The purpose of this study was to examine the impact Hip-Hop culture can have on white faculty who are committed to interrogating their identity and the constructs of whiteness, as it relates to implementing a sustainable process to interrogate race as a critically self-reflective educator and the development of a culturally sustaining practice in urban educational spaces. This qualitative study aimed to capture the experiences of the participants and to inform future efforts that challenge whiteness and identity amongst community college faculty and their role as educators by exposing them to educational tools and practices of Hip-Hop culture. With an emphasis on whiteness, power and privilege, this study engaged white community college faculty to not only look at themselves as educators but also how their influence impacts students on campus. The study used a cypher method to have participants engage in a series of interviews and workshops. Findings from this study suggest that Hip-Hop Based educational practices can offer tools for educators to engage in identity work and provide an opportunity to engage race, power, and whiteness. The implications from the study offers scholars beginning steps for further study around the relationship between Hip-Hop as a tool to engage white faculty with race and critical self reflection. It also presents implications for educators looking to further explore Hip-Hop Based Education as a tool for culturally responsive education, building community and liberatory practices.

Adolescents living in peri-urban settings in South Africa face multiple challenges to realising their own health and wellbeing. A lack of opportunities exists for young people to gain practical skills and the self-efficacy necessary to address these challenges. One area in which they have the potential to make an impact is that of water-related disease. In this context Jive Media Africa, a media agency with a focus on health communications, initiated the Hip Hop Health project. The project made use of hip hop centred community music making to enable 60 young people from three schools in peri-urban communities in KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa, to share, with their broader communities, findings from research tasks that they had undertaken in the area of water and health. This qualitative case study explored the affordances of this community music making process for the adolescents involved. The study employed thematic analysis of thick descriptions of video excerpts, song lyrics and focus group transcriptions, drawing strongly on a Freirean construct of conscientisation and on youth empowerment theory. This research suggests that the writing and performance of hip hop songs empowers young people to engage with complex issues affecting their health and wellbeing. Through this process they gained hope for their futures, as individuals and as a community. The overarching theme of empowerment is supported by three subthemes, each of which was facilitated by the creation and performance of hip hop songs. In ‘becoming’, young people gained knowledge and were empowered as individuals. Through ‘belonging,’ the learners forged mutually supportive relationships with their peers, families and the broader community. Finally, through ‘believing’, young people began to conceptualise the future as holding hope and possibilities, based on their learnings and the experiences of the process. In this sense, empowerment was seen to take place at both an individual and a community level, and demonstrated elements of building critical consciousness through cycles of action and reflection. The findings hold relevance for programmes that seek to address other issues impacting adolescent health and wellbeing by empowering participants through community music making using hip hop and rap. / Dissertation (MMus)--University of Pretoria, 2017. / University of Pretoria / Music / MMus Musicology / Unrestricted

Bibliografický záznam ORAVCOVÁ, Anna. Česká hiphopová subkultura: konstrukce autenticity v českém rapu. Praha, 2019. 171 s. Dizertační práce (Ph.D.) Univerzita Karlova, Fakulta sociálních věd, Institut sociologických studií. Katedra sociologie. Školitelka: PhDr. Marta Kolářová, Ph.D. Abstract The dissertation focuses on the construction of authenticity in Czech rap music. It seeks to explore attributes based on which one can define a certain rap expression as the "real" one. The theoretical part includes the definition of the term subculture, main attributes of hip hop (sub)culture, and the definition of authenticity, the key concept of the dissertation. In dialogue with the findings of the hip hop studies of Western countries, this dissertation looks at the authenticity claims expressed in Czech rap music and the context and situations in which the question of authenticity of Czech rappers becomes important. The empirical part of the dissertation is based on the perspective of the insider research using a combination of qualitative methods: (1) semi structured interviews with twenty rappers (one of them female); (2) qualitative content analysis of selected rap lyrics; and (3) participant observation at different hip hop events. The research took place between 2010 and 2016. The research shows that Czech...

Conjunctural Bratislava is complex regional study which emphasises the topic of identity and social features of the city and its impact on the physical infrastucture and organisation of the city. First theoretical part introduces the Theory of conjunctural city based on connection between hierarchy and dynamic development in broad sense. Second part provides the systematic view of Bratislava, explaining some aspects of the theory (population, economy, urbanism, transportation, culture). Short chapter is dedicated to current conceptual ideas of Bratislava in terms of a city and a region, too. The last part of the study brings a brief prognostic view of main prospects of the city and some possible problems which may occure soon or later. Empirical study in appendix is aimed to Bratislava's hiphop culture and its musical production. I have chosen four songs for the analysis (three local ones and one from Prague hip hop group PSH). Bratislava has been chosen for its uniqueness, being one of the very few remaining conjunctural cities in Europe. Keywords: Bratislava, city, identity, hierarchy, theory, regional development, hip hop

Conjunctural Bratislava is regional study which emphasises the topic of identity and social features of the city and its impact on the physical infrastucture and organisation of the city. First theoretical part introduces the Theory of conjunctural city based on connection between hierarchy and dynamic development in broad sense. Second part provides the systematic view of Bratislava, explaining some aspects of the theory (population, economy, urbanism, transportation, culture). Short chapter is dedicated to current conceptual ideas of Bratislava in terms of a city and a region, too. The last part of the study brings a brief prognostic view of main prospects of the city and some possible problems which may occure soon or later. Empirical study in appendix is aimed to Bratislava's hiphop culture and its musical production. I analysed three local hip hop songs. Bratislava has been chosen for its uniqueness, being one of the very few remaining conjunctural cities in Europe.

