The Popular Arts in America: The History of Hip-Hop

Catalog description

Hip-hop is an important and historically significant genre in popular music that initially began in the South Bronx in the early 1970s and has grown to become one of the most influential, controversial, and important genres to emerge in the last quarter of the 20th century. Beyond music, hip-hop has also been defined as a commercial enterprise, a lifestyle, and a sociocultural movement. This course explores the various meanings and manifestations of hip-hop throughout its evolution from the early 1970s to the present day. Students will examine the cultural, economic, social, and political implications of hip-hop nationally and globally. Drawing on frameworks like critical race theory and Black feminist/womanist theory, students will engage enduring debates at the heart of hip-hop-debates about art, race, class, gender, citizenship, power, and the body. Topics to be covered include: four foundational elements of hip-hop (rap, DJ arts, graffiti & visual arts, dance); the cultural, economic, political, and social conditions under which hip-hop emerged and developed; impact of hip-hop on the culture industries and the commercialization of the genre; stylistic principles that constitute the hip-hop aesthetic; racial parameters of hip-hop and notions of authenticity; gender and hip-hop's framing of black femininity and masculinity; and global circulation of hip-hop culture. Throughout the course students will explore the following questions: Under what social, political, and economic conditions did hip-hop emerge? Who were the key producers, fans, and detractors of hip-hop in its earliest years? Whose voices are privileged (and marginalized) within hip-hop studies as an academic project? How has hip-hop been framed within and/or transcended traditional notions of art and beauty? In what ways has hip-hop style been criminalized and degraded as low culture? In what ways has hip-hop style been (mis)appropriated? What is authentic hip-hop and how is it measured? To what extent do hip-hop artists pander to stereotypes? What is the relationship between hip-hop and capitalism? What are the benefits and limitations of the commercialization of hip-hop? How do fans and producers impact the genre in the contemporary digital era? What are the primary impediments to rappers who are neither black, nor male achieving the level of popularity and respect that hip-hop's biggest stars have attained? To what extent does the music industry use talent and marketability as a stand in for racial identity? How has hip-hop been taken up by marginalized groups in countries such as Brazil, Cambodia, and South Africa?