About
Dr. Alyxandra Vesey is a feminist popular music scholar and associate professor in the Department of Journalism and Creative Media. Her research examines the gendered dynamics of contemporary musicians’ work across media industries shaped by convergence, consolidation and digital distribution.
Dr. Vesey’s scholarship explores how female-identified musicians navigate persistent sexism and ageism by expanding their creative labor beyond recording and touring. She investigates how artists adapt their musical skills to secondary careers in film, television, branding, and digital self-presentation, and how these practices reshape expectations around entrepreneurship, visibility, and relational labor in the streaming and social media era.
Impact Beyond the University
Dr. Vesey is the author of “Extending Play: The Feminization of Collaborative Music Merchandise in the Early Twenty-First Century” (Oxford University Press, 2023), which analyzes how artists such as M.I.A., Rihanna, Patti Labelle, and St. Vincent use brand partnerships to assert creative authority and articulate their value to industry professionals and fans.
Her research has been published in leading journals including Journal of Cinema and Media Studies, Journal of Popular Music Studies, Feminist Media Studies, Television & New Media, Popular Music and Society, Camera Obscura, and Velvet Light Trap. She also serves as book reviews editor for the Journal of Popular Music Studies and as an editorial board member for Velvet Light Trap, contributing to the field’s scholarly leadership.
A Passion for Critical Media and Music Studies
Dr. Vesey teaches media studies, communication, and popular music studies curricula, with an emphasis on media literacy, close listening, formal analysis, and critical thinking. Her courses encourage students to examine how gender, power, and industry structures shape popular culture and media production.
At the graduate level, Dr. Vesey mentors students pursuing humanistic, qualitative and historical research in media and cultural studies, popular music studies, race and gender studies and sexuality studies. Through teaching and mentorship, she supports students in developing rigorous, ethically engaged research that connects cultural analysis to contemporary media realities.