Final – Global Hip Hop: Deconstructing the “Diaspora”

(Photo – thenewblackmagazine.com)

Since its inception in the South Bronx in the late 1970’s, locale and space have been central to hip-hop. At the beginning, hip-hop crews and posses were often identified with their territory, as gangs had been before them (Price 9). As hip hop has spread around the country and around the globe, it has retained a sense of importance in the “turf” and specific place, while becoming linked to the global hip-hop culture. As Tricia Rose, one of the first influential hip-hop scholars states, “Identity in hip-hop is deeply rooted in the specific, the local experience and one’s attachment to and status in a local group or alternative family” (Heath 863). Some hip-hop scholars have described the spread of hip-hop as the “Hip-Hop Diaspora” (Motley 1). Since it refers to the spread of an art form and culture instead of the spread of a people, it can’t actually be described as a Diaspora, though there are many aspects that liken it to a Diaspora. In the following study, I’ll explore the idea of the Hip-Hop Diaspora and the conflicting identities that emerge with the global spread of hip-hop including association with and resistance to national identity and the racial identity clash of a “black” art spreading around the world.

Most studies of hip-hop trace its roots to the South Bronx neighborhood of New York City in the late 1970s. From the beginning, it has been a global art, created by immigrants. Many of the first hip-hop practitioners, along with US-born Blacks, were first and second generation Latinos (Basu xxi). It grew out of the political and social atmosphere of the end of the Civil Rights movement (Price 2). In the beginning, hip-hop consisted of DJs, the producers spinning records and creating the music of hip-hop by layering breakdowns over other records, b-boys and b-girls, the dancers of hip-hop, graffiti artists, and MCs, the rappers who have now become the most well-known part of hip-hop. These four elements, spinning, breaking, graffiti and rapping, are still the four central elements of hip-hop.

One of the first pioneers of hip hop was DJ Kool Herc, a Jamaican American who was the first real hip-hop DJ, looping the drum breakdown section of records over the entire song (Price 11). He inspired the first b-boys, b-girls, created the first crew, the Kool Herc and the Herculords, and created party venues for hip-hop (Price 12).

DJ Kool Herc

Along with DJ Kool Herc, other DJs began to adapt his style and start the spread of hip hop. Some of the most influential were Grandmaster Flash in the South Bronx, Afrika Bambaataa in the southeast, and DJ Breakout and DJ Baron in the north (Price 12).

Grandmaster Flash (pabuc.wordpress.com)

Afrika Bambaataa (earwaks.com)

Hip-hop really started with the DJs who noticed that the dancers liked dancing most to the drum breakdowns and so started to loop them (Price 22). These dancers, who were inspired by the breaks and then inspired the DJs, were known as b-boys and b-girls, or breakdancers.  Breakdancing included highly acrobatic moves, footwork, floorspins, freezes, and incorporated many other dance styles of funk, popping, locking, gliding, etc. The Rock Steady Crew was one of the most influential early b-boy crews. They spread breakdance around the globe through tours and features in films such as Flashdance, Wild Style, Beat Street, Style Wars, and The Freshest Kids (Price 180). They used battles to recruit and initiate new b-boys and b-girls and to publicly exhibit their moves (Price 181). They were the first breakdance crew to perform in Carnegie Hall and for the Queen of England (Price 181). In this video, the battle scene from Beat Street, you can see examples of “top rock” (the majority of the standing moves), “locking” (consisting, in this case, mostly of body waves), “up rock” (the standing style imitating fighting), “footwork” (the fast leg moves with your hands on the ground), and “power moves” (the acrobatic spins and flips).

Beat Street – Rock Steady Crew (blue) vs. NYC Breakerz

(Photo – jojo.blog.mn)

The art of graffiti was that that was most easily spread by hip-hop practitioners. It was a way for the subculture to assert itself in a public sphere (Price 28). Writing and murals would appear on walls, subway cars, trains, overpasses, etc. Graffiti has often been associated with gangs – using graffiti to promote their gang and mark territory (Price 28). Because of gang association and accusations of vandalism, graffiti has long been outlawed and suppressed by the authorities. However, often, graffiti artists were not gang affiliated, simply individuals who wanted to express themselves publicly (Price 31).

