Category: English

Source: The Conversation – USA – By Michael C. Horowitz, Professor of Political Science, University of Pennsylvania

Wars in Ukraine and the Middle East have propelled drones into the headlines. The word “drone” now stretches to cover everything from hobbyist camera rigs available on Amazon to the Predator and Reaper systems the United States has relied on to fight terrorist organizations over the past 20 years.

A common ancestor in the animal kingdom can give rise, under sufficient environmental pressure, to distinct species that demand their own classification. Drones have undergone their own rapid speciation: the one-way attack drone, the medium-altitude, long-endurance and high-altitude, long-endurance drones, the collaborative combat aircraft drone – these share a lineage and a label, but in terms of cost, range and use, increasingly little else.

Nowhere is this variation more consequential than in the category of one-way attack drones: systems designed not to return home like an airplane, but to fly directly into a target and destroy it, like a bullet or a missile. Russia and Ukraine have fired millions of these at each other since 2022, and Iran has launched thousands at United States military bases and embassies, Israel and other countries in the Middle East in 2026.

The world is now in an era we call “precise mass.” In the past, military power was often determined by size – the number of knights, soldiers, guns or tanks, depending on the era, that an army had. Since the Cold War, advanced militaries have emphasized precise munitions, such as cruise missiles, gaining advantage with fewer but more accurately targeted weapons. Inexpensive but technologically sophisticated drones bring mass and precision together.

Commercial manufacturing, precision guidance and advances in artificial intelligence and autonomy have democratized the ability of militaries and militant groups to accurately strike their adversaries. This includes first-person-view, or FPV, drones – a type of one-way attack drone with interfaces like video games – that groups aligned with Iran are already using to target American forces in the Middle East.

One-way attack drones

One-way attack drones have featured most prominently in the war between Russia and Ukraine, and in the Middle East today. The first category of one-way attack drones is longer range and can travel hundreds or even thousands of miles to strike targets deep in an adversary’s territory. They are like extremely cheap cruise missiles – Iran’s Shahed-136 one-way attack drone, for instance, has a reported range of up to 1,250 miles (2,000 km) and costs between US$20,000 and $50,000 each. In comparison, America’s Tomahawk cruise missile costs $2 million each.

Russia acquired the Shahed technology almost immediately after Iran debuted it in 2022, creating its own version, the Geran-2, and has since used these drones to pummel Ukrainian cities and energy infrastructure. Most recently, the U.S. military has followed Russia’s lead and reverse-engineered its own version, the LUCAS, which debuted in the earliest days of Operation Epic Fury, the U.S. military operation against Iran that started on Feb. 28, 2026.

Since late February 2026, Tehran has fired thousands of one-way attack drones at targets across the Middle East. Iran’s one-way attack drones have hit buildings in Bahrain, Kuwait and the United Arab Emirates, and damaged the United States Embassy in Saudi Arabia. The UAE alone was targeted by nearly 700 Iranian drones in the war’s early days. Iran’s one-way attack drones have killed U.S. service members and destroyed critical American radar systems.

Because long-range, one-way attack drones are so slow, they are easier to shoot down than, say, a Tomahawk missile, but attackers can fire so many of them that they can overwhelm air defense systems.

The second category of one-way attack drones operates more like traditional artillery – typically from short distances, up to about 100 miles (160 km). Ukraine’s battlefield has showcased these systems extensively, where they generate 60%-70% of the casualties on the front lines.

FPV drones

One of the most common types of short-range, one-way attack drones is the FPV drone, sometimes built for a few hundred dollars each from commercial parts purchased online. In Ukraine, operators wearing video goggles fly FPV drones directly into Russian vehicles, fortifications and troops, and they feature guidance interfaces for remote operators that are not dissimilar to those of first-person video games.

