Risk is the potential that a chosen action or activity (including the choice of inaction) will lead to a loss (an undesirable outcome). The notion implies that a choice having an influence on the outcome exists (or existed). Potential losses themselves may also be called "risks". Almost any human endeavour carries some risk, but some are much more risky than others.

Historical background

The Oxford English Dictionary cites the earliest use of the word in English (in the spelling of ''risque'') as from 1621, and the spelling as ''risk'' from 1655. It defines ''risk'' as:

(Exposure to) the possibility of loss, injury, or other adverse or unwelcome circumstance; a chance or situation involving such a possibility.

For the sociologist Niklas Luhmann the term 'risk' is a neologism that appeared with the transition from traditional to modern society. "In the Middle Ages the term ''risicum'' was used in highly specific contexts, above all sea trade and its ensuing legal problems of loss and damage." In the vernacular languages of the 16th century the words ''rischio'' and ''riezgo'' were used. This was introduced to continental Europe, through interaction with Middle Eastern and North African Arab traders. In the English language the term ''risk'' appeared only in the 17th century, and "seems to be imported from continental Europe." When the terminology of ''risk'' took ground, it replaced the older notion that thought "in terms of good and bad fortune." Niklas Luhmann (1996) seeks to explain this transition: "Perhaps, this was simply a loss of plausibility of the old rhetorics of ''Fortuna'' as an allegorical figure of religious content and of ''prudentia'' as a (noble) virtue in the emerging commercial society."

Scenario analysis matured during Cold War confrontations between major powers, notably the United States and the Soviet Union. It became widespread in insurance circles in the 1970s when major oil tanker disasters forced a more comprehensive foresight. The scientific approach to risk entered finance in the 1960s with the advent of the capital asset pricing model and became increasingly important in the 1980s when financial derivatives proliferated. It reached general professions in the 1990s when the power of personal computing allowed for widespread data collection and numbers crunching.

Governments are using it, for example, to set standards for environmental regulation, e.g. "pathway analysis" as practiced by the United States Environmental Protection Agency.

Definitions of risk

The many inconsistent and ambiguous meanings attached to "risk" lead to widespread confusion and also mean that very different approaches to risk management are taken in different fields. For example:

:The ISO 31000 (2009) /ISO Guide 73 definition of risk is the 'effect of uncertainty on objectives'. In this definition, uncertainties include events (which may or not happen) and uncertainties caused by a lack of information or ambiguity. This definition also includes both negative and positive impacts on objectives.

:Another definition is that risks are future problems that can be avoided or mitigated, rather than current ones that must be immediately addressed.

:Risk can be seen as relating to the Probability of uncertain future events.. For example, according to Factor Analysis of Information Risk, risk is: the probable frequency and probable magnitude of future loss. In computer science this definition is used by The Open Group.

:OHSAS (Occupational Health & Safety Advisory Services) defines risk as the product of the probability of a hazard resulting in an adverse event, times the severity of the event.

:In information security risk is defined as "the potential that a given threat will exploit vulnerabilities of an asset or group of assets and thereby cause harm to the organization",

:Financial risk is often defined as the unexpected variability or volatility of returns and thus includes both potential worse-than-expected as well as better-than-expected returns. References to negative risk below should be read as applying to positive impacts or opportunity (e.g., for "loss" read "loss or gain") unless the context precludes this interpretation.

:The related term "hazard" is used to mean something that could cause harm.

As risk carries so many different meanings there are many formal methods used to assess or to "measure" risk. Some of the quantitative definitions of risk are well-grounded in statistics theory and lead naturally to statistical estimates, but some are more subjective. For example in many cases a critical factor is human decision making.

Even when statistical estimates are available, in many cases risk is associated with rare failures of some kind, and data may be sparse. Often, the probability of a negative event is estimated by using the frequency of past similar events or by event tree methods, but probabilities for rare failures may be difficult to estimate if an event tree cannot be formulated. This makes risk assessment difficult in hazardous industries (for example nuclear energy) where the frequency of failures is rare and harmful consequences of failure are very high.

Statistical methods may also require the use of a Cost function, which in turn often requires the calculation of the cost of the loss of human life, a difficult problem. One approach is to ask what people are willing to pay to insure against death, and radiological release (e.g., GBq of radio-iodine), but as the answers depend very strongly on the circumstances it is not clear that this approach is effective.

Mathematical formulations

In statistics, the notion of risk is often modelled as the expected value of some outcome seen as undesirable. This combines the probabilities of various possible events and some assessment of the corresponding harms into a single value. (See also Expected utility.) In a formula that can be used in the simple case of a binary possibility (accident or no accident), risk is then:

:$\backslash text\{Risk\}\; =\; (\backslash text\{probability\; of\; the\; accident\; occurring\})\; \backslash times\; (\backslash text\{expected\; loss\; in\; case\; of\; the\; accident\})$

For example: if activity X may suffer an accident of A at a probability of 0.01 with a loss of 1000, the total risk is a loss of 10, since that is the product of 0.01 and 1 000.