The element of hip-hop that has gained most widespread attention and commercial success is that of of the MCs (master of ceremonies), or rappers. The MCs have been described as urban griots, harking back to the West African tradition of poets and storytellers, spreading and passing on oral history and knowledge about society (Stapleton 220). Modern rappers are use “spoken or sung word to tell stories and teach ‘life lessons’” (Stapleton 220). Rapper Chuck D described rap as the “CNN of Black people” (Basu 3). In the beginning, DJs also acted as MCs, commenting as they spun records (Keyes 2). However, as rap became more widespread, they began to hire separate MCs to rap over their beats. The 1979 release of the Sugarhill Gang’s “Rapper’s Delight” is often used to mark the real beginning of what we now think of as hip-hop culture (Heath 849).

“Rapper’s Delight” – Sugarhill Gang (original 1979 promotion video)

By the late 1980s, rap music had been transformed into a multi billion dollar industry. At this point, it was also gaining international popularity and the different elements of hip-hop were being practiced around the globe. Some of the catalysts of the global spread of hip-hop were “Rapper’s Delight,” the 1980 releases of Blondie’s “Rapture,” and the Soul Sonic Four’s “Zulu Nation Throwdown” produced by Afrika Bambaataa, the 1981 release of “The Adventures of Grandmaster Flash on the Wheels of Steel,” and then in 1982, the release of UK artist Malcolm McLaren’s “Buffalo Gals.”

“Rapture” – Blondie

“Zulu Nation Throwdown” – Soul Sonic Four

“The Adventures of Grandmaster Flash on the Wheels of Steel” – Grandmaster Flash

“Buffalo Gals” – Malcolm McLaren

“Buffalo Gals” was especially important as it united all four elements of hip-hop in one video. The video included scratching, rapping, breakdance, and grafitti writing and with its international popularity, it spread the idea of a unified hip-hop culture based around the four core elements of hip-hop.

Now, hip-hop is seen as a global phenomenon, a transnational culture that has been described in terms of the “Hip-Hop Diaspora,” the “Hip-Hop Nation,” the “Hip-Hop Globe” and the “Hip-Hop Generation.” From it’s global start as an immigrant art in the US, it has spread outward again, creating deep-rooted hip-hop scenes across the world in countries as varied as France, Japan, Cuba, and many others. As Dipannita Basu and Sidney J. Lemelle state, “the roots of rap and hip hop have become (and arguably always have been) international” (Basu 2).

Carol M. Motley and Geraldine Rosa Henderson describe hip-hop culture as a global Diaspora because it spans “ethnic, linguistic, and geographic boundaries” (Motley 243). As Thomas Turino describes it, a Diaspora consists of a culturally unified community dispersed from a real or imagined “homeland” to various host sites. The community maintains a sense of connection with the homeland and various other sites throughout the Diaspora while also incorporating elements of local culture. In this sense, if hip-hop were a people, it would fit perfectly into this description. Hip-hop is a community with its homeland in the South Bronx of the United States. From there, it has spread across the country and throughout the globe with hip-hop heads in other countries identifying strongly with the homeland and other host sites. For example, rappers and b-boys in Cuba are aware of and appreciate their national hip-hop as well as that coming out of France and the original “old school” and contemporary hip-hop of the United States.

Since the commonly accepted definition of the term Diaspora applies to a group of people, not an art form itself, hip-hop cannot be unproblematically labeled a “Diaspora.” However, Motley and Henderson argue that it is a Diaspora with “commonalities among the members of the hip-hop Diaspora” and that “the core essence of hip-hop is shared by marginalized groups” (Motley 243). They also evidence the Diaspora saying that “hip-hop is malleable and is adapted to speak to members of multiple national cultures, and localized socioeconomic and political conditions: hip-hop youth culture is glocalized” (Motley 243).

