“Coal Miner’s Daughter” by Matt Monarchik
“Coal Miner’s Daughter” by Loretta Lynn is a country song that came out in 1971. The song is played in Coal Miner’s Daughter, which is a movie that debuted on March 7, 1980. Lynn was regarded as was one of the most successful female performers in country-western music. Unfortunately, she passed away on October 4th, 2022, but her legacy will live on forever. As we know from the song, Lynn is from a poor small town in Kentucky, and is immensely proud of where she comes from. Lynn’s father was a coal miner and made sacrifices for his family.
Sacrifice is one of the main messages that is portrayed in “Coal Miner’s Daughter.” Lynn had 8 siblings; therefore, it was always a battle to keep the household under control. Lynn shows her father’s sacrifice by saying “we were poor, but we had love that’s the one thing that daddy made sure of. He shoveled coal to make a poor man’s dollar.” This quote shows how she wasn’t embarrassed about how her father didn’t make a lot of money, but rather she used her father’s job as the foundation for her family’s resilience. This leads to a bigger life lesson that you should not be ashamed of where you come from, but rather be proud of conquering your hardships and overcoming adversity.
With the genre of the music being country, people will immediately stereotype this and say that is right wing or conservative. Unlike people’s stereotypes, she goes against the social narrative and delivers a hit that would be remembered forever. Lynn uses her voice to blend different words that you never thought somebody could get to rhyme. For example, she rhymes Holler with daughter, which couldn’t be down with her accent. All in all, Loretta Lynn used her voice to move away from the typical view of country and overcame the challenges of poverty to be proud of her career.
Coal Miner’s Daughter by Margaret Stewart
“Coal Miner’s Daughter,” written by Loretta Lynn, communicates through musical lyrics her childhood life and what it is like growing up as a child of a coal miner. Lynn discusses the difficulties her family experienced and how her family of ten was able to live with “a poor man’s dollar,” the money her father made from his jobs. However, through these difficulties, Lynn continues to discuss how proud she is of everything her family has accomplished throughout her childhood.
From observing her father through the years, Lynn is proud to call herself a coal miner’s daughter because of her father’s hard work and dedication to his family and job. Due to the daily challenges and risks of possibly losing her father to the coal mine, it takes a strong person to be a coal miner’s daughter. Coal miner families also faced financial hardships and high work commitments to live a particular lifestyle. Therefore, her hardworking father worked multiple jobs throughout the day and evening for the family to live comfortably on miners’ pay. From doing so, the family had food on the table and the necessities to live. However, while Lynn’s father worked, her mother cared for the ten children and managed household jobs. Loretta Lynn says, “Why, I’ve seen her fingers bleed,” to show her mother’s strength and dedication to the family and household. Being a part of a coal mining family is not for the weak; it takes a team effort and a positive attitude to accomplish daily tasks.
Through the lyrics and music video, Lynn, singing “Coal Miner’s Daughter,” discusses her family’s difficulties with a positive outlook. She does this by singing about her family’s challenges throughout her childhood and then adding a line that relates to why she was proud to be a coal miner’s daughter. The lyrics of the last line are, “Cept the memories of a coal miner’s daughter,” symbolizing how life was not always easy, but there were happy and rewarding memories with sad moments. These memories will continue to uprise throughout her career, allowing her to empathize with people who experienced similarities. In the music video of Lynn singing the song, her voice was confident and proud, yet sung in a sympathetic tone; her facial expressions were smiling, welcoming, and reminiscent. This song represents how her family made the best of rough situations and financial difficulties. Through this, she is thankful for her parent’s dedication to the family.
Coal Miner’s Daughter by Alex Morana
The song Coal Miner’s Daughter by Loretta Lynn is a song that was published on October 5th, 1970 and is a song that shows what it was like being a child of a coal miner in Appalachia. The first line, “borned a coal miner’s daughter,” shows that she was not traditionally educated because, “borned” is not correct grammatically. In this time mining was a very dangerous job that often caused different health issues and also paid very low income. Loretta probably spent her days working around the house instead of school and definitely did not get the same things people take for granted for example multiple pairs of shoes a year.
Lorretta also states that her mother was a very hard worker and took care of most of the chores in their house and stayed up late putting the kids to sleep. Their family had 8 kids which with the miner’s pay is quite impressive and shows that during her childhood her family had to have been very poor. “We didn’t have shoes to wear” shows the struggle for Loretta’s family because as the kids grew they could not afford to keep buying shoes and clothes that fit.
Another problem for Loretta’s family is how uncertain Loretta’s fathers job was so many times he would pick up other jobs to support his family. This is an example of the American Dream because it shows how hard work can support your family in this country. “Daddy always managed to get the money somewhere,” which shows that Loretta’s dad would do anything to support his family. Loretta even says that she is proud to be a coal miner’s daughter and this shows that she is not embarrassed to have a poor and frugal background. After all this song truly shows the side of America that does not get much attention, which is poor Appalachian people that struggle to keep ends meet and shows that parts of America can go unseen by people today.
Coal Miner’s Daughter Lyrical Analysis by Josh Stephenson
In 1971, Loretta Lynn released the song “Coal Miner’s Daughter.” The tune proved to be a testimony of American Exceptionalism through its message of the values that define Americans. Lynn’s work proved to be an influential piece of history that emphasizes the intense nationalism and pride that Americans have in their country and its morals.
Lynn opens the song by establishing her family’s situation. In the opening lines she explains that she is the daughter of a coal miner and that while she was, “poor, [she] had love.” Here, Lynn emphasizes the fact that while her family may not be rich monetarily, they are driven by and rooted in love. By making this statement early, she gives love of family as a motive for the hard-work that her parents constantly do. This value of the importance of family is a facet of American Exceptionalism. In the second stanza, Lynn explains specifically how hard her parents work. She specifies that her father, “ works all night in the Van Lear coal mines” and that her mother, “rocks the babies at night.” Additionally, she comments that this cycle of hard work by her parents occurs everyday. These lines are a statement of the hard working nature of Americans. The morals of discipline and consistency in hard work that are reflected in these lines are another key testament to American Exceptionalism. This idea is expanded in the third and fourth stanzas as Lynn recites the fact that her father, “raised eight children on a miner’s pay” and that her mother never complained despite scrubbing clothes so hard that her fingers began to bleed. Once again, the ability of Americans being superior due to their ability to continue to work hard despite obstacles is emphasized. The father is able to provide for his children despite minimal funds, and the mother is able to smile and continue working despite the struggle of physical harm. These actions all display the ideas of American Exceptionalism and the fact the values of hard work that defines Americans. Finally, Lynn expresses her pride in being an American rooted in these values of love, hard-work, and discipline. In the fifth stanza she explains that she is, “proud to be a coal miner’s daughter” and that she, “never thought of ever leaving Butcher Holler.” Here, Lynn encapsulates her earlier statements of the factors that make up American Exceptionalism by saying that she is proud to be an American. These feelings of nationalism and pride in one’s country are what ultimately drive the common idea of American Exceptionalism.
In “Coal Miner’s Daughter” Loretta Lynn makes a statement about the values that truly make someone American. Regardless of financial status or situation, Lynn makes it clear that Americans are going to work for their family, consistently work hard, and reflect pride in their country. Truly, this song is an anthem of American Exceptionalism and the vital factors that make it up.
