Understanding and incorporating rap: The articulation of alternative popular musical practices within dominant cultural practices and institutions

This essay concerns the ways in which rap was “understood” and articulated as an alternative popular musical practice in public discourse from its first identification in mainstream publications through its crossover success in the mid‐ to late 1980s. The essay focuses upon rap's presentation in a number of types of publications: the dominant, mainstream press; the mainstream black press; and the music industry trade press. These various publications have produced various interpretations of rap: It represented and produced the violence of African American youth; it was a passing, commercially unpromising “fad” and it was an “authentic” expression of African American resistance. The essay's main concern is the range of articulations of rap and the ways in which these different articulations discursively map out, within social space and the historical context of popular musical practices, the conditions of possibility for rap as a set of alternative musical, cultural, and political practices. Ending with a brief, critical review of academic and politically progressive approaches to rap, the essay challenges the implications of trying to “understand” and articulate race, class, and cultural practice.

Key terms:

• Class
• hip‐hop
• incorporation
• music industry
• popular music
• race
• rap music
• youth