FPV drones are not magic. Operating them requires a continuous data link between the operator and the drone, making them vulnerable to electronic jamming that can disrupt radio signals. To address this vulnerability, many Ukrainian FPV drones now use physical communication lines in the form of fiber-optic cables to avoid jamming, but the cables can be cut, and that limits the range of these systems. FPV drones with fiber-optic cables have ranges of about 12 miles (20 km). Effectively using FPV drones also requires skilled operators.

America and Israel’s war with Iran hit the pause button on April 7, but if it starts again and the U.S. deploys ground forces, they would likely face the kind of short-range, one-way attack drone barrages that have come to terrorize both Russian and Ukrainian forces alike.

The threat has proved so hard to stop that Ukraine has resorted to low-tech solutions: Hundreds of kilometers of roads are now covered with nets, donated by European fishermen and farmers. The nets stop FPV drones by tangling their propellers. Nets cover tanks and hospital courtyards and line supply routes and city streets. Ukraine’s government plans to install about 2,500 miles (4,000 km) of them on key roads by the end of 2026.

Iranian forces could similarly deploy one-way attack drones against American convoys, personnel or parked aircraft in ways that are difficult to defend against. Additionally, just as American adversaries such as ISIS and al-Qaida used video footage of attacks to try to scare the American public, Iran is likely to use FPV strike footage – the operator’s-eye view of the attack, easily edited and uploaded – to try to shape American attitudes.

In March 2026, an Iran-backed militia used FPV drones to strike a parked U.S. Army medevac Black Hawk helicopter and destroy an air defense radar at the Victory Base Complex near Baghdad. The attackers then released footage from the drone’s perspective as propaganda, blurring out the red crosses identifying the Black Hawk as a medevac aircraft.

The new reality

Short-range, one-way attack drones have redefined the front lines; long-range ones have changed what it means to wage war at strategic distances. Iran’s battlefield record – thousands of drones launched, air defenses nearing exhaustion across multiple targeted countries, American troops killed – demonstrates what a mid-tier military can achieve with precise mass.

Any military that fails to invest in these capabilities – and in the ability to defend against them – places itself at risk, including the U.S. military.

Michael C. Horowitz is a senior fellow with the Council on Foreign Relations. From 2022 to 2024 he was Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense and Director of the Emerging Capabilities Policy Office at the United States Department of Defense.
The views, thoughts, and opinions expressed in an article are solely those of the author and do not represent the official policy, position, or endorsement of any U.S. government department, agency, or branch of service

Lauren Kahn does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. One-way attack drones: Low-cost, high-tech weapons ‘democratize’ precision warfare – https://theconversation.com/one-way-attack-drones-low-cost-high-tech-weapons-democratize-precision-warfare-280364

Source: The Conversation – USA (2) – By Katrina Stack, Ph.D. Candidate in Human Geography, University of Tennessee

Within moments of entering the Newport Renaissance Faire, you are ushered to a group of fairies. They pass you a scroll and say, “You must seek out the Bone Man for the first hurdle in your quest.” As you navigate the fair, you find many men dressed in bones, both vendors and fellow attendees. When you find the correct Bone Man – an actor wearing what appears to be a mask made of human skull along with a crown constructed from deer antlers – he stamps your scroll. He then sends you to your next target: the Drunk Viking.

Following the directions of actors in the fair, you meet a variety of performers from many historical eras and fantastic realms, and stumble upon both merchants and merrymakers in your journey. It’s all part of the immersive experience that connects you with the other guests and staff, though many of the costumed staff members, speaking in faux Middle English, are also trying to sell you something.

Renaissance fairs were originally conceived as a creative refuge for artists sidelined by political repression during the Red Scare. Now, they sit at an uneasy crossroads between countercultural expression and commercial spectacle. Having grown into a nationwide industry with tiered tickets, branded merchandise and multimillion dollar valuations, the fairs can easily be seen as an offshoot of a corporate theme park.

As cultural geographers, we wanted to learn more about whether the spirit of the fairs has been changing. So for our recent study, we visited the Tennessee Renaissance Festival, Newport Renaissance Faire, Tennessee Medieval Faire and Tennessee Pirate Fest.

