Madonna (born 1958) is an American singer whose socio-cultural impact has been noted by popular press and scholars from different fields, throughout the late-twentieth and early twenty-one centuries, and attested outside of the music sphere to an international scale. 
Named by "Time" magazine as one of the most powerful women of the 20th century, Madonna was included among remarkable American figures by publications and cultural institutions, including the Smithsonian Institution, National Geographic Society, "Encyclopædia Britannica" and Discovery Channel. Her impact has been compared to that of other entertainers such as Michael Jackson, the Beatles, Marilyn Monroe and Elvis Presley. Madonna has also been described by different publications as one of the most-well-written about figures in popular culture. In between immediate and retrospectives, euphemistic or straightforward discussions around Madonna further centered her as arguably the long-time foremost influential female musician from popular music.
Her success led to other female singers being called to her namesake, and the way she was received by media, public, and academia was also credited to help the way future generations of female singers were scrutinized and succeed in a multi-metric environment, further breaking gender and multicultural barriers. Madonna's influence on other entertainers was also articulated. Her music impact as a whole led "Billboard" staffers to describe that "the history of pop music can essentially be divided into two eras: pre-Madonna and post-Madonna". In the process, she amassed various world records, especially for a female artist, being recognized as the best-selling music female artist by the "Guinness World Records" and other industry publications, also receiving various nicknames by the press, ranged from "Madge" to "Queen of Pop" and "Queen of Music" industry. She was also called a pop and cultural icon by academicians, including her critics. 
A complex figure, Madonna's evolving persona and work also attracted socio-cultural criticisms from a varied of perspectives and approaches, which made her someone difficult to categorize as noted by social critics like Stuart Sim. She became a polarizing and challenged figure, whom perpetuated an image of controversialist and provocateur, a reputation to which she acknowledges, although she responded is generally marked to provoke thoughts and conversations. As her career advanced, Madonna's credibility fluctuated. She has faced a substantial societal antireactions ranging from censorship to boycotts and death threats from organizations and radicalized groups, including the Islamic State (ISIS). The transcultural and globalized reach of Madonna from ambiguous and negative perspectives were further conceptualized within terms such as "Madonna-economy" or the "Madonnanization", drawing comparisons with that of the McDonaldization or Cocacolonization, while she was called a hyperglobalized example. Some criticisms towards Madonna also came from generalized criticisms of various aspects, including criticisms on popular culture. Despite correspondence between critics, it was also documented that some critical analyses considered the way Madonna polarized views, early marked prominently by the fact she was an "unavoidable" figure.
Background.
Madonna is an American musician whose impact transcended music. "Billboard" editor-in-chief Janice Min considered her as "one of a miniscule number of super-artists whose influence and career transcended music". Robert Sickels wrote in "100 Entertainers Who Changed America" (2013), that her "music alone cannot tell the full story" of her "colossal success and influence". In a "The Independent" article dedicated to Madonna in 1998 discussing her figure and impact, she was described as someone who translates things into a "phenomenon" in comparison to other women performing the same tasks. 
According to "The New York Times" staffers in 2018, she had a "singular career" that "crossed boundaries". She was reportedly to pioneer a multifaceted career that encompassess many aspects of culture, according to a Singaporean publication in 2005. Robin Raven from Grammy Awards' official website wrote that "Madonna redefined what it meant to be a powerful woman in music in many ways, and has since continued to challenge sexism in the music industry and beyond." 
Critical scope.
 ;templatestyles src="Template:Quote_box/styles.css" / ;
Madonna has "provoked and sustained exceptional interest as a female cultural icon".
—Scholar Ramona Curry as cited in "Pastiche" (2001).
The subject of Madonna attracted significant critical perceptions both immediate and retrospectively; Romanian professor at Babeș-Bolyai University, Doru Pop wrote in "The Age of Promiscuity" (2018) that her impact has been "extensively analyzed by many authors". She became the subject of a wide range of topics by multiple scholars from different fields. In 2018, Eduardo Viñuela, a musicologist at University of Oviedo explained that analyzing her was a result to delve into the evolution of various relevant aspects of society in recent decades. 
International media publications ranging from "El Universal" (1999) to "The A.V. Club" (2012), deemed Madonna as arguably the most analyzed, discussed or debated female singer in last decades or since the 1950s, at least. She "holds a privileged place", felt and wrote scholar Abigail Gardner in 2016, regarding popular culture studies. In 2018, Laura Craik from "The Daily Telegraph" estimated that she has "contributed more to the cultural conversation than any female performer in history". Overall, the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame regarded her in 2008, as one of the most "well-documented figures of the modern age", while in 2023, "The Cut"'s culture editor, Brandon Sanchez similarly referred to her as one of "the most-studied, most-written-about figures in U.S. cultural history". In 1998, feminist scholar Camille Paglia stated "I think historically people will see the enormous impact that Madonna has had around the world".
Culture.
According to authors of the "Encyclopedia of Women in Today's World" (2011), her "cultural influence has been profound and pervasive". In 2017, "Billboard"'s Louis Virtel, referred as "brutal" the task of defining her impact. 
Global.
Madonna's figure reached globalization camp, while Viñuela explains her career is closely linked to the "consolidation of globalization". Retrospectively, in 2014, scholar Jean Graham-Jones called her "globalization's quintessential femicon". Critics also hailed her an "icon of Western society", according to "Third Way"'s Paul Northup in 1998. 
According to "Billboard" in 1989, Madonna and Michael Jackson were the first Western musicians to have a release behind the Bamboo curtain. News agencies like United Press International also informed in 1988, how Madonna or Michael Jackson were among the first Western popular musicians approved by China's government radio. Informants, such as the koreanist historian Mózes Csoma, documented references of Madonna in North Korea, particularly in the context of their World Festival of Youth and Students in 1989, which turned out to be the country's biggest ever international event. Around 2002, "Evita" also became the first American film screened in the country. 
