Cultural impact of Madonna

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American singer-songwriter Madonna (b. 1958) has had a social-cultural impact on the world through her recordings, attitude, clothing, and lifestyle since her early career in the 1980s. Madonna has built a legacy that goes beyond music and has been studied by sociologists, historians and other social scientists.^[1][2][3] This contributed to the rise of the Madonna studies, an academic and critical response dedicated to her work and persona for which Madonna's semiotic and image was diversified in a wide-ranging of theoretical stripe from feminism to queer studies among others.

Called a "major 'historical figure'" by academic Camille Paglia, Madonna attained the status of a "cultural icon" as was noted by cultural theorists or sociologists like Stuart Sim and Suzanna Danuta Walters. Frenchman scholar Georges-Claude Guilbert attributed her a greater cultural significance and proposed the singer as a postmodern myth. Madonna, which also gained a cult status amongst different audiences according to professor Sheila Jeffreys, has been called a Gesamtkunstwerk herself. Her critical reception, alongside her media coverage, made Madonna one of the most "well-documented figures of the modern age". Both Madonna's references and impact are found —but not limited to— in the arts, literature, cinema, music, and even science.

From a musical perspective and despite Madonna's music playing a second place in scholarship analysis, she has been discussed with euphemism by multiple international authors as the "greatest" woman in music or arguably the most "influential" female artist in history. A large group of critics have retrospectively credited her presence, success and contributions with paving the way for female artists (as well she transcended gender) and changing the music scene for women in music —most notorious for dance and pop stages—with Billboard staff saying that "the history of pop music can essentially be divided into two eras: pre-Madonna and post-Madonna".^[4] In terms of record sales, Madonna is regarded as the best-selling woman in music history recognized by Guinness World Records since the late 20th-century. She has been cited as an influence by other artists.

She is also a polarizing figure. During her career, Madonna has attracted contradictory social-cultural attention from family organizations, anti-porn feminists, radical terrorists, and religious groups worldwide with boycotts, censorship, and protests. In the early 2010s, the Islamic state banned her name. Her critics and detractors attribute Madonna being a variety of things, such as being an important element in the normalization of prostitution in the malestream culture. Author Shmuley Boteach blamed her to "destroy the female recording industry by erasing the line that separates music from pornography". In addition and mainly in the late 20th century, she was negatively nicknamed a "modern Medusa" and some authors advised that she restored the image of the Whore of Babylon, for which she was described by some as "the most sexually perverse female of the twentieth century". Despite being a subject of contradictions, numerous academic studies have considered the way Madonna polarizes views and deemed her as a site of ambiguity and openness.