Sounding race in rap songs / Loren Kajikawa.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Kajikawa, Loren, 1975- author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Rap (Music)--Social aspects--United States.

Rap (Music).

Music and race.

Race awareness--United States.

Race awareness.

Racism in popular culture.

Rap (Music)--Social aspects.

United States.

Racism in popular culture--United States.

Genre:

Electronic books.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (220 pages): illustrations, photographs

Place of Publication:

Oakland, California : University of California Press, 2015.

System Details:

text file

Summary:

As one of the most influential and popular genres of the last three decades, rap has cultivated a mainstream audience and become a multimillion-dollar industry by promoting highly visible and often controversial representations of blackness. Sounding Race in Rap Songs argues that rap music allows us not only to see but also to hear how mass-mediated culture engenders new understandings of race. The book traces the changing sounds of race across some of the best-known rap songs of the past thirty-five years, combining song-level analysis with historical contextualization to show how these representations of identity depend on specific artistic decisions, such as those related to how producers make beats. Each chapter explores the process behind the production of hit songs by musicians including Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five, The Sugarhill Gang, Run-D.M.C., Public Enemy, N.W.A., Dr. Dre, and Eminem. This series of case studies highlights stylistic differences in sound, lyrics, and imagery, with musical examples and illustrations that help answer the core question: can we hear race in rap songs? Book jacket.

Contents:

Part I Stylistic Change and Racial Formation In Rap's First Decade

1 "Rapper's Delight": From Genre-less to New Genre 19

2 "Rebel Without a Pause": Public Enemy Revolutionizes the Break 49

Part II Rearticulating Race in the Neoliberal Nineties

3 "Let Me Ride": Gangsta Rap's Drive into the Popular Mainstream 85

4 "My Name Is": Signifying Whiteness, Rearticulating Race 118.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references, filmographies, discographies and index.

Description based on print version record.

Local Notes:

Electronic reproduction. Ann Arbor, MI : ProQuest, 2015. Available via World Wide Web. Access may be limited to ProQuest affiliated libraries.

Other Format:

Print version: Kajikawa, Loren, 1975- Sounding race in rap songs.

ISBN:

9780520959668

OCLC:

903016293

Access Restriction:

Restricted for use by site license.