People Power
‘Read between the lines’
Lifesavas
A limited notion of literacy breeds a limited notion of literature. And a limited notion of literature breeds a limited view of the world.1
Hip Hop is one way of reading the world. And in a world where many young people believe that what they learn in schools bears no relation to their lives, it is time to look for new ideas.
You don’t learn socialising at school… you get socialised…
Interviewee Two, Christchurch Group
When Sara Tamati interviewed groups of young people during her research for ‘The Next’ resource, she found that they all ‘strongly agreed that Hip Hop was a form of self-expression, a voice, or an outlet for them to be able to say, represent, or enact their ideas. They also found that through this type of self expression they obtained praise, respect, and visibility –they were seen and heard by society.’2
Freedom of speech… where one of them gets away with saying whatever he wants without getting in trouble.
Interviewee One, Christchurch Group
Codes to be Broken
Hip Hop is a unique form of self expression – as there is no doubt that it has created a whole new ‘language’. There are some who think Hip Hop’s language is designed as part of the community’s effort to ‘keep it real’ – a way of identifying ‘authentic Hip Hop headz from the wannabes’. Others suggest it’s just another way of getting messages across to the audience, a code to be broken.3
For me, when the rap is live and full throttle… I sometimes feel like a schoolboy sitting at an unfamiliar Shakespeare play, straining to catch the words…4
Whatever the reason, new words are constantly being added to the Hip Hop vocabulary… with some even making it into mainstream dictionaries. And the words are both universal and local. Some of the original terms used in the Bronx are still around today, being used by young people in Aotearoa. Some, however, are specific to Aotearoa – for example, rappers using the word uso, a Samoan equivalent of 'brotha or sista' or talk about being hoha, a Māori equivalent to trippin5. Then, of course, there is the inclusion of Te Reo and other Pacific languages, starting to influence many Hip Hop elements.
This use of indigenous language is a political statement. While some feared that the fascination of Māori youth with American Hip Hop would somehow take away from their own culture and language, in fact the critics have been proved wrong. In many ways, Māori people within the Hip Hop community, like Dean Hapeta (Te Kupu), Dam Native and Iwi, are contributing to the overall desire for cultural and language revival.6
Hapeta was influenced by the political messages of Bob Marley and later by Malcolm X and The Nation of Islam. They helped to confirm his own political views about the ‘land grievances, cultural genocide and other issues resulting from colonisation’7 that were affecting his own people. His crew, ‘Upper Hutt Posse’, brought a more aggressive ‘raw’ style to Māori music, very different from the ‘happy-go-lucky’ guitar-playing stereotype attached to Māori at the time.
It’s interesting to note that language can be used as a political ‘weapon’ in countries with unsettled race relations. In Germany, for instance, newer immigrants not only rap in the language of their country of origin (in order to assert their unique cultural identity), but may also rap in German to confirm their ‘new’ identities. 8 Advanced Chemistry’s 1993 song ‘Fremd im eigenen Land’ (A Foreigner in My Own Country) speaks of the three immigrant rappers struggle to be accepted as German, even with German citizenship.
Ich habe einen grünen Paβ, mit einem Goldenen Adler drauf’ – I have a green passport, with a golden eagle insignia (design on the old German passport).9
However, the wave of new immigration into Germany has brought with it a wave of ‘neo-Fascism’ (essentially, Nazi) and with it a growing number of neo-Fascist bands whose insistence on singing in German symbolises their beliefs in the Third Reich’s original attempt to ban all non-German music during the 1930s.10 In this case, language is being used as a weapon to assert their belief in their own superior power and status.
The DJ’s use of ‘sampling’ adds another whole layer of ‘literacy’ to Hip Hop. Starting in the late 1980's Bomb Squad (producers of Public Enemy) and other rap artists (such as pioneer Marley Marl) began experimenting with ‘multi-layered sound collage’11 – using sounds bites from current media, everyday life, and the recorded voices of black activists.
Hip Hop’s reliance on sampling, whereby producers extract, manipulate, and reassemble bits of music from many sources, means that the people who make it don’t play musical instruments in the usual sense of that word.12
The DJ and/or producer, or mixer, plays an important part in the production of these layers, and should be respected accordingly. This use of sampling, quotation and ‘borrowing’ from others makes for a kind of ‘sonic shoplifting,’ ‘poaching’ or ‘recycling’… where snippets and phrases (and older musical works) can be used to enhance or underline the importance of a message, or can be used ironically (in such a way to point out the stupidity or ignorance of the ‘borrowed’ statement). This ‘borrowing’ can also be seen in a political context - that once spoken and recorded, words belong to all people, not just those who hold a piece of paper claiming ‘ownership’.
Sampling is not without controversy. There have been some high profile court cases, taken out by African American artists such as James Brown, objecting to their work being 'ripped off' by Hip Hop producers. Nowdays, samples must be 'cleared', and their rights purchased.
Hip Hop culture is also an intense body culture; it finds its expression in dance and gesture. The ‘language’ of dance often makes a cultural or political statement about those participating – where they come from and what they are expressing. As part of her research, Halifu Osumare interviewed B-boy Justin Alladin (TeN) who is of Hawaiian, Japanese and African American decent:13
When I was last in Japan, there were two kids battling. One kid came in and cut the other off before he was finished, and so they walked around in a circle looking at each other. And all of a sudden they jumped like this, boom, together, at the same time, knowing exactly what they were doing. It was the "Brooklyn rock". Do you know what a "Brooklyn rock is? No, I can barely do it. These two kids, one from Japan, one from Hawai'i, never met each other before, got to the park not even an hour before, just started dancing, and cannot communitcate [verbally] with each other. They walked in the circle, jumped at the right time together and landed at the same time together, and started Brooklyn rocking together. That is international communitcation. That is people of the same culture.