In case of there being several possible accidents, risk is the sum of the all risks for the different accidents, provided that the outcomes are comparable:

:$\backslash text\{Risk\}\; =\; \backslash sum^\{Accidents\}((\backslash text\{probability\; of\; the\; accident\; occurring\})\; \backslash times\; (\backslash text\{expected\; loss\; in\; case\; of\; the\; accident\}))$

For example: if activity X may suffer an accident of A at a probability of 0.01 with a loss of 1000, and an accident of type B at probability of 0.000 001 at a loss of 2 000 000, the total risk is a loss of 12, that is 10 from accident of types A and 2 from accidents of type B.

One of the first major uses of this concept was at the planning of the Delta Works in 1953, a flood protection program in the Netherlands, with the aid of the mathematician David van Dantzig. The kind of risk analysis pioneered here has become common today in fields like nuclear power, aerospace and the chemical industry.

In statistical decision theory, the risk function is defined as the expected value of a given loss function as a function of the decision rule used to make decisions in the face of uncertainty.

Risk versus uncertainty

Risk: Combination of the likelihood of an occurrence of a hazardous event or exposure(s) and the severity of injury or ill health that can be caused by the event or exposure(s)

In his seminal work ''Risk, Uncertainty, and Profit'', Frank Knight (1921) established the distinction between risk and uncertainty.

Thus, Knightian uncertainty is immeasurable, not possible to calculate, while in the Knightian sense risk is measurable.

Another distinction between risk and uncertainty is proposed in ''How to Measure Anything: Finding the Value of Intangibles in Business'' and ''The Failure of Risk Management: Why It's Broken and How to Fix It'' by Doug Hubbard:

::Uncertainty: The lack of complete certainty, that is, the existence of more than one possibility. The "true" outcome/state/result/value is not known.

::Measurement of uncertainty: A set of probabilities assigned to a set of possibilities. Example: "There is a 60% chance this market will double in five years"

::Risk: A state of uncertainty where some of the possibilities involve a loss, catastrophe, or other undesirable outcome.

::Measurement of risk: A set of possibilities each with quantified probabilities and quantified losses. Example: "There is a 40% chance the proposed oil well will be dry with a loss of $12 million in exploratory drilling costs".

In this sense, Hubbard uses the terms so that one may have uncertainty without risk but not risk without uncertainty. We can be uncertain about the winner of a contest, but unless we have some personal stake in it, we have no risk. If we bet money on the outcome of the contest, then we have a risk. In both cases there are more than one outcome. The measure of uncertainty refers only to the probabilities assigned to outcomes, while the measure of risk requires both probabilities for outcomes and losses quantified for outcomes.

Risk as a vector quantity

Hubbard also argues that defining risk as the product of impact and probability presumes (probably incorrectly) that the decision makers are risk neutral. Only for a risk neutral person is the "certain monetary equivalent" exactly equal to the probability of the loss times the amount of the loss. For example, a risk neutral person would consider 20% chance of winning $1 million exactly equal to $200,000 (or a 20% chance of losing $1 million to be exactly equal to losing $200,000). However, most decision makers are not actually risk neutral and would not consider these equivalent choices. This gave rise to Prospect theory and Cumulative prospect theory. Hubbard proposes instead that risk is a kind of "vector quantity" that does not collapse the probability and magnitude of a risk by presuming anything about the risk tolerance of the decision maker. Risks are simply described as a set or function of possible loss amounts each associated with specific probabilities. How this array is collapsed into a single value cannot be done until the risk tolerance of the decision maker is quantified.

Risk can be both negative and positive, but it tends to be the negative side that people focus on. This is because some things can be dangerous, such as putting their own or someone else’s life at risk. Risks concern people as they think that they will have a negative effect on their future.

Insurance and health risk

Insurance is a risk-reducing investment in which the buyer pays a small fixed amount to be protected from a potential large loss. Gambling is a risk-increasing investment, wherein money on hand is risked for a possible large return, but with the possibility of losing it all. Purchasing a lottery ticket is a very risky investment with a high chance of no return and a small chance of a very high return. In contrast, putting money in a bank at a defined rate of interest is a risk-averse action that gives a guaranteed return of a small gain and precludes other investments with possibly higher gain.

