The Good, the Bad, and the Narrative: How Youth Experience the ‘Gangsta’ in Rap Music

Abstract

Rap is a music genre that is as dynamic and internationally successful as it is extensively discredited. This contribution begins here by focusing on the perception of young rap fans and asking what meaning they attach to rap specifically with regard to the criminality of gangstas. The empirical basis for the analyses is an ethnographic study with young rap fans in Germany. The results show that rappers as gangstas have a high identification potential for the young people – but not in every case. Rappers have to be authentic and show the young people possibilities to find ways out of disadvantaged and discriminating living conditions, if necessary with the help of crime. To appear credible in this respect, gangstas must rap about actual crimes and communicate experiences with which the young people, for their part, are familiar.