The Eighties in America - Salem Press (2009)

Mintzer, Richard.Latino Americans in Sports, Film,
Music, and Government: Trailblazers.Broomall, Pa.:
Mason Crest, 2005. A volume that focuses on the
role of Latino celebrities in U.S. culture.
Oboler, Suzanne, and Deena J. Gonzalez, eds.The
Oxford Encyclopedia of Latinos and Latinas in the
United States. 4 vols. New York: Oxford University
Press, 2006. A four-volume encyclopedia covering
the history and culture of Latinos in the United
States.
Stavans, Ilan, and Harold Augenbraum, eds.Encyclo-
pedia Latina: Histor y, Culture, and Society in the
United States. 4 vols. Danbury, Conn.: Grolier,

2005. A four-volume encyclopedia dealing with
      the history and culture of Latinos in the United
      States.
      John C. Hathaway

See also Business and the economy in the United
States; El Niño; Film in the United States; Foreign
policy of the United States; Immigration Reform
and Control Act of 1986; Immigration to Canada;
Immigration to the United States;L.A. Law; Latin
America; Mariel boatlift; Mexico and the United
States;Miami Vice; Music; Pop music; Television.

Lauper, Cyndi

Identification American New Wave singer,
musician, and songwriter
Born June 22, 1953; Ozone Park, Queens, New
York

Lauper’s quirky, tuneful music gave mainstream exposure
to New Wave eccentricity and became permanently associ-
ated with the American popular culture of the 1980’s.

Cyndi Lauper became a rock star in 1983 at the com-
paratively late age of thirty. Before that, she had
grown up in the working-class suburb of Ozone Park
in Queens, New York, and had had a fitful musical
career, including fringe appearances with several
groups and a near-bankruptcy in 1982. In 1983, how-
ever, she released her first album,She’s So Unusual,
which became a major hit—rising to number four
on theBillboard200 chart—and launched Lauper to
stardom. The album’s first hit single, “Girls Just
Want to Have Fun,” gave voice, despite the hedonis-
tic implications of its title, to a deeply felt sense of
everyday life and of what it meant to be part of a

working-class family: Such people were not, to quote

the song’s lyrics, “the fortunate ones.” The song and

the album used an accessible, if quirky, New Wave

presentation to bring attitudes sometimes associ-

ated with the punk scene to a more mainstream au-

dience.

Lauper became one of the most popular and mar-

ketable of the stars that emerged from the initial

years of MTV and music videos. Her unpretentious,

girl-next-door style made her seem more accessible

and approachable than many of her fellow rock

stars. She also benefited from the video revolution,

which made performers’ appearances as important

as their sound in promoting their music. Lauper

wrote most of her own material and played a wide va-

riety of instruments with skill. She had an interesting

sense of visual style, and her performances appealed

578
Lauper, Cyndi The Eighties in America

Cyndi Lauper holds aloft her award for best female video at the

1984 MTV Video Music Awards.(AP/Wide World Photos)