Once upon a time … not so long ago

Although renaissance fairs and festivals recreate the atmosphere of centuries past, the first formally recognized fair took place in May 1963 in Irwindale, California. A public school English and history teacher named Phyllis Patterson was the brains behind the event, which she dubbed the Renaissance Pleasure Faire.

For Patterson, the fair was a chance to celebrate the era’s countercultural values like free expression, experimentation with identity and creative play. It also served as a source of employment for those who had been pushed out of their careers in the film and entertainment industries after being blacklisted or graylisted as suspected communists.

Patterson herself had refused to sign a Cold War–era loyalty oath required to work in California public schools. At the Renaissance Pleasure Faire, actors, educators and set designers could continue their craft, whether that meant designing costumes, creating characters, performing or writing.

From creative refuge to thriving business

Since those first events in Southern California, renaissance fairs have spread across the U.S., with some constructing permanent structures even though they’re only open seasonally, in the spring or fall. Built to resemble small villages, fair operators create towns-within-towns, fantasy lands where visitors can briefly step away from their routines and obligations.

Their popularity continues to grow, and what began partly as a creative refuge has grown into a thriving entertainment business.

The East Tennessee Renaissance Faire recently announced that it would be relocating after deciding that its original venue in Newport could no longer accommodate the swelling crowds: Within three years, the fair had grown from 600 to 6,000 attendees, spurring a move to a larger site in neighboring Sevierville. New fairs are sprouting up as well: The Chattanooga Renaissance Faire will host its inaugural season in spring 2026.

There are almost always entry fees – US$38 at the Tennessee Renaissance Festival and $53 at the Renaissance Pleasure Faire, for example – and many offer season passes.

Attendees often arrive in costume, but strict rules about adhering to a specific time period or setting rarely apply.

Some visitors dress as Tolkien-style elves, while others show up as Tudor nobles. Viking-clad participants walk alongside fairies and swashbuckling pirates. Some fairs have also developed their own themed weekends – with names like “Viking Victory,” “Fantasy and Folklore,” “Pirate Plunder” and “Celtic Celebration” – that weave history and fiction with few constraints. And those committed to their role will often address each other in playful faux-medieval speech, with greetings like “my lady” or “my lord.”

Vendors, often dressed in costume themselves, sell everything from cloaks, swords and crowns to contemporary jewelry and shampoos. Booths sell era-adjacent fare like Scotch eggs, ciders, mead and turkey legs, while modern cocktails like “The Shipwreck” and “The Blueberry Faerie” can also be had, with visitors paying the equivalent of stadium and arena concession prices.

Renaissance fairs have even spread to countries like Germany and France, reconnecting with their roots. The expansion into new venues – along with the development of offshoots such as pirate- and steampunk-themed festivals – point to profit margins that would have been unthinkable in the early days of the Renaissance Pleasure Faire.

But as with many ventures, the prospect of cashing in comes with complications.

The 2024 HBO Max series “Ren Faire” introduced viewers to the eccentrics and costume-clad vendors involved in the nation’s largest fair, the Texas Renaissance Festival in Todd Mission. The fight over its future involved lawsuits and, eventually, the court-ordered $60 million sale of the event’s property and assets.

King Richard’s Faire, which takes place in Carver, Massachusetts, and is the largest fair in New England, reportedly generates massive daily revenue while allegedly relying on widespread worker misclassification, leaving many performers earning below minimum wage without benefits. Even volunteer “villagers” work only for free admission, and both workers and attendees receive no compensation or refunds when the fair closes due to rain.

Seeking out a space of whimsy

Despite the creeping influence of profit motives, we concluded that renaissance fairs have always been – and continue to be – mostly about community.

Dressing as a fantastical version of yourself or your favorite character bonds you to others dressed up at the festival. Unlike popular Civil War or World War II reenactments where historical accuracy is paramount, renaissance fairs instead invite people to take part in shared, often mythologized ideas about history through performance, costume and play.

