‘Tis the season of i-banking and consulting internship interviews! Much discussion has concerned the later-life usefulness of STEM majors as opposed to the alleged futility of liberal arts majors. “Practicality” seems to be the word on everyone’s minds, as we consider the future usefulness of our studies.
But sometimes it’s nice to hear those stories of following your dreams and loving what you do, while at the same time being innovative in your field. So let me tell you a story about a girl.
She was a hard-working, diligent student. She played saxophone and trumpet in her marching band. She was in the International Baccalaureate program. She got straight As and a 1500 on the SAT (back when it was out of 1600). She loved physics, math and community service. She would go to Cold War history classes at a local college, just because she found them fascinating.
Yet she never felt she fit in, with her propensity for purple hair and self-made purple velvet pants.
Still, her academic efforts paid off. She was planning on attending Columbia University, intending to study psychology. She might’ve even gotten into Duke.
Then she dropped out of high school.
The good news is: She needn’t worry about that decision too much. She dropped out to move to Los Angeles to pursue music, and she became more successful than she could have ever anticipated.
That girl’s name was Kesha Rose Sebert; now, she is internationally recognized as the party-starting, glitter-covered superstar sensation Ke$ha, replete with a dollar sign in her name. Oh, and she did end up getting her GED after all.
Gleaned from her music and public appearances, Ke$ha boasts a certain image: glitter, “garbage-chic” clothing, brushing her teeth with a bottle of Jack, dancing with no pants on, throwing up in Paris Hilton’s closet. She stands for fun of a ridiculous, wasted variety. Her interviews are laden with the colorful exclamation: “F— yeah!” She claims that “I can have a party in a f—ing cardboard box.” She states that her optimum hangover cure is “Glitter. It fixes everything. Just put some more glitter on.”
I mean, that’s awesome.
Yet growing up, Ke$ha was just a girl with big dreams. She grew up with a single mother, a singer-songwriter. Life was hard; they survived on food stamps and welfare payments. The family moved to the Bible Belt (Nashville, Tenn.) in 1991, where Ke$ha felt she never fit in. Still, every day after high school, she would sit with her mother and write songs and record demos. By the way, Ke$ha wrote every song on her album “Animal.”
That’s the thing about Ke$ha. In her path toward superstardom, she comes across as admirable in her spunk and perseverance. She could have had an academic back-up, but she chose not to. She knew she wanted to follow her dream of making music, regardless of the consequences, regardless of what she would leave behind. Instead, Ke$ha epitomizes doing what she loves, by loving what she does.
Ke$ha epitomizes contradiction; she exists in a liminal space between serious and goofy, smart and useless, excess and subtlety. For someone who claims to brush her teeth with whiskey, she has this to say about her “hot party mess” reputation: “People say ‘party girl’ and instantly you think: DUI, drug problem, [privates] out, no underwear, going to nightclubs every night. Problem. I’m none of the above.” Oh, and of course she doesn’t actually brush her teeth with alcohol.
She rarely ever truly sings, and it is often assumed that she can’t. But listen to “Right Round” or “Animal”—that’s singing, what Ke$ha is doing. I know; it’s shocking. But really, she just prefers this pop-talk-rap style to singing, fostering “the complete and painless assimilation of the white female rapper into pop music,” as one critic stated.
Actually, Ke$ha’s ambitions are quite admirable, in that she desires not simply to perform a genre, but to extend, to subvert, to meld a music of her own. What is that if not innovation and creation?
And yet despite her chart-topping popularity, despite her secret academic prowess, creativity and lack of living by her lyrics, Ke$ha doesn’t take herself too seriously. And that’s the best thing about her. That’s what the elaborateness of her ridiculous lyrics and glittery, unicorn and rainbow-laden, psycho-wet-dream videos mean to emphasize.
In short, Ke$ha is kind of a troll, in the best way possible. Someone smart enough to recognize what the American public wants and give it to them with her own glittery, ironic spin on excess. Someone smart enough to secretly poke fun at us, while poking fun at herself at the same time. Someone who respects herself, but doesn’t take herself too seriously. Someone everyone can learn from. And I love it.
In her own immortal words: “I’m not a moron, so there.”
Indu Ramesh is a Trinity junior. Her columns runs every other Friday. Follow Indu on Twitter @IRrationally
Get The Chronicle straight to your inbox
Signup for our weekly newsletter. Cancel at any time.