That is the difference between someone really from hip hop and someone from commercialized hip hop. A person in commercialized hip hop cannot do that, does not know what that is, don't know anything about it, and could not do it to save their life. That's just [the difference in authenticity] on the dancing level. The same difference exists on the emcee level, on the deejay level, on the [aerosol] art level. That part about them knowing what to do is what you [I, the interveiwer] are talking about: how traditions are passed on. Who passed it on: They didn't go to school. They lived it, you know. That's their life, so they know it. They have the same values. That kid knows that he cut the other kid off, and he should not have done that. That's why they jumped into the Brooklyn rock. They knew and they were ready for it. They knew what a [hip hop ] battle was.
Alladin 1999
This cross-cultural link is seen in countries like Cuba as well. Lester Martínez of Cuban Hip Hop group Free Hole Negro says: ‘We make music of the street to make people dance and think. We let the message be in the lyrics but in an ironic way. We feed off rap, timba, soul, son and guaguancó.16 In Te Kupu’s ‘rapumentary’ Ngā Tahi: Know the Links, women in Cartagena, Columbia, are shown dancing and rapping ‘there is no more – this is the…life you have to enjoy…’17
Josh Kun, who worked in American classrooms to inspire the writing of poetry through rap sums this experience up by saying: "There really was no fundamental difference between these raps and the John Donne poem I read… these poems… were self contained lyrical narratives in rhyme about what mattered…’18
In a sense these words – what mattered – is what has always given Hip Hop the edge: ‘its lyrics often tackle ‘serious’ subject matter; they are presented over minimal musical backing; and the speed at which the lyrics are delivered in a Hip Hop track usually means they have a larger quantity than the average pop song.’19
And so, like the best of the protest songs from the folk tradition, Hip Hop speaks for the people, and to the people about the times (that) are a’changing.
Sage Francis - Slow Down Ghandi (Reanimator Remix) from the album "A Healthy Distrust"
» listen to track
Test your knowledge
- What reasons are given to explain the way a unique Hip Hop language has developed?
- What is the name of Dean Hapeta’s crew?
- What does Advanced Chemistry’s 1993 song ‘A Foreigner In My Own Country’ speak about?
- What does the term ‘sampling’ mean?
- How can ‘sampling’ be used in a political context?
- What is it that has always given Hip Hop its edge?
Extend your thinking
Language changes according to the group you associate with.
Have you developed any unique words or phrases within your group? How did they evolve (come about)? Why do you use them? What other ways do groups mark out their unique identities? If you were going to use some kind of political message in your ‘sampling’, who would you use and why? What message would you be hoping to communicate?
1 Kun, J. 1994 ‘Reading, Writing, and Rap: Literacy as Rap Sound System’ Bad Subjects Issue 12.
2 Tamati, S. 2004 ‘A window to our world’ ‘The Next – An Impression of Hip Hop Expression’ p61.
3 Waiti, D. ‘Spotlight On: Angles on Global Hip Hop Culture’, in ‘The Next – an Impression of Hip Hop Expression’. p99.
4 Shaw, W. 2000 ‘Westsiders – Stories of the Boys in the Hood’, Bloomsbury p82.
5 In the case of ‘uso’, it has now spread to sections of the music industry in Hawai’i and California. Waiti, D. ‘Spotlight On: Angles on Global Hip Hop Culture’, in ‘The Next – an Impression of Hip Hop Expression’.
6 Waiti, D. ‘Spotlight On: Angles on Global Hip Hop Culture’, in ‘The Next – an Impression of Hip Hop Expression’. p102.
7 Ibid, p104.
8 Bennett, A. 1999 ‘Hip Hop Am Main: The Localization Of Rap Music and Hip Hop culture’ Media, Culture and Society, (Sage Publications, London) Vol. 21: pp77-91.
9 Ibid.
10 Ibid.
11 Best, S. & Kellner, D. Spring 1999, ‘Rap, Black rage, and Racial difference’: ‘Enculturation, Vol 2, No.2.
12 Walser, R. 1998 ‘Clamor and Community in the Music of Public Enemy in Generations of Youth (etc)’ Austin and Willard (eds.) New York, New York University Press p294
13 Aladdin (B-Boy TeN) quoted in Halifu Osumare, Global Breakdancing and the Intercultural Body. Dance Research Journal Winter 2002, Vol 34, Issue 2: 30-45
14 Shuman A. Feb 2002 ‘Dance with a Purpose: Interview with Naomi Bragin’ Bad Subjects Issue 59.
15 Olavarria, M ‘Rap and revolution – Hip Hop Comes To Cuba’ NACLA Report On The Americas.
16 ‘Ngā Tahi: Know the Links’ DVD 2003, Kia Kaha Productions.
17 Kun, J. 1994 ‘Reading, Writing, and Rap: Literacy as Rap Sound System’ Bad Subjects Issue 12.
18 Shute, G. ‘Hip Hop in Aotearoa as a Contemporary Art-form’– NZEPC essay.