For example, each weekend, the Tennessee Renaissance Festival organizes jousts. Competitors and their horses meet at a permanent jousting pitch located at the back of the property. Each knight represents a noble house, and each section of the bleachers is assigned a knight to root for. Announcers explain the rules of each event, while also leading the crowds in chants and cheers. While the knights might fight under titles tied to historical lineages, they represent a jumble of eras and place. They also reject antiquated social norms by including women and ethnic groups who never would have been seen together on a jousting pitch.

Here, fidelity to the facts is an afterthought; it actually might ruin the fun.

Beyond the jousting pitch, you can find the queen dictating a game of human chess. A rotating cast of performers play music, tell jokes, juggle and blow fire. Elsewhere, you might stumble across pixies teaching children how to make fairy homes or relax in a mermaid’s magical grotto.

There’s also a comforting simplicity in the narratives of this make-believe world. Ladies are almost always gentle and beautiful, while the men are brave and noble. All the villains are easy to spot – they’re always defeated.

In a real world characterized by political upheaval, information overload, invisible surveillance and shadowy villains, perhaps the fair, with its simple prism of good and evil, becomes a space of comfort – a curated cultural experiment that’s also an improvised escape.

In other words, renaissance fairs wield a quiet power: They forge communities that deliberately blur fantasy, history and everyday life with a wink. Vendors, performers and attendees alike can be Tudors, Vikings, hobbits, elves or mermaids for a day. Few actually believe in elves, or imagine their mock-Elizabethan speech is anything more than cheerful, mangled guesswork.

And that’s the point. There’s joy in pretending – just as there’s a universal pleasure in the weird, the whimsical and the absurd.

The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. As renaissance fairs become big business, can they retain their counterculture roots? – https://theconversation.com/as-renaissance-fairs-become-big-business-can-they-retain-their-counterculture-roots-273757

Source: The Conversation – USA (2) – By Elena Bertozzi, Professor of Game Design & Development, Quinnipiac University

Imagine you and your partner are sitting in the waiting room of your doctor’s office, waiting for your appointment to get birth control – and instead of calculating how many other people will be called before you, or perusing old magazines, a nurse hands you a digital tablet and encourages you to play a game.

You power it on, and you find yourselves drawn into a story: Can you help Laila and Caleb figure out which contraceptive method will work best for them, given their lifestyles and Laila’s physiology? Their situation, you realize, is a bit similar to your own. Would helping them choose a form of contraception help you and your partner make an informed decision for yourselves?

As a designer and developer of games that promote positive health behavior change, I work with physicians, public health experts, artists and programmers to create games just like these. I focus on topics like vaccine hesitancy, sexuality and reproductive health – sensitive issues that people may have a hard time discussing openly.

Laila and Caleb are characters in a game that my team and I are developing called What’s My Method? We are testing whether playing it helps people choose a birth control method and makes it easier to have a fruitful discussion with their health care provider. And we are finding that this and other games for health-related education are a powerful but underused way of not just conveying information, but also providing people with an arena to learn from the outcomes of their choices.

The power of play

When I tell people I make health-related video games for a living, they’re often surprised that this is a viable career choice. Many adults still see video games as trivial at best – and destructive at worst. For example, games that involve guns and shootings are widely blamed for gun violence in real life, even though there’s no causal evidence supporting the connection.

Play is how intelligent and curious beings make sense of the constantly changing world and ensure they keep learning. It is an early factor in children’s cognitive development. Peek-a-boo, for example, helps babies learn about object permanence – meaning that even if a person disappears for a short time, they aren’t gone forever. Digital play can support many types of learning. Games like Minecraft teach resource management, planning and spatial reasoning, among other skills.

The game industry is also an increasingly large part of the world economy. Given the size and reach of the international video game market – US$300 billion in 2025 – games are often the way technological innovations are introduced to a mass audience.

