, she is "one of if not the most".

Madonna still or has been the world's best-selling female artist, the top-earning or wealthiest woman in music, or the highest-grossing female touring artist.

Examples
Beyond merely headlines, many have discussed Madonna with euphemism as the greatest female, most influential or most important:

From CNN to Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty and Vogue Mexico, various have referred to Madonna as arguably the "all-time" most "influential female singer". Others have similarly attributed that title in the context of the late 20th century, in "pop history", or as both MTV and BET indicated in American music history in consideration by many.

The treatment of the greatest female artist, have been also present over the years. In 1994, Norman Mailer proclaimed her as "our greatest living female artist", while in 2018, Ben Kelly from The Independent argues she has "ensured her legacy as the greatest female artist of all time". VH1 called twice her the Greatest Woman in Music in 2012, and as a result of a 2002 poll. She has been also referred to as the "most successful female artist" over the decades, present in online sources like Deutsche Welle to books such as Guinness Book of World Records or 101 Albums That Changed Popular Music (2009). Musicologist such as David Nicholls (1990s) to scholars including Laura Viñuela (2010s), and from Journal of Business Research (2020s), have extensively explored and justified this lattermost referential title on Madonna.

Other descriptions were a constant. In comparison, "important" was under the discourse of author Chuck Klosterman, calling her as "arguably the most important female musician of the twentieth century" in Chuck Klosterman X (2017), while in ¿Qué es Estados Unidos? (2014) by Mexican academics and diplomants, Madonna was similarly understood as "the most important woman in the history of popular music". In New Book of Rock Lists (1994), music critic Dave Marsh ranked Madonna first among the most important woman in music, those who have impacted more.

Honorific nicknames and epithets


Deborah Jermyn, a British reader at Roehampton University, wrote that "Madonna has been frequently described as a 'queen'" in a variety of things. In Celebrity Colonialism (2009), Australian professor Robert Clarke from University of Tasmania describes the "range of nicknames" such as "'The Material Girl' or 'The Queen of Pop'" that refers to "her big business pop career". In 1996, Chilean magazine Qué Pasa stated: "to Madonna can be attributed many titles and they never be exaggerated. She is the undisputed Queen of Pop, sex goddess, and of course marketing". Others have called her as the "Queen of Music", "Queen of Videos", "Queen of Tours" or Concerts among many others.

In the late-1990s British press, especially tabloids, started to call her "Madge" which according to Christopher Zara, is British shorthand for "Your Madgesty". As early as 1986, British magazine Sounds used this nickname for Madonna, and their critic John Harris referred to her as "Our Madge" in a 1991 article. While "Madge" was adopted by overseas press, others international media outlets from music-related ones like Billboard and NME to more generalized ones such as La Dépêche du Midi, Der Spiegel and La Nación have referred to her in the traditional form of "Her Majesty". In "The Queens Remix", Beyoncé calls her "Queen Mother Madonna".

Cultural depictions


Madonna has been depicted in many ways. Guilbert stated in Madonna as Postmodern Myth (2002) she "has become the ultimate reference in several domains" and her likeness has been exhibited in museums. Writing for The Guardian in 2011, Peter Robinson held there is "a little bit of her in the DND of every modern pop thing".

On science references, in 2006, a new "water bear" species, Echiniscus madonnae was named after her. The Zoologists commented: "We take great pleasure in dedicating this species to one of the most significant artists of our times". Quadricona madonnae is a fossil Bradoriid from the Cambrian of South Australia named after Madonna; in reference to the nodes on each valve resembling her conical bustiers.

Cultural critic' lists and polls
TV Guide included Madonna in their series 101 People Who Made the 20th Century (season 1, episode 2), a look of influential people who made "dramatic impacts" during the century. She was also included in the The Oxford Children's Book of Famous People (2002) published by Oxford University Press, in which it mentions over 1000 women and men "who have influenced the course of history". Editors of The Italian 100 (1998), remarked her impact on society, her influence and mark in many aspects. She was included in the Danish book De 100 sejeste mennesker i verden (2021) from publishing house Lindhardt og Ringhof.


 * Ultimate Biography: Inside the Lives of the World's 250 Most Influential People; 2002. DK Pub; 177, 194, 253 ("The longest-running, single-topic documentary series, A&E Network's Biography is not only one of the critically successful shows; it is one of the most popular. Hosted by journalist Harry Smith, a winner of three Emmy Awards, Biography has profiled nearly 900 people in fifteen years.") by Arts and Entertainment Network

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 * Today 2009
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