In 1989, "Micromanía" referred to the "symbol Madonna" as the "most palpable proof that Western society advances and changes", while a decade later in 1999, political scientist David Held with other academicians stated: "The most public symbols of globalization consist of Coca-Cola, Madonna and the news on CNN". In "Israel" (2003), historian Efraim Karsh cites an Israeli journalist, whose commented: "Madonna and Big Macs the most peripheral of examples of ... 'normalness' which means, amongst other things, the end of the terrible fear of everything that is foreign and strange". 
American culture.
Authors of "American Icons" (2006), said that she was long considered an icon of American identity, and was often described in her career, as a metaphor for American society according to marketing professor Stephen Brown in 2003. According to historian Glen Jeansonne in "A Time of Paradox: America Since 1890", she epitomized one of the cultural faces of the 1980s, along with U.S. president Ronald Reagan. Political historian and commentator, Gil Troy similarly compared how both Michael Jackson and Madonna shaped the cultural sensibility in the 1980s during the Reagan era. Among other entertainers, biographer Gilbert B. Rodman compared her impact in the 20th-century American culture to that of Elvis Presley, and media scholars Charlotte Brunsdon and Lynn Spigel to Oprah Winfrey. Her primary contribution to U.S. culture has been musical, according to American critic Gina Arnold in 1996. Referred as the "high priestess of American pop culture" in the 2010s and 2020s by theater historian Catherine Schuler and Swedish media Sveriges Television, in 2008, British music critic for "The Guardian", Kitty Empire called her as "Michigan's biggest export since the automobile". At the end of the 20th century, Madonna made an appearance in the top ten of "Detroit Free Press" Michigan's 100 Greatest Artists and Entertainers.
Popular culture.
During the late twentieth century, Madonna was seen by some as an active reflection of her times, including "Vogue France"'s Martine Trittoleno in 1993, while a scholar proposed her as "hero of our time". Professor Marjorie Garber reflected that she perhaps "read the temper of the time" more than other entertainer. In 1995, professor Suzanna Danuta Walters even referred how she circulated "constantly" in various forms of everyday life, with cultural critic Greil Marcus further calling her as "undeniably part of our culture". In this root, American poet Jane Miller was quoted as saying in 1999, that she "functione[d] as an archetype directly inside contemporary culture". At the end of the century, academic William G. Doty reflected on Madonna in "Mythography" (2000): "Nor can any late-twentieth-century theory satisfactorily explain" her momentary appeal. She was dubbed the reigning "queen of popular culture" or the "queen of global culture" by writers and academics Marsha Kinder and Vincent Ryan Ruggiero in the 1990s.
Madonna's impact wadded turning into the 21st century, but she continued to left a mark and been retrospectively recognized by others. In "Morning in America" (2013), Gil Troy said that her enduring celebrity made her a "cultural force". Commenting about her multi-decades career, in 2018, "The New York Times" reflected she "made real cultural change" despite the short-memory of pop culture things. Others, including scholars in "Ageing, Popular Culture and Contemporary Feminism" (2014) and Ellis Cashmore (2022), noted how her "status as a cultural icon is acknowledge" even in her sixties. Some observers ranging from Matt Cain to Cashmore have also explored how she helped significantly change pop culture landscape in her time. Back in 2001, Noah Robischo commented for "Entertainment Weekly" that she was able to "defined, transcended, and redefined pop culture". In addition, Cashmore compared that women like Madonna, Margaret Thatcher and Rosa Parks, became one of the most influential of the past 100 years, which lead him to add "we can feel the effect of the changes she triggered in our everyday life". 
In the views of various commentators, Madonna transcended the definition of pop icon to became a cultural icon, including music critic Robert Christgau in the 1980s to PRS for Music's Russel Iliffe in early 2010s, with British author George Pendle noting in 2005, that she has been "consistently described as a 'cultural icon'". On the same point, Kathleen Sweeney wrote in "Maiden USA" (2008), that some entertainers like Madonna or Marilyn Monroe, "reach a status beyond mere celebrity in public consciousness to become enduring cultural icons". In the 2010s and 2020s, author Mary Gabriel and scholar Camille Paglia deemed her as one of the "most significant figures of modern times" and a historical figure, respectively.
Other areas.
According to cultural organization in 2009, her impact was significant to the point, it extended "into the subconscious world of imagination, fantasy and dreams". On the lattermost point, editors of "Mythic Astrology Applied" (2004), commented: "Many men and women have reported Madonna appearing in their dreams. As she become a living archetype in our culture, it is no wonder that this is so". Sandra Bernhard wrote in her book "Confessions of a Pretty Lady" (1989), "I dream about Madonna more than anyone I know (or don't know)". A decade later, in 1999, Prince dedicated an article titled "An Open Letter To Madonna" in which he recounts a dream related to Madonna. Andrew Morton also documented in "Madonna" (2001), the case of an artist dreaming about her every night for five years. Folklorist scholar Kay Turner, devoted a book titled "I Dream of Madonna: Women's Dreams of the Goddess of Pop" (1993), which tells the dreaming of 50 women on Madonna. The "New York Social Diary" dedicated a dream analysis to a Madonna dream that the singer herself related in a "Vogue" interview in 1996. Virtel compared her career amounts to "living mythology".
Multiculturalism.
Multiculturalism and race would largely define Madonna's career, including public perception in forms of criticisms, impact and her lifetime relationships. A subject of racial studies approaches, authors of "Encyclopedia of Women in Today's World" (2011), described that such studies revealed her as a