Take motion capture technology, which enables a device to track a person’s movement. Microsoft introduced it to the general public in 2010 through its Kinect console, in which two players can box or play tennis virtually by actually performing the movements with their bodies.

Augmented reality – the ability to use a smartphone to see a virtual world overlaid on the “real” world – entered the mainstream in 2016 when people began playing and watching others play Pokemon Go. Games are also how many people first experience virtual reality – a full immersion in an entirely virtual world – by wearing headsets like Oculus (now called Meta Quest) and Apple Vision Pro.

Gaming also has a powerful social dimension. Massively multiplayer online games like Animal Crossing, Fortnite and World of Warcraft provide a means for socialization and togetherness for billions of people worldwide. This became especially powerful during the COVID-19 pandemic when people were social-distancing – people’s use of such games soared during lockdowns, and they helped players maintain social connections.

In my own experience as the director of a university program in game design and development, I find that students who grew up playing complex digital games are better prepared to engage with technology and navigate an increasingly digital world.

Gaming for health

Early in my game design career, I realized that games don’t just provide compelling entertainment, but they can also equip players with the knowledge and the agency to solve hard problems in real life.

That’s especially valuable in health. Information for patients is usually conveyed through pamphlets or links to websites that often provide too much information in formats patients find difficult to decipher. These formats don’t effectively address gaps in health literacy. Games, on the other hand, provide targeted information in a specific context that players don’t just understand, but also, in some ways, inhabit. Such games allow players to try out different behaviors through avatars to see how they turn out. Conveying information through relatable avatars also triggers empathy, which further cements learning.

Since 2010, my team has been testing how to deploy digital games in the U.S., India, Barbados and Ghana to communicate complex health-related information through animated graphics, audio and interactive experiences.

In 2012, we worked with doctors at a hospital on Long Island, New York, to encourage families of critically ill children to get a flu vaccination. We found that family members who played a game we jointly developed called Flu Busters! were 40% more likely to get a flu vaccination than those who didn’t.

In the game, players help an avatar navigate a school filled with children sneezing and blowing their noses in order to enjoy social interactions such as sharing a cookie without getting sick. Rather than telling people how they should behave, the game allows players to experience how difficult it is to avoid being exposed to the flu virus in everyday life and how the vaccine can help children stay healthy, equipping players to make informed decisions about their own health.

In our first international project, we collaborated with public health physicians in India on a game we developed to gather data about how teenagers there make decisions about family planning. In addition to determining that a game was a very effective tool for anonymized data collection, we found that giving young people access to information about reproductive anatomy gave them the vocabulary and tools to understand and discuss their future reproductive choices..

Responding to rising vaccine hesitancy during the COVID-19 epidemic, my team developed Activate My Shield! The game demonstrates how vaccines protect against different diseases using the metaphor of armor that only works against specific types of attacks. To address misinformation that was widespread at the time – that COVID-19 vaccines contained injectable microchips – the game asks players to try putting a microchip in a vaccine needle and administering it to a person. Experiencing how impossible it is to do this helps players understand that it’s not a legitimate concern.

Reaching digital natives

Our games are available to all for free, but in order to be able to widely distribute them on the app stores, my team and I founded SolitonZ Games.

Several other research groups are developing similar games. They address an enormous range of health issues – for example, encouraging people with HIV to adhere to their treatment, helping teens avoid vaping and teaching children with asthma to manage their disease. A video game called EndeavorRx was authorized by the Food and Drug Administration in 2020 as a prescription-based therapy to improve attention in children who have attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder.

Overall, our research and that of other groups show that digital games can be easily integrated into health care, and that play is an effective way of delivering health information. Simply put, people find the games fun and engaging.

Even as these efforts gain ground, however, health campaigns and patient education efforts have been slow to embrace game-based patient education. That’s perhaps partly because decision-makers such as hospital and clinic administrators are often unfamiliar with gaming and may be slow to buy into the idea of delivering health education through play-based technology. Plus, it’s difficult to make changes in busy environments with a lot of moving parts, like health care.