Risks in personal health may be reduced by primary prevention actions that decrease early causes of illness or by secondary prevention actions after a person has clearly measured clinical signs or symptoms recognized as risk factors. Tertiary prevention reduces the negative impact of an already established disease by restoring function and reducing disease-related complications. Ethical medical practice requires careful discussion of risk factors with individual patients to obtain informed consent for secondary and tertiary prevention efforts, whereas public health efforts in primary prevention require education of the entire population at risk. In each case, careful communication about risk factors, likely outcomes and certainty must distinguish between causal events that must be decreased and associated events that may be merely consequences rather than causes.

In epidemiology, the lifetime risk of an effect is the ''cumulative incidence'', also called ''incidence proportion'' over an entire lifetime.

Information technology risk

Information technology risk, or IT risk, IT-related risk, is a risk related to information technology. This relatively new term due to an increasing awareness that information security is simply one facet of a multitude of risks that are relevant to IT and the real world processes it supports.

The increasing dependencies of modern society on information and computers networks (both in private and public sectors, including military) has led to a new terms like IT risk and Cyberwarfare.

Information security risk

Information security means protecting information and information systems from unauthorized access, use, disclosure, disruption, modification, perusal, inspection, recording or destruction.

Information security grew out of practices and procedures of computer security. Information security has grown to information assurance (IA) i.e. is the practice of managing risks related to the use, processing, storage, and transmission of information or data and the systems and processes used for those purposes. While focused dominantly on information in digital form, the full range of IA encompasses not only digital but also analog or physical form. Information assurance is interdisciplinary and draws from multiple fields, including accounting, fraud examination, forensic science, management science, systems engineering, security engineering, and criminology, in addition to computer science.

So, ''IT risk'' is narrowly focused on computer security, while ''information security'' extends on risks related to other forms of information (paper, microfilm). ''Information assurance'' risks include the ones related to the consistency of the business information stored in IT systems and the one stored on other means and the relevant business consequences.

Economic risk

Economic risks can be manifested in lower incomes or higher expenditures than expected. The causes can be many, for instance, the hike in the price for raw materials, the lapsing of deadlines for construction of a new operating facility, disruptions in a production process, emergence of a serious competitor on the market, the loss of key personnel, the change of a political regime, or natural disasters. Reference class forecasting was developed to eliminate or reduce economic risk.

In business

Means of assessing risk vary widely between professions. Indeed, they may define these professions; for example, a doctor manages medical risk, while a civil engineer manages risk of structural failure. A professional code of ethics is usually focused on risk assessment and mitigation (by the professional on behalf of client, public, society or life in general).

In the workplace, incidental and inherent risks exist. Incidental risks are those that occur naturally in the business but are not part of the core of the business. Inherent risks have a negative effect on the operating profit of the business.

Risk-sensitive industries

Some industries manage risk in a highly quantified and enumerated way. These include the nuclear power and aircraft industries, where the possible failure of a complex series of engineered systems could result in highly undesirable outcomes. The usual measure of risk for a class of events is then:

: ''R'' = probability of the event × ''C''

The total risk is then the product of the individual class-risks.

In the nuclear industry, consequence is often measured in terms of off-site radiological release, and this is often banded into five or six decade-wide bands.

The risks are evaluated using fault tree/event tree techniques (see safety engineering). Where these risks are low, they are normally considered to be "Broadly Acceptable". A higher level of risk (typically up to 10 to 100 times what is considered Broadly Acceptable) has to be justified against the costs of reducing it further and the possible benefits that make it tolerable—these risks are described as "Tolerable if ALARP". Risks beyond this level are classified as "Intolerable".

The level of risk deemed Broadly Acceptable has been considered by regulatory bodies in various countries—an early attempt by UK government regulator and academic F. R. Farmer used the example of hill-walking and similar activities, which have definable risks that people appear to find acceptable. This resulted in the so-called Farmer Curve of acceptable probability of an event versus its consequence.

The technique as a whole is usually referred to as Probabilistic Risk Assessment (PRA) (or Probabilistic Safety Assessment, PSA). See WASH-1400 for an example of this approach.

In finance

In finance, risk is the probability that an investment's actual return will be different than expected. This includes the possibility of losing some or all of the original investment. In a view advocated by Damodaran, risk includes not only "downside risk" but also "upside risk" (returns that exceed expectations). Some regard a calculation of the standard deviation of the historical returns or average returns of a specific investment as providing some historical measure of risk; see modern portfolio theory. Financial risk may be market-dependent, determined by numerous market factors, or operational, resulting from fraudulent behavior (e.g. Bernard Madoff). Recent studies suggest that testosterone level plays a major role in risk taking during financial decisions.

