“And you don't like, don't like the way I talk”: Authenticity in the language of bruce springsteen.

Abstract

Authenticity, defined here as conveying a sense of truthfulness and being forthright in self-presentation, is often discussed as a core characteristic of rock music, with the popularity of rock musicians often attributed to their perceived authenticity. Bruce Springsteen's songs are among the most recognized in rock music, and music scholars have theorized that Springsteen's appeal is accounted for by his perceived authenticity, including authenticity as conveyed through his lyrics. Textual (word use) analysis offers a quantitative method to examine the degree to which Springsteen's lyrics express authenticity relative to other aspects of his use of language. This study used Linguistic Inquiry and Word Count (LIWC) to examine Springsteen's body of lyrics, focusing on composites of word choices within songs and aggregated at the album level indicating authenticity, cognitive processing, emotion, and time orientation. We found that the expression of authenticity as indexed by LIWC varied across Springsteen's 18 studio albums, with authenticity rising in earlier albums, followed by a period of declining authenticity, and then rising again in later albums. Springsteen's most recent album in the analysis expressed the greatest level of authenticity, representing an outlier across his body of work. We also found that cognitive processing declined across albums and that his songs are focused on the present and tend to express positive emotion. These patterns vary from those observed in popular music, which has more typically shown greater negativity and increased cognitive processing over time.

An exploration of the motivations of catfish perpetrators and the emotions and feelings expressed by catfish victims using automated linguistic analysis and thematic analysis

“…This study focused on those three dimensions. The first dimension authenticity, considers the sense of truthfulness and forthrightness within participant's accounts [40]. A low score on authenticity would represent that the individual has prepared a text, whereas a high score would be more indicative of a spontaneous conversation [41].…”

The writing is on the wall: predicting customers' evaluation of customer-firm interactions using computerized text analysis

“…Examples of the critical empirical research that underpins the algorithmic computation of the authenticity summary language variable is Newman et al. (2003) and Kalichman and Smyth (2021). Emotional tone: The emotional tone summary language variable combines both positive and negative emotions into a single variable (Cohn et al. , 2004).…”

“…Examples of the critical empirical research that underpins the algorithmic computation of the authenticity summary language variable is Newman et al. (2003) and Kalichman and Smyth (2021).…”

“I may look fake but I’m real where it counts”: Positivity and authenticity in the songs of Dolly Parton.

“…Although country music lyrics are known for being personal and autobiographical (Peterson, 2013), and thus might be interpreted as authentic, it has been suggested that this idealized image of the earnest, hardworking country singer with traditional values may be fabricated, linked more with nostalgia than with reality (Lewis, 1997; Peterson, 2013). Although there is some evidence that the quantitative linguistic analytic approach that we are using can identify authenticity in song lyrics (e.g., Kalichman & Smyth, 2021), it is possible that it is unable to distinguish between manufactured authenticity and actual authenticity. Thus, while our expectation was that Parton’s lyrics would contain more indicators of actual authenticity than both country and pop song lyrics, this prediction was more exploratory in nature.…”