But I’m optimistic that by working together with public health experts and health care providers, game designers like me can help fit gaming into the industry and culture of health care. After all, it makes sense to try to reach digital natives on the technologies they are already holding in their hands.

Elena Bertozzi is co-Founder of SolitonZ Games which produced two of the games mentioned. She has been funded by the Gates Foundation and Connecticut Innovations.

– ref. Health information delivered as a video game can bridge the communication gap between patients and providers – https://theconversation.com/health-information-delivered-as-a-video-game-can-bridge-the-communication-gap-between-patients-and-providers-280222

Source: The Conversation – USA (2) – By Austin McCoy, Assistant Professor of History, West Virginia University

The CBS television show “It’s What’s Happening Baby” aired a music video featuring Martha and the Vandellas performing their hit song “Nowhere to Run” to kick off its national broadcast dedicated to Detroit on June 28, 1965.

In the video, the Detroit-based trio sang about how they could not escape missing an ex-lover after a breakup while sitting in a white Mustang moving slowly down the assembly line in the Ford Motor Co.’s River Rouge plant.

As a cultural and labor historian, I see the “Nowhere to Run” video as an iconic testament to Detroit’s reputation as the “Motor City” and the role of the autoworker in the American imagination.

Motown founder and CEO Berry Gordy, Jr. worked on the Ford assembly line and used it as inspiration for Hitsville U.S.A., the famed headquarters and music recording studio that served as a space to train performers and perfect the “Motown sound” for the masses.

Martha and the Vandellas were part of Motown’s illustrious roster of artists in the 1960s. Initially comprised of Martha Reeves, Rosalind Ashford and Annette Beard, and with members changing over the next three decades, they helped establish the Black “girl group.” They presented themselves as working class in videos like “Nowhere to Run.”

Their classic anthem “Dancing in the Street” reflected the revolutionary mood of civil rights protesters, especially Black Americans in the 1960s. As lead singer, Reeves also emerged as a pioneering R&B “diva,” helping pave the way for Black female solo vocalists like Whitney Houston, Janet Jackson, Mary J. Blige and Beyoncé.

A patient path to stardom

Martha Reeves was born in Eufaula, Alabama, on July 18, 1941. Soon after, her family moved to Detroit’s east side. Music occupied a central place in her life from childhood.

Reeves writes in her 1994 memoir, “Dancing in the Street: Confessions of a Motown Diva,” about her father serenading her mother with his guitar while she was pregnant with Martha. Her mother, Ruby, also sang. Reeves’ parents passed their love for music to her, and she sang in her church choir and aspired to a life of performance.

“At that young age I was already hooked on pleasing the crowd with my singing,” Reeves wrote.

Reeves graduated from Northeastern High School. As a teenager, she used fake IDs to get into night clubs to watch singers perform, and she sang in open mics and talent shows. She scored her first break after earning a three-night performance at the 20 Grand, a popular Detroit night club located on 14th Street and Warren Avenue.

It was after one of those performances when she met William Stevenson, Motown Records’ executive for discovering new talent. Stevenson invited Reeves to the label’s headquarters.

Reeves came to the studio, but she didn’t audition for reasons that aren’t entirely clear today. Instead, Stevenson told her she could answer the phones. That’s how she got a job in the A&R Department and began working with other Motown artists.

In 1957, Reeves joined her first group, the Del-Phis. Formed by Edward “Pops” Larkins, the Del-Phis also included leader Gloria Jean Williamson, Rosalind Ashford and Annette Beard.

Reeves soon caught another break. In September 1962, Stevenson called for her to fill in for Mary Wells in a Marvin Gaye studio session. Reeves enlisted the other Del-Phis, and they performed so well that they became the supporting vocal group for Gaye.

After the Del-Phis toured with Gaye and recorded “I’ll Have to Let Him Go,” Gordy offered Reeves, Beard and Ashford a recording contract. The group also took on a new name, Martha and the Vandellas.