In finance, ''risk'' has no one definition, but some theorists, notably Ron Dembo, have defined quite general methods to assess risk as an expected after-the-fact level of regret. Such methods have been uniquely successful in limiting interest rate risk in financial markets. Financial markets are considered to be a proving ground for general methods of risk assessment. However, these methods are also hard to understand. The mathematical difficulties interfere with other social goods such as disclosure, valuation and transparency. In particular, it is not always obvious if such financial instruments are "hedging" (purchasing/selling a financial instrument specifically to reduce or cancel out the risk in another investment) or "speculation" (increasing measurable risk and exposing the investor to catastrophic loss in pursuit of very high windfalls that increase expected value).

As regret measures rarely reflect actual human risk-aversion, it is difficult to determine if the outcomes of such transactions will be satisfactory. Risk seeking describes an individual whose utility function's second derivative is positive. Such an individual would willingly (actually pay a premium to) assume all risk in the economy and is hence not likely to exist.

In financial markets, one may need to measure credit risk, information timing and source risk, probability model risk, and legal risk if there are regulatory or civil actions taken as a result of some "investor's regret". Knowing one's risk appetite in conjunction with one's financial well-being are most crucial.

A fundamental idea in finance is the relationship between risk and return (see modern portfolio theory). The greater the potential return one might seek, the greater the risk that one generally assumes. A free market reflects this principle in the pricing of an instrument: strong demand for a safer instrument drives its price higher (and its return proportionately lower), while weak demand for a riskier instrument drives its price lower (and its potential return thereby higher).

"For example, a US Treasury bond is considered to be one of the safest investments and, when compared to a corporate bond, provides a lower rate of return. The reason for this is that a corporation is much more likely to go bankrupt than the U.S. government. Because the risk of investing in a corporate bond is higher, investors are offered a higher rate of return."

The most popular, and also the most vilified lately risk measurement is Value-at-Risk (VaR). There are different types of VaR - Long Term VaR, Marginal VaR, Factor VaR and Shock VaR The latter is used in measuring risk during the extreme market stress conditions.

In public works

In a peer reviewed study of risk in public works projects located in twenty nations on five continents, Flyvbjerg, Holm, and Buhl (2002, 2005) documented high risks for such ventures for both costs and demand. Actual costs of projects were typically higher than estimated costs; cost overruns of 50% were common, overruns above 100% not uncommon. Actual demand was often lower than estimated; demand shortfalls of 25% were common, of 50% not uncommon.

Due to such cost and demand risks, cost-benefit analyses of public works projects have proved to be highly uncertain.

The main causes of cost and demand risks were found to be optimism bias and strategic misrepresentation. Measures identified to mitigate this type of risk are better governance through incentive alignment and the use of reference class forecasting.

In human services

Huge ethical and political issues arise when human beings themselves are seen or treated as 'risks', or when the risk decision making of people who use human services might have an impact on that service. The experience of many people who rely on human services for support is that 'risk' is often used as a reason to prevent them from gaining further independence or fully accessing the community, and that these services are often unnecessarily risk averse.

Risk in psychology

Regret

In decision theory, regret (and anticipation of regret) can play a significant part in decision-making, distinct from risk aversion (preferring the status quo in case one becomes worse off).

Framing

Framing is a fundamental problem with all forms of risk assessment. In particular, because of bounded rationality (our brains get overloaded, so we take mental shortcuts), the risk of extreme events is discounted because the probability is too low to evaluate intuitively. As an example, one of the leading causes of death is road accidents caused by drunk driving—partly because any given driver frames the problem by largely or totally ignoring the risk of a serious or fatal accident.

For instance, an extremely disturbing event (an attack by hijacking, or moral hazards) may be ignored in analysis despite the fact it has occurred and has a nonzero probability. Or, an event that everyone agrees is inevitable may be ruled out of analysis due to greed or an unwillingness to admit that it is believed to be inevitable. These human tendencies for error and wishful thinking often affect even the most rigorous applications of the scientific method and are a major concern of the philosophy of science.

All decision-making under uncertainty must consider cognitive bias, cultural bias, and notational bias: No group of people assessing risk is immune to "groupthink": acceptance of obviously wrong answers simply because it is socially painful to disagree, where there are conflicts of interest. One effective way to solve framing problems in risk assessment or measurement (although some argue that risk cannot be measured, only assessed) is to raise others' fears or personal ideals by way of completeness.

Neurobiology of framing

Framing involves other information that affects the outcome of a risky decision. The right prefrontal cortex has been shown to take a more global perspective while greater left prefrontal activity relates to local or focal processing

From the Theory of Leaky Modules McElroy and Seta proposed that they could predictably alter the framing effect by the selective manipulation of regional prefrontal activity with finger tapping or monaural listening. The result was as expected. Rightward tapping or listening had the effect of narrowing attention such that the frame was ignored. This is a practical way of manipulating regional cortical activation to affect risky decisions, especially because directed tapping or listening is easily done.

Fear as intuitive risk assessment

For the time being, people rely on their fear and hesitation to keep them out of the most profoundly unknown circumstances.

