ABSTRACT
This introduction chapter outlines the history and development of popular musicology, and accounts for its diversity in the present day. By excavating some of the ways in which popular musicology intercedes in sociocultural issues, the authors position the study of popular music and identity as a politically charged endeavour. Much attention is paid to the potential of musical sound for shaping narratives about gender, sexuality, race, age, class, and other facets of identity. The primary objective of the introduction is to present popular musicology as a pluralistic field that is attentive to the myriad interpretive possibilities that musical experiences afford, in order to lay the ground for the further advancement of the critical study of popular music and identity.
