<nettime> hip hop digest vol. 6 [levesque, buhard]

[nettime <nettime@bbs.thing.net>]

Maroussia Lévesque <sourma@yahoo.com>
    hip hop: ownership? 

"Elnor Buhard" <buhard@mail.com>
    Re: <nettime> hip hop digest vol. 5 [Guderian, Wark]


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Date: Tue, 7 Jan 2003 20:54:38 +0100 (CET)
From: Maroussia Lévesque <sourma@yahoo.com>
Subject: hip hop: ownership? 

"It's not where you're from,
it's where you at."
Or is it the other way around?

In his response, Art Mcgee wrote:"WE created it, and
WE feel a sense of ownership of it", referring to
black people as creators of hip hop. The message of
hip hop in his early state is in fact rooted in a
specific context, namely that of a minority fighting
for its rights in the UNited States? But the message
can and has to be interpreted on a more universal
scale, embracing values like equity, respect and
turning negative energy into positive. 

If you provide a song, a genre or a culture out there,
it doesn't belong to you anymore. In the public
sphere, so-called hip hop artifact are always being 
modified and emulated. But the ideology has been
recuperated both for its marketing potential by
companies and for its universal message in other
cultures. In her book No Logo, Naomi Klein exposes a
figure case with fashion: in poor urban areas, Tommy
Hilfiger gave retailers extras merchandise that could
be  stolen. So the (poor) black kids acted as
trendsetters for white suburbs kids, because they
incarnate hip hop's stereotipical true "nigga". On the
other hand, Dutch, Germans, Cubans, Japanese,
Chilians, Mexicans and French have adopted hip hop's
ideology and inserted their own social fight. Hip hop
is not about being black or latino and working class.
It's about any social cause, or, for that matter,
simply unity and awareness.
And about the "white middle-class libertarian academic
male", that's a little below the belt. I understand
that this resentment has some serious basis, but it
isn't very constructive. In that sense it's somehow
antithetic to hip hop's struggle for better
tomorrow(s).
btw, I am neither white nor male

Maroussia Lévesque

=====
http://hybrid.concordia.ca/~4868390


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Date: Tue, 07 Jan 2003 16:54:56 -0500
From: "Elnor Buhard" <buhard@mail.com>
Subject: Re: <nettime> hip hop digest vol. 5 [Guderian, Wark]

hi - the only complaint i have about all these posts is that none of them are 
funny,

here, this is funny:

http://www.blackpeopleloveus.com/

and highlights the trend, in this conversation, for all y'all to try to claim to be down through knowledge of hip-hop.  .... which is in itself proof that hip hop is alive as a cultural currency - altho the days of Wild Style (1982 film chronicling a hiphop culture dominated by graffiti artists), yeah, sure those have past.  

elnor


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