In ''The Gift of Fear'', Gavin de Becker argues that "True fear is a gift. It is a survival signal that sounds only in the presence of danger. Yet unwarranted fear has assumed a power over us that it holds over no other creature on Earth. It need not be this way."

Risk could be said to be the way we collectively measure and share this "true fear"—a fusion of rational doubt, irrational fear, and a set of unquantified biases from our own experience.

The field of behavioral finance focuses on human risk-aversion, asymmetric regret, and other ways that human financial behavior varies from what analysts call "rational". Risk in that case is the degree of uncertainty associated with a return on an asset.

Recognizing and respecting the irrational influences on human decision making may do much to reduce disasters caused by naive risk assessments that pretend to rationality but in fact merely fuse many shared biases together.

Risk assessment and management

Because planned actions are subject to large cost and benefit risks, proper risk assessment and risk management for such actions are crucial to making them successful.

Since risk assessment and management is essential in security management, both are tightly related. Security assessment methodologies like CRAMM contain risk assessment modules as an important part of the first steps of the methodology. On the other hand, risk assessment methodologies like Mehari evolved to become security assessment methodologies. A ISO standard on risk management (Principles and guidelines on implementation) was published under code ISO 31000 on 13 November 2009.

Risk and size

In the book ''Megaprojects and Risk'', Professor Bent Flyvbjerg (with Nils Bruzelius and Werner Rothengatter) demonstrates that big ventures (big construction projects, big capital investments, etc.) are highly risky. For instance, such ventures typically have high cost overruns, benefit shortfalls, and schedule delays, plus negative and unanticipated social and environmental impacts.

Risk in auditing

The audit risk model expresses the risk of an auditor providing an inappropriate opinion of a commercial entity's financial statements. It can be analytically expressed as:

: AR = IR x CR x DR

Where AR is ''audit risk'', IR is ''inherent risk'', CR is ''control risk'' and DR is ''detection risk''.

See also

References

Bibliography

Referred literature

Bent Flyvbjerg, 2006: ''From Nobel Prize to Project Management: Getting Risks Right.'' Project Management Journal, vol. 37, no. 3, August, pp. 5–15. Available at homepage of author.

James Franklin, 2001: ''The Science of Conjecture: Evidence and Probability Before Pascal'', Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press.

Niklas Luhmann, 1996: ''Modern Society Shocked by its Risks'' (= University of Hong Kong, Department of Sociology Occasional Papers 17), Hong Kong, available via HKU Scholars HUB.

Books

Historian David A. Moss's book ''When All Else Fails'' explains the U.S. government's historical role as risk manager of last resort.

Peter L. Bernstein. ''Against the Gods'' ISBN 0-471-29563-9. Risk explained and its appreciation by man traced from earliest times through all the major figures of their ages in mathematical circles.

Flyvbjerg, Bent, Nils Bruzelius, and Werner Rothengatter, 2003. ''Megaprojects and Risk: An Anatomy of Ambition'' (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press)..

Gardner, Dan, ''Risk: The Science and Politics of Fear'', Random House, Inc., 2008. ISBN 0771032994.

Articles and papers

Clark, L., Manes, F., Antoun, N., Sahakian, B. J., & Robbins, T. W. (2003). "The contributions of lesion laterality and lesion volume to decision-making impairment following frontal lobe damage." ''Neuropsychologia'', 41, 1474-1483.

Drake, R. A. (1985). "Decision making and risk taking: Neurological manipulation with a proposed consistency mediation." ''Contemporary Social Psychology'', 11, 149-152.

Drake, R. A. (1985). "Lateral asymmetry of risky recommendations." ''Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin'', 11, 409-417.

Gregory, Kent J., Bibbo, Giovanni and Pattison, John E. (2005), "A Standard Approach to Measurement Uncertainties for Scientists and Engineers in Medicine", ''Australasian Physical and Engineering Sciences in Medicine'' 28(2):131-139.

Hansson, Sven Ove. (2007). "Risk", ''The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy'' (Summer 2007 Edition), Edward N. Zalta (ed.), forthcoming .

Holton, Glyn A. (2004). "Defining Risk", ''Financial Analysts Journal'', 60 (6), 19–25. A paper exploring the foundations of risk. (PDF file).

Knight, F. H. (1921) ''Risk, Uncertainty and Profit'', Chicago: Houghton Mifflin Company. (Cited at: , § I.I.26.).

Kruger, Daniel J., Wang, X.T., & Wilke, Andreas (2007) "Towards the development of an evolutionarily valid domain-specific risk-taking scale" ''Evolutionary Psychology'' (PDF file).

