Michael Jackson Betwixt and Between: The Construction of Identity in 'Leave Me Alone' (1989)

Abstract

In this thesis I analyze the role that dis/ability plays in the construction of identity in Michael Jackson's highly self-referential and self-reflexive music video 'Leave Me Alone' (1989). Doing so, I make use of three distinct theoretical concepts: David D. Yuan’s conceptual categories of ‘static enfreakment’ and ‘plastic freakishness’, Victor Turner’s and Arnold Van Gennep’s theory of liminality, and lastly the notion of the collage as a form of postmodern art. I link findings on the construction of identity to postmodern conceptualizations of identity as socially constructed, and argue that ‘Leave Me Alone’ exemplifies the ways in which dis/ability may problematize and complicate these postmodern theories.