The term “glocalization” refers to the necessary adaption of any global art, product, etc., to local tastes and interests (Basu 3). Using this idea, globalization intensifies localization (Basu 3). In hip-hop, this is often the case, with hip-hop heads around the world adapting global hip-hop culture to their own aesthetics. As Motley states, “while the core essence and elements of hip-hop are shared by all members of the hip-hop culture, the aesthetic is adapted to suit multiple national cultures, localized conditions and grievances” (Motley 248) In some instances, this translates into the celebration of local culture and art through the use of the cosmopolitan formation that is hip-hop. In other cases, it results in the use of hip-hop to criticize or reject local habits or the national situation. Often, what occurs is a complex mix of the two.

A good example of this nationalist sentiment in hip-hop can be seen in the Cuban hip-hop group Orishas. Orishas are a hip-hop group who started in Cuba under the name Amenaza (Threat). Most of the members immigrated to France where they reformed as the Orishas. There, they have become the most internationally popular Cuban hip-hop group, but are often accused of selling out to consumerism and capitalism. Their song “537 Cuba,” is a remix of the iconic Cuban song, “Chan Chan,” made famous by the Buena Vista Social Club.

“537 Cuba” – Orishas

This is a love song to Cuba talking about the artist’s nostalgia and affection for his homeland. Adding to the music’s iconic reference to Cuba through the song Chan Chan, the lyrics speak of all things Cuban with the title, 537 Cuba, referring to the area code of Havana. The video adds another layer of iconicity with its images of Havana.

Lyrics of Orishas’ “537 Cuba”

Vengo de donde hay un río
Tabaco y cañaveral
Donde el sudor del guajiro
Hace a la tierra soñar.

Soy de Cuba,
Lo que impulso
Y que se pega,
Y cuando llega
No despega,
Pega, pega lo que puso
El Ruzzo en el discurso
Que Compay Segundo puso
Entre tus cejas.

Ahora la distancia queda.

Si de mi lengua estoy viviendo y calmando mi fiel tristeza
De qué forma quieres tú que yo detenga
La sangre de amor y patria que me corre por las venas,
Generaciones vieja y nueva de corazón sangre y pulmón.

Allá lejos dónde el sol calienta más
Olvidé mi corazón, un arroyo y un palmar.
Dejé mi patria querida hace más de un año ya,
Por más que me lo propongo mi herida no cerrará.

Vengo de donde hay un río
Tabaco y cañaveral
Donde el sudor del guajiro
Hace a la tierra soñar.

Extraño mi tierra querida
Hablar de ella ni lo intentes.
Todo el tiempo está en mi mente
La tengo presente, entiendes.
Me habla el corazón que no me miente, hermano.
Flotando ando pasando la mano, “mano”
Sobre el mapa de este mundo
Y desde lo profundo de mi corazón siento nostalgia,
Una extraña sensación como añoranza
De esta distancia
Que se interpone.
Que regresaré bien se supone
Y eso me pone el hombre más feliz por un segundo,
Ya lo cantó Compay Segundo.
Y yo de nuevo escucha el quejo de mi gente chico
Bien te lo explico
Cubano cien por ciento prototipo.

Me arrancaré el corazón y esperaré mi regreso
Para sacarlo otra vez y colocarlo en mi pecho.

Vengo de donde hay un río
Tabaco y cañaveral
Donde el sudor del guajiro
Hace a la tierra soñar.