Metzner-Szigeth, A. (2009). "Contradictory Approaches? – On Realism and Constructivism in the Social Sciences Research on Risk, Technology and the Environment." ''Futures'', Vol. 41, No. 2, March 2009, pp. 156–170 (fulltext journal: ) (free preprint: ).

Miller, L. (1985). "Cognitive risk taking after frontal or temporal lobectomy I. The synthesis of fragmented visual information." ''Neuropsychologia'', 23, 359 369.

Miller, L., & Milner, B. (1985). "Cognitive risk taking after frontal or temporal lobectomy II. The synthesis of phonemic and semantic information." ''Neuropsychologia'', 23, 371 379.

Neill, M. Allen, J. Woodhead, N. Reid, S. Irwin, L. Sanderson, H. 2008 "A Positive Approach to Risk Requires Person Centred Thinking" London, CSIP Personalisation Network, Department of Health. Available from: http://networks.csip.org.uk/Personalisation/Topics/Browse/Risk/ [Accessed 21 July 2008].

External links

Risk - The entry of the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy

''Risk Management'' magazine, a publication of the Risk and Insurance Management Society.

The Institute of Risk Management (IRM) is risk management's leading international professional education and training body

''Risk and Insurance''

''StrategicRISK, a risk management journal''

"Risk preference and religiosity" article from the Institute for the Biocultural Study of Religion

Category:Actuarial science Category:Core issues in ethics Category:Economics of uncertainty

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Name	Janelle MonĂ¡e
Background	solo_singer
Birth name	Janelle MonĂ¡e Robinson
Birth date	December 01, 1985
Origin	Kansas City, Kansas US
Genre	R&B;, soul, funk, alternative rock, dance-punk
Occupation	musician
Years active	2003-present
Label	Bad Boy Records, Atlantic Records
Website	http://www.jmonae.com/ }}

Janelle MonĂ¡e (born Janelle MonĂ¡e Robinson; December 1, 1985) is an American R&B;/soul musician signed to Bad Boy Records and Atlantic Records.

MonĂ¡e debuted with a conceptual EP, ''Metropolis: Suite I (The Chase)''. The EP failed to make much of a commercial impact, peaking at #115 on the Billboard charts in the United States.

In 2010, Janelle MonĂ¡e released her debut studio album, ''The ArchAndroid (Suites II and III)'', a concept album sequel to her first EP; it was released widely to the general public under Bad Boy Records. This album received acclaim from critics and gained a Grammy Nomination for Best Contemporary R&B; Album. The song "Tightrope" was also nominated for "Best Urban/Alternative Performance"; this album was also more successful commercially officially reaching the 17th Spot on the Billboard Charts.

Biography

Early life and career

MonĂ¡e was born Janelle MonĂ¡e Robinson in Kansas City, Kansas, where she spent her early life; MonĂ¡e has stated that the fictional character of ''Dorothy'' from the Wizard of Oz has been one of her musical influences. She has told reporters that she has dreamed of being a singer and a performer since she was very young. MonĂ¡e moved from Kansas City, Kansas to New York to study drama at the American Musical and Dramatic Academy. She attended a Performing Arts School called Freedom Theatre, which is the oldest African-American theatre in Philadelphia. After moving to Atlanta, Georgia, where she met OutKast's Big Boi, MonĂ¡e founded the Wondaland Arts Society with like-minded young artists and made appearances on ''Idlewild'', where she is featured on the songs "Call the Law" and "In Your Dreams". Big Boi told his friend Sean Combs about MonĂ¡e, whom he had not heard of before. Combs promptly visited her MySpace page, and according to Bad Boy Records' A&R; Daniel 'Skid' Mitchell in an interview with HitQuarters, the label boss loved it straight away, "[He] loved her look, loved that you couldn’t see her body, loved the way she was dancing, and just loved the vibe. He felt like she has something that was different - something new and fresh." MonĂ¡e signed to Bad Boy in 2006. The label's chief role was in facilitating her exposure on a much broader scale rather than developing the artist and her music, because in the words of Mitchell, "She was already moving, she already had her records - she had a self-contained movement." Combs and Big Boi wanted to take their time and build her profile organically and allow the music to grow rather than put out "A hot single which everyone jumps on, and then they fade because it's just something of the moment."

