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Impact of hip hop on youth
Hip hop culture influence on the youth
Hip hop culture influence on the youth
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It is a day in the summer of 1974 on the block of 1520 Sedgwick Avenue, Bronx, NY. The grass is blazing, the air is fresh, and the kids are shrieking with joy. This is where it happened. DJ Kool Herc popped in his new record playing smooth rhythms of jazz and blues with the integration of Jamaican sound creating a new genre that would soon sweep the nation. He called it Hip-Hop. Some would call it “black noise”, but to urban African Americans it was music they could own; music they could learn to appreciate and adore. As they faced afflictions like racism, oppression, drugs, and much more, they used this new found hip- hop to express their thoughts and feelings. Today, we try to understand where this passion and substance in rap has escaped; if it was left to wither in the blazing grass, or blow away in the fresh air. Today, we try to understand what is hip hop, and why it’s becoming the “black noise” we once denied it to be. Ever since rap officially emerged in the 1970s, critics had a negative reaction; even when rap had meaning and substance and consisted of people telling their stories. Now that rap has become more contemptuous, critics have began to question what rap is really about. It is clear themes have changed: But at what point? And how? Furthermore, how has this impacted blacks and their image, who dominate the rap industry. Conclusively, while themes in mid 20th century rap have been known to revolve around aspects like politics and unity, currently rap has underwent a dramatic change now producing themes that promote violence, among many other things, and has ultimately painted a negative image of African Americans. Even before the party in the Bronx rap music made a mark. Some say it originated in Jamaican under th... ... middle of paper ... ...mages of Violence in Rap Music Lyrics: 1979-1997” Journal of Public Health Policy, Vol. 30, No. 4 (Dec., 2009), pp. 395-406 J. Cole. Runaway. Roc Nation, 2013. MP3. Keef, Chief. 3hunna. Interscope Records, 2012. MP3. Nicki MInaj. Super Bass. Young Money Cash Money Entertainment, 2010. MP3. Public Enemy. Fight the Power. Motown Records, 1989. MP3. Queen Latifah. U.N.I.T.Y. Motown Records, 1993. MP3. Salaam, Mtume ya. “The Aesthetics of Rap” African American Review, Vol. 29, No. 2, Special Issues on The Music (Summer, 1995), pp. 303-315 Shakur, Tupac. Keep Ya Head Up. Interscope Records, 1993. MP3. Smith, S. L. (2005). From Dr. Dre to dismissed: Assessing violence, sex, and substance use on MTV. Critical Studies in Media Communication, 22, 89–98. Wood, Joann. "Rap Music." Nova Online. C.T. Evans and J. Wood., Apr. 2004. Web. 3 May 2014.
Negus, Keith. "The Business of Rap: Between the Street and the Executive Suite." Rpt. in That’s the Joint!: The Hip-Hop Studies Reader. Ed. Murray Forman and Mark Anthony Neal. New York, NY: Routledge, 2004. 525-540. Print.
Randolph, A. (2006). "Don 't Hate Me Because I 'm Beautiful": Black Masculinity and Alternative Embodiment in Rap Music . Race, Gender & Class Journal, 200-217.
George covers much familiar ground: how B-beats became hip hop; how technology changed popular music, which helped to create new technologies; how professional basketball was influenced by hip hop styles; how gangsta rap emerged out of the crack epidemic of the 1980s; how many elements of hip hop culture managed to celebrate, and/or condemn black-on-black violence; how that black-on-black violence was somewhat encouraged by white people scheming on black males to show their foolishness, which often created a huge mess; and finally, how hip hop used and continues to use its art to express black frustration and ambition to blacks while, at the same time, refering that frustration and ambition to millions of whites.
Light, Alan. "About a Salary or Reality? – Rap’s Recurrent Conflict." Rpt. in That’s the Joint!: The Hip-Hop Studies Reader. Ed. Murray Forman and Mark Anthony Neal. New York, NY: Routledge, 2004. 137-146. Print.
Negus, Keith. "The Business of Rap: Between the Street and the Executive Suite." Rpt. in That’s the Joint!: The Hip-Hop Studies Reader. Ed. Murray Forman and Mark Anthony Neal. New York, NY: Routledge, 2004. 525-540. Print.
African aesthetics traveled across the globe due to the african slave trade and africans being taken to the Caribbean. This then traveled to New Orleans and resulted in Jazz and later the development of hip hop. As discussed in Osumare’s article The Africanist Aesthetic in Global Hip Hop: Power Moves, hip hop did not originate solely from African-American influences but rather Afro-diasporic influences, “owing contributions to Caribbean immigrants in the Bronx”. In addition, hip hop grew as an outlet for youth to deal with marginalization and social issues, including police brutality occurring in the Bronx. It developed as a way to
Rhodes, Henry A. “The Evolution of Rap Music in the United States.” Yale. Yale-New Haven Teachers Institute. 2014. Web. 10 Mar. 2014.
Jeffries, M. P. (2011). Thug Life: Race, Gender, and the Meaning of Hip-hop. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
5. Rose, Patricia (1991, Summer). ?Fear of a Black Planet: Rap Music and Black Cultural Politics in the 1990s,?. The Journal of Negro Education, 60 (3).
References to illegal drugs use in rap music jumped sixfold in the two decades since 1979. Previously, rap music was more likely to depict dangers
64,000 Americans died from drug overdoses in 2016” (National). This number will rise as the rap industry continues to prosper. Today’s rap is affecting people all over the world. Rap artists today hide their songs’ actual meanings. Men and women are targeted in rap songs. Drugs are talked about in the song’s and go hand in hand with the making of songs. Many children and teens are unconsciously being affected by rap and it will turn into more than that.
Rap Genius. N.p., n.d. Web. The Web. The Web. 01 May 2014.
In order to assess the impact of hip-hop on criminal activities, this essay examined data from major hip-hop sites such as Hip-hop DX, rap basement, and rap rehab. Information on these websites revealed that the hip-hop culture accommodates violence throug...
Dixon, Travis L., TaKeshia Brooks. “Rap Music and Rap Audiences: Controversial Themes, Psychological Effects and Political Resistance.” Perspectives. 7 April 2009. .
Throughout these decades music has evolved, “The music of today is not like the music of past generations and the messages in today’s music are nothing like before. Today’s rap is more about obtaining and maintaining an image, whether that image is fact or fiction is often a mystery.” (RJ4AY) Teenagers nowadays a...