The Gendered Score: Music in 1940s Melodrama and the Woman's Film

Heather Laing examines, for the first time, the issues of gender and emotion that underpin the classical style of film scoring, but that have until now remained unquestioned and untheorized, thus providing a benchmark for thinking on more recent and alternative styles of scoring. Many theorists have discussed this type of music in film as a signifier of emotion and 'the feminine', a capacity in which it is frequently associated with female characters. The full effect of such an association on ei