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Relationship Between Hip-Hop Rap Music And Subculture

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Hip-hop Rap Music and Subculture

The topic I have chosen for this review is the association between a particular music genre and a subculture. In particular, the issue of focus is the association of the hip-hop rap genre with the black youth subculture in America.
As a youth subculture, hip-hop emerged in the 1970s from New York City’s borough of the Bronx. The African American community was the root of the music genre, which gained popularity in the 1980s and 1990s. As part of its growth, the genre developed its own distinct language, music style, and lifestyle values, which have influenced widespread recognition of its uniqueness [4]. As a term, hip-hop refers to both a style of music and a subcultural movement. Music scholars …show more content…

Alongside these developments, the followers of hip-hop developed a unique form of dancing and particular forms of dressing, which they refined over time. The “art” of writing graffiti also raised as an overlapping form of expression among hip-hop followers [4].
This assessment demonstrates the appropriateness of the definition of hip-hop as a subculture. A subculture is a cultural group within a broader culture that has variant or different beliefs and values compared with those of the larger culture. The members of such a group differentiate themselves from the parent culture based on adverse perceptions about some aspects of the parent culture [2]. The hip-hop subcultural group includes all followers of hip-hop rap music, but the principal and most recognized members of this subculture are typically inner city youth who support the culture due to its appeal and representation of their feelings, perceptions, and experiences in the society. For most youths in these neighborhoods who identify with the subculture, hip-hop amounts to a proclamation of their independence and intolerance or rebellion towards most aspects of the “adult” society (normal and mainstream society), which they consider as hypocritical and oppressive [2]. As a form of art and musical style, hip-hop has a lasting and widespread influence. It has grown into a multi-billion dollar industry since the 1980s,

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