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I grew up in Hertfordshire, the same part of the UK as singer Charli XCX. We’re also the same age. So, I clearly remember the excited chat among friends who were attending her infamous warehouse raves – events the musician was playing from the tender age of 16. I wasn’t cool enough to be a teen raver myself, but I was hooked on her music.
On my first listen to Brat, Charli’s sixth album, in early June, I knew this record was different. The lyrics are gritty, funny and devastatingly honest – a refreshing counterpoint to the squeaky-clean pop that has dominated the charts of late. I wanted to commission a review, not from a music expert, but a literary one. I came across Oxford’s Lilian Hingley thanks to a list in her academic bio that placed Charli XCX among her favourite poets. A throwaway mention, but when I asked if she’d be interested in writing about Brat, she told me: “I’ve always wanted to write something about Charli.” For Hingley, the album is more than a party record, it’s a work of contemporary imagist poetry – and a reclamation of “bratty” women’s art.
So, The Conversation knew Brat was special. Long before, it seems, Brat-mania took over the world. The latest celebrity to join the brat pack? Kamala Harris. This week, Charli posted a simple, but world-stopping endorsement to X, in just three words: “Kamala IS brat.” Harris’s camp rushed to embrace the label, changing the colours of their X profile to the album’s distinct chartreuse. But, as meme expert Anastasia Denisova explains in her insightful piece on the phenomenon, they should proceed with caution. Viral moments like this “brat-ification” of the vice-president can quickly be turned against a person who thought memes would work in their
favour.
Meanwhile, as the Olympic Games get underway in Paris, follow our coverage from the global homepage.
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Charli XCX in a press photo for Brat.
HARLEY WEIR
Lillian Hingley, University of Oxford
Charli XCX’s Brat can be seen as part of a multimedia tradition of women’s writing that is honest and no longer afraid of being labelled ‘bratty’.
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Prudence Flowers, Flinders University
For decades, presidents and presidential aspirants have tried (with varying degrees of success) to use music and musicians to connect with voters.
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Anastasia Denisova, University of Westminster
Charli XCX’s endorsement of Kamala Harris is a perfect ‘political mindbomb’.
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Anne de Bortoli, École des Ponts ParisTech (ENPC)
Organisers of the Paris 2024 Olympic Games have made big and bold green promises. Are they up to the heavy carbon lifting?
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Keith Rathbone, Macquarie University
As the world’s attention turns to Paris, the French capital is under its strongest-ever security regime ahead of the Olympics.
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Tony Heynen, The University of Queensland; Prabhakaran Vanaraja Ambeth, The University of Queensland
The Paris games are shaping up as the greenest games yet. But some critics say even more needs to be done.
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Vaughan Cruickshank, University of Tasmania; Brendon Hyndman, Charles Sturt University
Between hammers in trees, uneven fields, audience members joining teams and post-humous recognition for winners, the 1900 Paris games left much to be desired. Luckily, 1924 made up for it.
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Vaughan Cruickshank, University of Tasmania; Tom Hartley, University of Tasmania
Most Olympic stadiums, venues and structures continue to be used long after the games finish. But how are they used and what happened to the venues that have fallen into disuse?
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Wycliffe W. Njororai Simiyu, Stephen F. Austin State University
Kenya must keep adapting its development programmes - and move beyond just high altitude running academies.
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Francois Cleophas, Stellenbosch University
Jan Mashiani and Len Tau apparently found themselves in the US in 1904 as part of a world’s fair displaying ‘savages’.
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