Thursday Draft Questions - Paul Druta
1. In the essay "Voicing Citizenship: Undocumented Women and Social Media", Jilian Baez mentions that 1100 people are deported every day under the Obama administration (Baez 56). Given that the US government has shown an eagerness to deported undocumented immigrants whenever it can, is it ever dangerous for these undocumented migrants to establish a presence online? Do social media companies ever give up locations of these undocumented individuals to government officials?
2. In "Cyphers: Hip-Hop and Improvisation", Watkins and Caines write: "Hip-hop’s lineage of hagiography consists of graffiti writers, breakers, DJs, and emcees who animate the black postmodern ethos through raps that contain ad-lib logorrhea, near-assonance, and gritty vocab with gunfire punctuation, announcing with bravado to an oppressive white world that the carcinoid Other has adopted the master’s tools and things will never be the same." (Watkins and Caines 1). Hip hop emerged as a form of resistance against white ruling society, pioneered by African Americans and Latino-Americans in New York. Given that white populations have not gone through the same cultural trauma that these groups have, what would Watkins, Caines, and other hip-hop experts say about the large number of white hip-hop artists in today's music scene? Is this an example of cultural appropriation?
3. In the "Hip Hop Feministas" video, one of the feministas describes rap as "Rhythm, art, and poetry" (minute 2:20). Why has hip hop/rap proven to be such an effective global art form for promoting social change compared to other popular lyrical music forms?
4. In "Mujeres de Acero", Black Mama tells the story a prostitute who works in the streets every night in order to be able to feed her children. Black Mama's rap encourages the woman to keep her head high and be proud of being a woman. This type of story-telling rap is not heard on mainstream radio so much nowadays. Instead the mainstream is dominated by male rappers, often with mysoginistic lyrics. What are some ways that listeners can incentivize the mainstream to incorporate more socially aware songs?
2. In "Cyphers: Hip-Hop and Improvisation", Watkins and Caines write: "Hip-hop’s lineage of hagiography consists of graffiti writers, breakers, DJs, and emcees who animate the black postmodern ethos through raps that contain ad-lib logorrhea, near-assonance, and gritty vocab with gunfire punctuation, announcing with bravado to an oppressive white world that the carcinoid Other has adopted the master’s tools and things will never be the same." (Watkins and Caines 1). Hip hop emerged as a form of resistance against white ruling society, pioneered by African Americans and Latino-Americans in New York. Given that white populations have not gone through the same cultural trauma that these groups have, what would Watkins, Caines, and other hip-hop experts say about the large number of white hip-hop artists in today's music scene? Is this an example of cultural appropriation?
3. In the "Hip Hop Feministas" video, one of the feministas describes rap as "Rhythm, art, and poetry" (minute 2:20). Why has hip hop/rap proven to be such an effective global art form for promoting social change compared to other popular lyrical music forms?
4. In "Mujeres de Acero", Black Mama tells the story a prostitute who works in the streets every night in order to be able to feed her children. Black Mama's rap encourages the woman to keep her head high and be proud of being a woman. This type of story-telling rap is not heard on mainstream radio so much nowadays. Instead the mainstream is dominated by male rappers, often with mysoginistic lyrics. What are some ways that listeners can incentivize the mainstream to incorporate more socially aware songs?
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