2007 to 2010: ''Metropolis - The Chase Suite'' and ''The ArchAndroid (Suites II and III)''

In 2007, MonĂ¡e released her first solo work, titled ''Metropolis''. It was originally conceived as a concept album in four parts, or "suites", which were to be released through her website and mp3 download sites. After the release of the first part of the series, ''Metropolis: Suite I (The Chase)'' in mid-2007, these plans were altered following her signing with Sean "Diddy" Combs's label, Bad Boy Records, later in the year. The label gave an official and physical release to the first "suite" in August 2008, which was retitled ''Metropolis: The Chase Suite (Special Edition)'' and included two new tracks. The EP was generally well-received by critics, garnering MonĂ¡e a 2009 Grammy nomination in the Best Urban/Alternative Performance for her single "Many Moons", festival appearances and opening slots for the indie pop band Of Montreal. MonĂ¡e also toured as the opening act for band No Doubt on their summer 2009 tour. Her single "Open Happiness" was featured in the 2009 season finale of ''American Idol''. MonĂ¡e told MTV about her concept for her new album and also discussed her alter-ego named ''Cindi Mayweather'', she said:

"Cindi is an android and I love speaking about the android because they are the new “other�. People are afraid of the other and I believe we’re going to live in a world with androids because of technology and the way it advances. The first album she was running because she had fallen in love with a human and she was being disassembled for that."

In a November 2009 interview, MonĂ¡e revealed the title and concept behind her album, ''The ArchAndroid''. The album was released on 18 May 2010. The second and third suites of ''Metropolis'' are combined into this full-length release, in which MonĂ¡e's alter-ego, Cindi Mayweather—also the protagonist of ''Metropolis: The Chase Suite''— becomes a messianic figure to the android community of Metropolis. MonĂ¡e noted that she plans to shoot a video for each song on ''The ArchAndroid'' and create both a movie and graphic novel based on the album. The ''Metropolis'' concept series draws inspiration from a wide range of musical, cinematic and other sources, ranging from Alfred Hitchcock to Debussy to Philip K. Dick. However, the series puts Fritz Lang's 1927 silent film ''Metropolis'', which MonĂ¡e referred to as "the godfather of science-fiction movies," in special regard. Aside from sharing a name, they also share visual styles (the cover for ''The ArchAndroid'' is inspired by the iconic poster for ''Metropolis''), conceptual themes and political goals, using expressionistic future scenarios to examine and explode contemporary ideas of prejudice and class. Both also include a performing female android, though to very different effect. Where ''Metropolis'' android Maria is the evil, havoc-sowing double of the messianic figure to the city's strictly segregated working class, MonĂ¡e's messianic android muse Cindi Mayweather represents an interpretation of androids as that segregated minority, which MonĂ¡e describes as "... the Other. And I feel like all of us, whether in the majority or the minority, felt like the Other at some point."

MonĂ¡e received the Vanguard Award from the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers at the Rhythm & Soul Music Awards in 2010. MonĂ¡e covered Charlie Chaplin's ''Smile'' on Billboard.com in June 2010. In an NPR interview in September 2010, Monae stated that she is a believer in, and a proponent of time travel. MonĂ¡e performed "Tightrope" during the second elimination episode of the 11th Season of Dancing with the Stars on September 28, 2010. MonĂ¡e performed at the 53rd Annual Grammy Awards in 2011 alongside artists Bruno Mars and B.o.B; MonĂ¡e performed the synth section of B.o.B's song "Nothin' On You" and she then performed her track "Cold War" with B.o.B on the Guitar and Mars on the drums. Her performance received a standing ovation.

Her single, "Tightrope" was featured on the American Idols LIVE! Tour 2011, performed by Pia Toscano, Haley Reinhart, Naima Adedapo, and Thia Megia.

2011 to present: instrumental re-release of ''ArchAndroid'', new album and other projects

Janelle tweeted that she is planning on releasing an instrumental version of her album The ArchAndroid.

In an interview, MonĂ¡e stated that she plans to release two albums in 2012. In another interview with Forbes, MonĂ¡e also said that she plans to release an ArchAndroid inspired film. She will join the Red Hot Chili Peppers as a support act on part of their "I'm With You" tour.

Artistry

Musical styles and influences

''The Telegraph'' released their interview with MonĂ¡e talking about her first studio album where they said "I begin to worry for a moment that MonĂ¡e may not just be a humourless science-fiction nerd, but actually an android herself, created in a laboratory as a super-musical cross between James Brown, Judy Garland, Andre 3000 and Steve Jobs, invented to test the desperate incredulity of music journalists". They also compared MonĂ¡e to artists such as Annie Lennox and Lauryn Hill. Her musical styles have been described as "a soaring orchestral trip enlivened with blockbuster vocals, mysterious imagery and notes of Sixties pop and jazz". ''The Guardian'' have noted some of her influences as: Michael Jackson, Prince, OutKast, Erykah Badu, Beyonce, James Brown, Grace Jones, Stevie Wonder, David Bowie, Jimi Hendrix, Bernard Herrmann, Funkadelic and the Incredible String Band. MonĂ¡e has stated that she has an alter-ego named ''Cindi Mayweather'' who according to MonĂ¡e is from the year 2719. In her first EP she gave her alter-ego a back-story stating that she is on the run after breaking the law in her home town of ''Metropolis'' after falling in love with a human named ''Anthony Greendown''. MonĂ¡e explained about Cindi, saying "The Archandroid, Cindi, is the mediator, between the mind and the hand. She's the mediator between the haves and the have-nots, the oppressed and the oppressor. She's like the Archangel in the Bible, and what Neo represents to the Matrix."

