Madonna: A Timeless Icon Celebrates Her 65th Birthday
Originally Published 2 years ago — by The Cut
Madonna's ever-evolving persona has had a profound impact on pop culture, inspiring a vast amount of academic scholarship and cultural analysis. From the early days of her career, Madonna became a symbol of contradiction and a threat to the status quo, leading to Marxist, feminist, queer, racial, ethnic, and religious interpretations of her work. She recontextualized popular imagery and symbols, changing the way pop music was perceived by construing the self as episodic and malleable. Madonna's influence on academia and her ability to provoke critical analysis has paved the way for the study of other pop stars and their impact on society.