Cayo Hueso
Saliom Pordo
Buenavista,
Miramar,
Alamar,
La Victoria,
Habana Vieja,
Barrio Nuevo,
Bejucal,
¿Dónde estás tú mi Rampa?
El sol que canta,
La catedral,
El Capitolio se levante en el oído de estas voces,
23 y 12,
Vedado,
Paseo del Prado,
Tus leones lado a lado,
Forman parte de mis tradiciones,
Mis emociones,
Eres tú mi Cuba,
Como tú ninguna.
Kabiosile
Soy Yoruba,
Que no quede duda,
Que si lloro es porque la extraño,
No ver mi Malecón,
A mis amigos de mi zona,
Los que nacieron conmigo,
Los que jugaron conmigo,
Recordarlos sin tenerlos me hace daño,
Año tras año
Sueño con volver a ver
A estos amigos que añoraba.
Color de la campiña cuando llueve.
El Morro, cañonazo a las nueve,
El que te quiere nunca muere,
No, jamás, jamás.

Vengo de donde hay un río
Tabaco y cañaveral
Donde el sudor del guajiro
Hace a la tierra soñar

English Translation

I come from a place where there is a river
Tobacco and sugar-cane plantation
Where the sweat of the peasant
Makes the land dream.

I am from Cuba,
Which imposed itself
And hits you
And when you arrive
You don’t break away
Hit, Hit, what was put
That Compay Segundo put
Between your eyebrows

Now, the distance is left!

If I live from my mothertongue
And calming my faithful sadness
How do you want me to stop
The blood of my love and my country
That runs through my veins
Old and new generations
Of heart, blood and lung.

There, far away
Where the sun heats more
I have forgotten my heart, a stream and a palm grove
I have left my dear native land
More than a year ago
For how much as I put my mind to something
My wound will not heal.

I come from a place where there is a river
Tobacco and sugar-cane plantation
Where the sweat of the peasant
Makes the land dream.

I miss my dear land
Don’t even intent to talk about it
It’s on my mind, all the time
I have it present, understand
The heart that doesn’t lie to me, talks to me, brother
Floating, i put the hand
On this world’s map
And from the bottom of my heart, i feel nostalgia
A strange feeling like sense of loss
Of this distance that interposes
That I will return well, it’s supposed
And this makes me the happiest man, for a second.
Compay Segundo has sung it, and me again
Listen to the moan of my people, boy
Good, I’ll explain it to you
Hundred per cent Cuban prototype.

I will pull out my heart
And I will wait for my return
For pulling it out one more time
And put it in my chest.

I come from a place where there is a river
Tobacco and sugar-cane plantation
Where the sweat of the peasant
Makes the land dream.

I come from a place where there is a river
Tobacco and sugar-cane plantation
Where the sweat of the peasant
Makes the land dream.

Cayo Hueso, San Leopordo
Vuena Vista, Miramar
Alamar, La Victoria
Habana Vieja, Barrio Nuevo
Bejucal
Where are you my Rampa?
The sun that sings, the Cathedral
The imposing building rises
In the ear of this voices
23 and 12, Vedado, Paseo del Prado
Your lions side one by one
Are part of my traditions
My emotions
You are my Cuba
Like you, nobody else
Caviosile, I am Yoruba
No doubt!(Of course!)
If I cry is because I miss it
Not seeing my Malecón
My friends from the neighbourhood
The ones that were born with me
The ones that played with me
Remembering them without having them, makes me suffer
Year after year I dream about seeing again those friends that I yearned for
Your smell of the countryside when it rains
The Morro, Cañonazo of the Nueves
The one that loves you, never dies, never, never.

I come from a place where there is a river
Tobacco and sugar-cane plantation
Where the sweat of the peasant
Makes the land dream.

(lyrics partially from lyricstranslate.com)

The same group has been highly critical of Cuba and the problems in the government and society. In their song “El Kilo,” they talk about all the lies and deception that is Cuba.

