In Hip Hop TimePub Date : 2019-01-31DOI: 10.1093/OSO/9780190913489.003.0003
Catherine M. Appert
{"title":"Remembering the Griot","authors":"Catherine M. Appert","doi":"10.1093/OSO/9780190913489.003.0003","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1093/OSO/9780190913489.003.0003","url":null,"abstract":"This chapter locates Senegalese hip hop at the intersection of local musical history, transatlantic Afrocentric dialogue, and the accelerated globalization of the 1980s. It traces the historical invention of the griot through colonialism, religious conversion, and postcolonial nationalist projects, while showing how griot instrumental and vocal performance practices provided a foundation for Senegal’s preeminent popular music, mbalax. It details how early international rappers, including Positive Black Soul (PBS) and Daara J, in line with a history of Afrocentric and pan-African projects in which they were well versed, traced an alternative history that routed the griot through diaspora and “back” to Africa, bypassing contemporary griot performance and mbalax in the process. It argues that this was not a literal claim to hip hop origins, but a strategic project of remembering that claimed diaspora as an alternative local history.","PeriodicalId":126629,"journal":{"name":"In Hip Hop Time","volume":"1 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2019-01-31","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"128920484","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
In Hip Hop TimePub Date : 2019-01-31DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780190913489.003.0002
Catherine M. Appert
{"title":"Globalizing the Underground","authors":"Catherine M. Appert","doi":"10.1093/oso/9780190913489.003.0002","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1093/oso/9780190913489.003.0002","url":null,"abstract":"This chapter outlines the early history of Rap Galsen (Senegalese hip hop), showing the emergence of two originating schools: internationally circulating groups like Positive Black Soul (PBS), Daara J, and Pee Froiss, and hardcore groups like Rap’Adio, Waa BMG 44, and Yatfu. It problematizes the ghetto, the street, and the underground as globally circulating hip hop myths, and argues for local specificity when linking hip hop to urban marginalization. In Dakar, the street and the ghetto represent a particular experience of urbanity tied up in colonization and underdevelopment, and the hip hop underground defines itself not only through lyrical and linguistic content, but through musical aesthetics. Ultimately, this chapter highlights the extent to which Rap Galsen’s own origin story has been produced and finessed over decades to better align with globally circulating hip hop myths.","PeriodicalId":126629,"journal":{"name":"In Hip Hop Time","volume":"3 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2019-01-31","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"114148032","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
In Hip Hop TimePub Date : 2018-12-20DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780190913489.003.0006
Catherine M. Appert
{"title":"Producing Diaspora","authors":"Catherine M. Appert","doi":"10.1093/oso/9780190913489.003.0006","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1093/oso/9780190913489.003.0006","url":null,"abstract":"This chapter shows how palimpsestic practices of hip hop genre produce diasporic connections. It describes how hip hop practices of layering and sampling delink indigenous musical elements from traditional communicative norms to rework them in hip hop, where they signify rootedness and locality in ways consistent with hip hop practice in the United States. It demonstrates that this process relies on applications of hip hop time (musical meter) as being fundamentally different from indigenous music, whose local appeal is contrasted with hip hop’s global intelligibility. It outlines how hip hop concepts of flow free verbal performance from lyrical referentiality to render it a musical element. It argues that these practices of hip hop genre, in their delinking of sound and speech, reshape understandings of the relationship between commercialism and referentiality, and suggests that voice therefore should be understood to encompass artists’ agency in pursuing material gain in the face of socioeconomic struggle.","PeriodicalId":126629,"journal":{"name":"In Hip Hop Time","volume":"22 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2018-12-20","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"121640729","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}