The Good, the Bad, and the Deadly: Gendered Moral Teachings in American Murder Ballads

Once planted firmly in America, murder ballads old and new sparked the Southern imagination, and familiar motifs and formulas were sung with a distinct American twist. The moral standards and beliefs of Christianity, specifically those of Baptist and Methodist denominations, are weaved through a majority of Southern murder ballads, which reflects the impact of the Second Great Awakening, a religious revival founded in the South during the 1790s and early 1800s. Murder ballads found in the American South from 1800 to 1950 follow a structure that reinforces southern expectations for men and women, emphasizing moral and immoral traits in a way that encourages the listener to adhere to strict gender roles. The question of who the villain is and who the victim is must be confronted while examining American murder ballads, because the answer is not as clear cut as one would assume. Virginal women and sinful women, hapless men and cold-blooded men, each play a role in these ballads and the way in which they are perceived shifts the moral weight of the song. Heterosexuality and gender norms are heavily enforced in murder ballads from the South, and any deviations from these norms leads to murder, execution, or eternal damnation.