Martha and the Vandellas enjoyed commercial success soon after, with songs like “Come and Get These Memories,” “Quicksand” and “Heatwave.”

An anthem for revolution set to a groove

“Dancing in the Street,” written by Gaye, Stevenson and Ivy Jo Hunter, was released in the summer of 1964 and became a signature hit for Martha and the Vandellas.

Reeves wrote in her autobiography that she did not like “Dancing in the Street.”

However, she made it her own, and Reeves later acknowledged that the song embodied the spirit of civil rights protests.

“It became the anthem of the decade,” Reeves wrote.

She was right.

At the time of the song’s release, the Civil Rights Movement was in full swing. Black Americans in Harlem took to the streets to protest the killing of 15-year-old James Powell by an off-duty New York Police Department officer.

The 1960s set off a string of “long, hot summers” as racial tensions intensified. Black folks in the Watts neighborhood in Los Angeles in 1965 protested in the streets in response to police violence.

More than 100 protests were organized in response to Martin Luther King Jr.’s assassination in 1968, from Chicago to Washington and Baltimore.

Detroit erupted a year earlier, in July 1967, after Detroit police officers raided a “blind pig,” or an unlicensed bar, on 12th Street.

The iconic opening lines of “Dancing in the Street” announced a new attitude among Black folks: “Calling out around the world/ Are you ready for a brand new beat?”

The high-octane, optimistic song is laced with slogans interpreted as invitations to take action. Martha and the Vandellas’ declaration that “Summer is here and the time is right for dancing in the street” reflected Black Americans’ willingness to not only march, but to take measures in their own hands and fight for equality and justice.

Battle for fair pay and recognition

The late 1960s and early 1970s were a time of transition for Reeves and the Vandellas. The Supremes were on the rise and threatened to displace them as the most prominent girl group on the Motown label. Reeves also experienced creative differences with Motown executives and struggled with drug addiction. Then, in 1972, Gordy moved Motown to Los Angeles so he could try his hand at filmmaking.

Martha and the Vandellas broke up later that year after the release of their album, “Black Magic.” However, Reeves continued as a solo artist, releasing five albums, including her self-titled debut “Martha Reeves” in 1974, “The Rest of My Life” in 1976 and “We Meet Again” in 1978, among others.

Martha Reeves and the Vandellas, along with many Motown artists, experienced a resurgence in popularity during the 1980s. Motown Records’ 25th anniversary show in Pasadena, California, in 1983 launched them back into the mainstream. The group reunited and started performing again in 1989.

Also, Reeves and the group sought to resolve their old conflicts with Motown Records. Reeves and various members of the Vandellas sued Gordy and Motown in 1989 for unpaid royalties. Motown Records settled the suit in 1991 for an undisclosed amount.

Four years later, the B-52s inducted Reeves and the Vandellas into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

The diva archetype

Martha and the Vandellas played a vital role in laying the foundation for future all-Black female groups like En Vogue, TLC, SWV and Destiny’s Child.

They helped set the standard for turning songs about the trappings of love and heartbreak into anthems. Reeves embraced being an “R&B Diva” long before music critics applied the persona to singers like Mary J. Blige and Beyoncé. Reeves was not just a larger-than-life vocal presence; she showed future generations of Black female vocalists that, to be a diva, one must have control of one’s own career.

“We became the Vandellas and with me being the only lead singer, my name was put out there because I did all the work,” Reeves said in a 2020 interview. “I did all the singing … I managed to just come up with my own destiny, with my own future in show business.”

Austin McCoy does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Motown girl group Martha and the Vandellas not only recorded an anthem for the civil rights era – they fought for fair pay and proudly called themselves divas – https://theconversation.com/motown-girl-group-martha-and-the-vandellas-not-only-recorded-an-anthem-for-the-civil-rights-era-they-fought-for-fair-pay-and-proudly-called-themselves-divas-278383