Gangsta Rap And American Culture Analysis

Hip Hop was the wildfire that started in the South Bronx and whose flames leapt up around the world crying out for change. James McBride’s Hip Hop Planet focuses on his personal interactions with the development of Hip Hop culture and his changing interpretations of the world wide movement. Many of his encounters and mentions in the text concern young black males and his writing follows an evolution in the representation of this specific social group. He initially portrays them as arrogant, poor, and uneducated but eventually develops their image to include the positive effects of their culture in an attempt to negate their historical misrepresentation.

This article focuses on the color-blind ideology that allows white people to participate in and appropriate hip-hop culture. Rodriquez notes that they do so by using the guise of inclusivity of all races to justify their participation in hip hop and to adapt characteristics of the culture without respecting Black identity. He uses his own interviews of several white audience members of hip hop concerts who identified as participants of hip hop culture. Rodriquez identifies two groups resulting from social collectivity to reinforce his argument: consciously collective white groups, who actively reinforce racial segregation and passively collective white groups, who unknowingly unite and reinforce systematic racism through their adherence to color-blind ideology. The participants of his research are part of the latter, who unconsciously reinforce systematic racism through treating cultural objects, namely aspects of hip hop culture, as shareable products and experiences.

Mr McBride, you claim that “It is a music that defies definition...remains an enigma, a clarion call, a cry of ‘I am’ from the youth of the world” (McBride 8). This is true, as hip hop has disseminated everywhere and has transformed into a style, and has become a way of expressing the social problems our world still

Kömives Dániel Can we consider Hip Hop as the new Civil Rights Movement? Chapter 1: What does the Civil Rights Movement gave to the African-Americans compared to Hip Hop as a subculture/movement. African-Americans through their history faced the toughest ways of oppression, racial segregation, racism and slavery. Their affliction led to the emergence of the Civil Rights Movement which was one of the biggest social movements in the history of mankind. The legacy of this movement had a powerful impact on the formation of Hip Hop as a subculture, community and subsequently one of the biggest music industry.

Hip Hop has been around for generations, but over the years the meaning behind the music genre continues to change as old artists vanish and new artist step up and take the throne. In the reading Hip Hop’s Betrayal of Black Women by Jennifer McLune explains how women are betrayed in the music industry, and how from this the world perceives to see them afterwards. Mainly the idea behind all of this is that hip hop owes it’s success to the ideology of women hating. The purpose of this article is trying to convince people that hip hop is sexist and degrading. Which in some sense is true from an african american women of myself. After reading the article the author gives very good reasoning for why black women are betrayed that way.

Since the beginning of its creation in 1970 rap music has always been judged. People think of rap in a negative way because of the subjects it normally references. In some cases this is understandable but in most cases it is not. Rap just like any other form of music is a way to express thoughts and feelings that not everyone can relate to but this doesn’t mean individuals should be able to criticize the music and its listeners based off the lyrical content.

In her essay “hip hop’s betrayal of black women,” Jennifer McLune implies that “(h)ip-hop owes its success to the ideology of women-hating” (193). She does not agree with Kevin Powell’s article that hip-hop does not mean to “offend” black women, but instead artists are only letting out their temper throughout their music. McLune feels infuriated that many artists in hip hop (including black men) rap about their community and downgrade their own women. In the hip-hop genre, sexism is mainly used, not only by black men but also by many other race hip-hop artists. Artists assume that women-hating in their rap songs will be accepted by women, but do not realize that it is affecting all women.

Instead of sending a political message, this song gives people a look into the life of a rapper. The young black audience could perceive this as a potential goal in life, as many young black children see rappers as role models. As Quest Love stated, “These days, nearly anything fashioned or put forth by black people gets referred to as ‘hip-hop.’” This demonstrates the fact that hip-hop is white people’s window into black culture. White people automatically make associations with what is illustrated in the music.

Hip Hop is seen as something inspiring, but most people see it as a way to speak out the truth about a problem. As in “Hip Hop planet” being able say the truth can sometimes worsen any situation because sometimes what we say can promote violence and whatever happens after is not in our control. The essay is about how hip hop has changed into speaking out the issues that need to be taken care of in order to maintain a proper society. McBride talked about how rappers use violent lyrics to degrade women and gays and because of this it shows how the music has evolved into something entirely different that no one would have ever expected to have changed. In James McBride's essay “Hip Hop Planet,” he argues that hip hop has a negative influence on American Culture despite people thinking of it as inspirational and how people live through different experiences in life despite of your race.

“Large business” (Spotlight 13), utilize “hip-hop artists as” (Spotlight14) spokesmen to gain attention. Many believe that by doing this companies are “purposefully --promoting negative values” (Spotlight15). Yet to say that all rappers promote negative values is completely bias, because as we have previously established not all rappers rap about negativity. “No connection is found between antisocial behavior in young people and controversial genres of music such as ‘gangster music’”

As Can’t Stop Won't Stop continues to progress to the 1970’s, Jeff Chang addresses the developments, changes and increasing influence of hip-hop. Hip-hop’s influence and popularity seemingly spread globally overnight. Hip-hop culture took on new aspects and the motives for expressing the art continued to grow and change for artists. Throughout the chapters, Chang highlights the evolutions of hip-hop, hip-hop’s new audiences and the increase in drugs and violence in hip-hop during a rebellion ear. In the late 1970s, many citizens in the Bronx began to see a dramatic change in hip-

sharpest young critics, believes that male rapper uses violence as a symbol to express macho power, as a way to resolve all the disagreements between blacks and as necessary for individual protection. Due its popularity, hip hop exacerbates the criminal image of black men in a criminal justice system that has an overpopulation of black men in the prison system. Sorrowfully, many believe that this is the direct product of overly increasing black male criminality as opposed of blaming the social structure. With the enormous success of hip hop what started as pure art and a mechanism to bring awareness of what was going on in the black community, has transformed in a lucrative business. The negative aspect of this is that since big corporations control the music’s distribution channels, in many cases the rap artist is forced to produce the type of music that according to the owner is marketable.

Nowadays, everyone wears the identity with pride. The genre was a testament to triumphing over hardships, to having enough confidence in oneself not to let the world drag you down, and to rising above the struggle, even when things seem hopeless. Violence in rap did not begin as an affective agent that threatened to harm America 's youth; rather, it was the outcry of an already-existing problem from youth whose world views have been shaped by the inequalities and prejudice they have experienced. The relentless wave of heroic new rappers arriving on the scene formed the golden age of hip hop in the 1980s, a newfound voice which rose from the impoverished ghettos during the 1980s and inspiring a generation of black youth to fight the police brutality they faced on a daily basis.

The Impact of Hip-Hop Ever since its birth in the 1970s in West Bronx, Hip Hop has been known as “Gangsta” music and most commonly associated with black culture. Since its creation it has become a fast growing genre of music and has growing fame all over the world. The popularity of it has increased to all races, age and gender. However the growing popularity of hip hop has come with several controversies among scholars. Some scholars argue that the growing popularity of the genre is very helpful to low income families who can use this as their outlet into going to Universities, on the other side some believe associating the genre to black culture is bad for the culture as a whole and they should not be associated together.

“Beyond Beats and Rhymes” Summary This movie was a broad discussion about hip-hop music (or more specifically gangster rap) and what kind of social issues the music not only showcases but seems to promote. The producer of this film, Byron Hunt, interviewed people involved in all aspects of the hip-hop industry, including famous rappers, to try to get to the bottom of this. Some of the most prominent issues discussed in the film were the over-sexualization of women, gun violence, and anti- homophobic attitudes. Hunt would ask those involved in the industry about why they think these themes are so prevalent.