Responding to and provoked by an America colored by stark political division, tense racial conflict, and the powerful urban narrative of hip hop culture, Hamilton: An American Musical, created by composer/lyricist Lin-Manuel Miranda, became the subject of a cultural focus unprecedented in the reception history of an American work of art. Hamilton premièred at a critical time during the Obama presidency, and it squarely confronts the issues lying at the heart of our democracy. Hamilton caught the attention of millions of Americans with little prior interest in Broadway musicals, hip hop, or the performing arts in general, and it stimulated important and timely conversations about race, representation, and American identity. Hamilton asks pressing questions: Who speaks for America? How does the character and biographical narrative of this founding father suggest a new, updated conversation about American history? How do the political sensitivities of audiences determine the commercial and artistic success of a stage work? How does the rap genre operate in conveying Hamilton’s historical content in dramatic terms? How do representations of minorities in popular culture affect the wider perception of the sociopolitical order? To what degree is it possible for the historically-rooted genre of musical theater – often viewed as benign musical pablum for middle-class whites – to advance a public conversation about race and representation in the twenty-first-century? This dissertation first considers these questions through the historical lens of racial depiction in American musical theater, situating Hamilton within a lineage of commercially successful musicals that have used the Broadway stage subversively as a place to challenge the social and racial order. It documents Hamilton’s genesis and the collaborative process of adapting Ron Chernow’s acclaimed biography, then examines Hamilton’s music, its relationship to text and musico-historical resonances, and constructs a theory of Lin-Manuel Miranda’s hip hop-infused compositional style. Finally, it examines Hamilton’s reception, contemporary political dimensions, and essential ties to the administrations of Barack Obama and Donald Trump, exploring what are often contentious criticisms of the work within the academic and online worlds.

This thesis examines whether hip hop, and rap in particular, was an infrastructure for the lower-class of Black Americans in the 1980s and early 1990s to transport their concerns, knowledge, and protest from the margins to the center. It first demonstrates what issues Black Americans from the ghetto have raised in terms of content in the first place. Next is an examination of where and how hip hop created a platform for itself and how the institutionalization process unfolded. Finally, it is discussed whether and to what extent the infrastructure was successful. In general, and in a nutshell, the research revealed that rap had an impact, especially in the late 1980s and early 1990s and more and more hip hop artists appeared in the white American mainstream public sphere. Through various media and in different circles, they addressed topics that were otherwise less part of the discourse of this public, such as racism, the situation of subalterns in the ghetto or Black history. Thus, through rap, this knowledge flowed into the Center. Although women were given far less space to talk about Black feminism, for example, they too had consistently raised these issues.

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This research examines the potential of polycentrism as artistic methods in contemporary hip-hop and as a socio-political movement in dance to luminate negotiations of relations, power and appropriation. The research questions are: 1. How can the concept of polycentrism as an aesthetic principle in the traditions of hip-hop be used to investigate and develop artistic methods in a contemporary dance context? 2. What scope for action and negotiation of power systems does polycentrism create in contemporary hip-hop? This artistic research is drawn upon Practice as Research with methods of freestyle/improvisation and interactive introspection. It also suggests polycentrism as a research method. The empirical material consists of the experiences of the eleven dance artists that participated in the study through five workshops that was documented via filming and writing. Artistic methods are presented as processes and ideas of polycentric movements inside and outside our bodies, always in relation. Secondly, the study suggests polycentrism with potential to circulate as sociopolitical movement through our bodies and create expanded crosscircular perspectives on aesthetics as multiple, relational centers in constant energy flow. The findings of this project can also be useful in education and teaching of dance.

The purpose of this essay is to find out through semiotic analysis and rhetorical tools how the music video “Svartskallar” performed by Swedish artist Stor is being mediated and perceived. The word svartskallar is a Swedish slur and derogatory term used towards immigrants and people of other descent than Scandinavian/Arian. Mostly people with dark attributes, hence the word “blackhead.” The song lyrics poke fun at mundane stereotypes and prejudices that people have towards certain ethnicities, especially minorities that there are a lot of in Sweden. The music video was quite controversial as it depicted a plantation where white people portrayed slaves whilst minorities played the slaveowners. As the video was released it caused a lot of debate online. The analysis has shown that there are many ambiguities in this video that have triggered a lot of reactions. This video has a lot more nuances to it than what is seen at first glance and portrays a lot of subliminal messages. Ultimately there are a lot of more aspects to consider in this debate than solely that of the plot.