Towards a transnational hip-hop feminist liberatory praxis: a view from the Americas

Abstract

The author argues that hip-hop feminism has come to a point where it needs to take a transnationalist turn if it is going to realize its potential to be a twenty-first century feminist praxis. The author highlights how people speaking from a U.S. American context inadvertently become a global referent for anti-oppression movements and subjectivities. Unfortunately, by virtue of being in one of the centers of global power, becoming a global referent of anti-oppression has the potential to distort and even render invisible the realities of Black women throughout the Americas. Through taking a transnational approach to hip-hop feminism, U.S. based advocates can increase the possibilities for hip-hop feminism to function as a politic of solidarity and mutual empowerment for Black women and girls throughout the Americas. Data are drawn from participant observation and interviews conducted in Havana, Cuba (1998–2010), and São Paulo, Brazil (2008–2013).

KEYWORDS:

• Transnational
• hip-hop feminism
• United States
• Americas
• Brazil
• Cuba

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

¹In this essay I use the term U.S. American as a way to recognize a regionally based discourse and identity politic that recognizes that Americans refers to people from the Americas, while U.S. American refers to the United States. This addresses a common critique of the U.S. from the Americas. The critique is the U.S., in its position as an imperial power, is so U.S. centric that U.S. Americans only think of themselves as Americans, and globally are assumed to be the face of all Americans.

²Here I am thinking of women, girls and people assigned female at birth and who fall onto various trans spectrums.

³Police in major cities in countries such as Brazil and Colombia have received training from police from major U.S. cities such as New York and Chicago.

⁴In Spanish and Portuguese speaking countries, words ending in “o” are understood to be masculine and words ending in “a” are understood to be feminine. Words like “Latino” are masculine and are used as a generalized term to all Latinxs regardless of gender. Some writers began using the word Latin@ as the @ looks like both the o+a together. However, activists recognized that this was still centered on a male/female gender binary. The ending “x” is now being used to reference human diversity, what ever that looks like  …  it is the queering of language. In the last two years, the usage of the “x” has proliferated. It has become popular via hip-hop feminists and queer activists in Latin American and Caribbean hip-hop movements, including spoken word artists and bloggers who move through hip-hop feminist circles.

⁵Bric refers to the countries of Brazil, Russia, India and China which are seen as emerging, global economic superpowers.

1. Fred Brathwaite, also known as Fab 5 Freddy is a U.S. American visual artist, filmmaker, producer and central figure that was involved in the emergence of U.S. American hip hop within New York's experimental arts scenes. During the 1990s he was known for hosting Yo! MTV Raps, one of the first TV shows dedicated to showcasing emerging hip-hop artists.