DFW Riffs of Resistance

Credit & Citations

Photo Credit

Professional band photographs provided by Benji — thank you for lending your eye, your time, and your support throughout this project.

Links to Bands

Backtalk — https://www.instagram.com/backtalktx/

Crown the Empire — https://www.crowntheempire.com/

Fit For a King — https://www.fitforakingband.com/

Sidewalks and Alleyways — https://www.facebook.com/sidewalkstx/

Research Citations
  • Auslander, Philip. “Live and technologically mediated performance.” The Cambridge companion to performance studies (2008): 107-119.
  • Bennett, A. (2020). Hebdige, punk and the post-subcultural meaning of style. In Hebdige and Subculture in the Twenty-First Century: Through the Subcultural Lens (pp. 11-27). Cham: Springer International Publishing.
  • Gaballo, V. (2025). PUNK MUSIC, DISCOURSE, AND CULTURE Exploring the Intersection with Edupunk. Lingue e Linguaggi, 71, 161-186.
  • Griffin, N. C. (2015). Understanding DIY punk as activism: Realising DIY ethics through Griffin, N. C. (2015). Understanding DIY punk as activism: Realising DIY ethics through cultural production, community and everyday negotiations. University of Northumbria at Newcastle (United Kingdom).
  • Loehwing, M., & Motter, J. (2009). Publics, counterpublics, and the promise of democracy. Philosophy & Rhetoric, 42(3), 220-241.
  • Maharani, N., & Arief, S. (2025). Music as Identity: The Dynamics of the Pop Punk Community in Bojonegoro from a Subcultural Perspective. Paradigma, 14(3), 81-90.
  • Mironică, I., Ionescu, B., Knees, P., & Lambert, P. (2013, June). An in-depth evaluation of multimodal video genre categorization. In 2013 11th International Workshop on Content-Based Multimedia Indexing (CBMI) (pp. 11-16). IEEE.
  • Warner, M. (2002). Publics and counterpublics (abbreviated version). Quarterly Journal of speech, 88(4), 413-425.
How This Research Shaped the Project

This exhibit is grounded in scholarship on performance, counterpublics, and digital culture. Research on counterpublic formation helped me understand how local music scenes create alternative spaces where marginalized or dissenting voices can gather, express themselves, and challenge dominant narratives. Performance studies shaped the way I approached musicians’ actions onstage and online—not just as entertainment, but as meaningful rhetorical acts that communicate identity, resistance, and community values.

Work on digital media and participatory culture informed the analysis of reels, lyric videos, and online interactions, showing how political expression circulates through humor, aesthetics, and everyday posting practices. Scene‑based ethnography also inspired the project’s focus on place—how venues, neighborhoods, and digital platforms become sites where meaning is made and shared.

Together, these bodies of research guided the design of the StoryMap, the selection of artifacts, and the interpretive lens used throughout the exhibit. They helped me frame the DFW metal/rock/punk community not only as a music scene, but as a network of people performing resistance, building solidarity, and creating cultural spaces on their own terms.

Next Stop