Public image

MonĂ¡e has gained a signature clothing style of wearing a Tuxedo wardrobe and she said on the matter to ''Honey Magazine'' "I bathe in it, I swim in it, and I could be buried in it. A tux is such a standard uniform, it’s so classy and it’s a lifestyle I enjoy. The tux keeps me balanced. I look at myself as a canvas. I don’t want to cloud myself with too many colors or I’ll go crazy. It’s an experiment I’m doing. I think I want to be in the Guinness Book of World Records." In MonĂ¡e's concerts she has been noted to hand out her ''Ten Droid Commandments'' which encourages her fans to be individuals. ''The Telegraph'' also commented on her image as an artist saying "Sitting in a grey, airless record company office, this slight, stiff young woman delivers her speech in slow, deliberate tones, utterly expressionless. Dressed in her trademark starched shirt and tuxedo, hair immaculately coiffed, MonĂ¡e’s face is an opaque mask of perfection: all silken smooth skin, button nose and glassy brown eyes. I begin to worry for a moment that MonĂ¡e may not just be a humourless science-fiction nerd, but actually an android herself." She has described her Tuxedos as being a uniform for her career and she has stated that she wears them when she is working. She also featured in the "Style 100" of ''InStyle Magazine''.

Discography

Studio albums

Year	Album details	Peak chart positions
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2010		* First studio album	* Release date: May 18, 2010	* Label: Bad Boy Records	17	4	12	24	36	51	96

Extended plays

Year	Album details	Peak chartpositions
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2007		* First extended play	* Release date: August 24, 2007	* Label: Bad Boy Records	115	20	2

Singles

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2006
2006
2007
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2009
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Featured Singles

36

+ List of singles, with selected chart positions

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"We Are Young"( Fun featuring Janelle MonĂ¡e)

2011

1

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1

* US: 2x Platinum

''Some Nights''

"—" denotes a release that did not chart.

Guest appearances

2005: ''In "House" Sessions'' (My First Love)

2005: ''Broadcasting the Definition'' (Peachtree Blues)

2005: Purple Ribbon All-Stars - ''Got Purp? Vol 2'' ("Time Will Reveal," "Lettin' Go")

2006: Outkast - ''Idlewild'' ("Call the Law," "In Your Dreams")

2008: "Big" Collaboration with Big Boi and the Atlanta Ballet

2009: Chester French- ''Jacques Jams, Vol. 1: Endurance (Mixtape)'' ("Nerd Girl")

2009: ''Open Happiness''

2009: ''Stargate Universe'' - "Earth" Episode 7, Season 1

2010: B.o.B. - ''B.o.B Presents: The Adventures of Bobby Ray'' ("The Kids")

2010: Big Boi - ''Sir Lucious Left Foot: The Son of Chico Dusty'' ("Be Still")

2010: of Montreal - ''False Priest'' ("Our Riotous Defects," "Enemy Gene")

2010: Without a Fight - For Colored Girls: Music From and Inspired by the Original Motion Picture Soundtrack

2011: fun. - ''Some Nights'' ("We Are Young")

2011: ("Tightrope") (featuring Big Boi) - performance on ''Later With Jools Holland'' - BBC Television

Awards and nominations

!Year	!Award	!Category	!Result
	2009		Grammy Awards	Best Urban/Alternative Performance ("Many Moons")
		ASCAP Awards	Vanguard Award
	MTV Video Music Awards
	Aposta Internacional (International Bet)
Soul Train Awards	Centric Award
	Best of the Booth Award	Best R&B;/Pop Album of 2010
	Best Contemporary R&B; Album (''The ArchAndroid (Suites II and III)'')
Best Urban/Alternative Performance ("Tightrope")

References

External links

Official website

Janelle MonĂ¡e discography at Discogs

Janelle Monae interview by Pete Lewis, 'Blues & Soul' June 2010

Janelle MonĂ¡e Interview

Janelle MonĂ¡e interview at URB

Janelle MonĂ¡e interview with SPIN

Review of Tightrope (feat. Big Boi)

Q & A with Janelle Monae

"Janelle MonĂ¡e on BackPocketMag.com

Category:1985 births Category:Living people Category:People from Kansas City, Kansas Category:African American singers Category:American female singers Category:Atlantic Records artists Category:Bad Boy Records artists Category:Musicians from Georgia (U.S. state) Category:Musicians from Kansas Category:People from Atlanta, Georgia

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