Rob Skogen
Back in the days when I was a teenager
Before I had status and before I had a pager
You could find the Abstract listening to hip hop
My pops used to say, it reminded him of be-bop
I said, well daddy don’t you know that things go in cycles
The way that Bobby Brown is just ampin like Michael
--A Tribe Called Quest “Excursions�, from The Low End Theory (1991)
This week’s hip-hop forum was a welcome diversion to the usual weekly film study. A much appreciated shout out to Alexs, Eddie and Melisa for contributing their thoughts and time to helping us put this vibrant movement into the socio-political context we have been working in this semester.
Just as with any other academic conversation, this one began with setting boundaries. Hip-hop was defined as a culture of opposition to the mainstream, one that embodies more elements than simply the rap music to which most in would like to confine it. That being said, however, does not make discussion of rap music less important. Which brings me to the question I would like to focus on.
Tricia Rose’s chapter Prophets of Rage: Rap Music and the Politics of Black Cultural Expression discusses the concept of rap music as a form of expression in “a long history of black cultural subversion and the social critique in music and performance (99)�, one that serves as a way to give a voice to those experiences that are ignored or marginalized by the dominant public transcript.
• With the obvious parallels between the jazz cultures of the past and the hip-hop culture of today makes this is a
valid assertion? Or do you believe that the hip-hop movement represents a break with previous generations and is a unique phenomenon?
While discussing the poetic/literary value of rap music and the distinctions between “good� and “bad� art found in the movement, Alexs made a curious assertion that it “is probably the first true artistic export of the African American culture�. This idea runs counter to the argument presented by Tricia Rose and I am not sure I agree either.
Making this statement requires us to ignore the past. Does this dismiss or deny the importance of historical African American artistic movements? For example, in parallel with the Great Migration of blacks into the industrialized Northern cities during the 1920s came the Harlem Renaissance. There was an explosion of literary and musical contributions made by black jazz artists, poets, and authors like Louis Armstrong, Billie Holiday, Zora Neale Hurston, and Langston Hughes. There was also another such movement a generation later by artists such as John Coltrane, Miles Davis, Ralph Ellison, and Richard Wright.
I find it extremely hard to speak to the present without understanding and acknowledging the past. Maybe there is more to it than that for Alexs to make the claim he did. I would really like to find out more if that is the case.