“El Kilo” – Orishas

Lyrics to Orishas’ “El Kilo”

A mi estilo te canto mi negro
A mi estilo voy

Mentira no, tíralo, pásalo písalo, asereo
Se te olvido, que el kilo no tiene
Vuelto no, asereo

Entro mi flow, entro mi clan
Mi voz como Jackie Chan
Que es lo que dan, mil cuentos mil
Promesas que enganchan
Yo sí, yo fui lo que te digo pipo
El dinerito es el gobierno
Quien lo raba chico
Habla tu habla como si yo te fuera ajeno
Habla tu, habla política cochina vemos
Pero porque tu esperas
Si el que espera, desesperas veras
Así que juega por la acera verdadera

Estribillo

Es invento es la bala trazante
Que utilizan todos los cuenteros
Los que dicen verdad no son tantos
Dime cuantos y donde los veo
Dime cuanto les costo llegar
Y si son buenos
No es por nada pero no dan ya nervios ni miedo
La mentira puede correr años tiene
Genios eso no lo niego
Recordando los tiempos de ataño
Solo puedo quitarme el sombrero
Lo que tengo es musicalidad viene de lejos
No es robado, ni copiado es más
Es heredado, es otra edad

Estribillo

Te lo advertí más de una vez
Que yo no entro en el juego
De pendencieros mentirosos
Y embusteros viejos
Para el que se atreve
Esta poniendo en juego su pellejo
Tremendo bla, bla, bla, tremendo guaguanco,
Rumberito recoge al Viejo que su tiempo
Ya ha pasado
Y ahora camina de lado embustero

A mi estilo te canto mi negro

La mentira no pasa, si no esperas
Desesperas y que
Ya te paso una vez, son dos
Si no lo ves

Estribillo

English Translation

In my style I sing to you, my black
In my style I go
Lie not, throw it, pass it, step on it, asereo (slang – dude, guy, buddy, etc)
You’ve forgotten, the kilo hasn’t got
No return asereo

I go in my flow, enter my clan
My voice like Jackie Chan
What’s what they give you
What-many-thousands
Promises that hook

I did, I was what I tell you pipo
Little money is the government
Who steals it guy

You speak as if I was foreign to you
You speak, speak dirty politics we see
But why you wait?
If who waits despairs, you see

So play on the real curb

The invention is the tracing bullet
What all story-tellers use
Those who say the truth are not so many
Tell me how many and where to see them
Tell me how hard it was for them to get here
And if they’re good
It’s not for nothing but they are not scary or nervous?
The lie can run for years
It has genius I don’t deny it
All I can do is remove my hat

Remembering the old times
All I can do is remove my hat
What I’ve got is musicality from way back
What I’ve got
It’s not stolen or copied, it’s more
It’s inherited, is another age

I warned you more than once
That I don’t get into the game
Of trouble-maker liars
And old liars / story-tellers
For whom dares
It’s putting your skin on the game
All that bla-bla, what a big guaguanco,
Rumberito (rumbler?) picks up the old man
Whose time is gone
And now walks on his side (crooked), liar

The lie doesn’t pass, if you don’t wait
Despair and
It happened once, it’s two
If you don’t see it

Along with the issues of national identity within the global hip-hop scene, the spread of hip-hop has created conflicting racial identities and issues dealing with the association of hip-hop as a “black” art and its appropriation by other races. As Halifu Osumare states, “No investigation of hip-hop inside or outside the United States can be complete without the discussion of the issue of race, its place in America, and the resulting appropriation and exportation of ‘blackness’” (Osumare 8). Sometimes in hip-hop, class identity takes precedent over racial identity. In rapper Lupe Fiasco’s song “Kick Push II,” he describes the poor hardships of young urban life, not exclusively for Black Americans, saying “And see, his girl was a white girl / But, just cause she was white, see her life wasn’t light-world / She, too had the drama thick…”

Internationally, issues of race in hip-hop are highlighted by the clashing racial identities of hip-hop as an African-American art coming into places where racial relations and identities are very different than those in the United States. In some places, where there are substantial African-descended communities, hip-hop is seen as a way to connect to a Black racial identity. For example, in France, hip-hop is often strongly associated with African immigrant communities (Basu 151). There is an abundance of references to Africa in French Rap lyrics and one of the first French rap hits, “Les tam-tam de l’Afrique” by IAM deals expressly with issues of slavery and French exploitation of African people (Basu 151).

“Les tam-tam de l’Afrique” – IAM

Lyrics of “Les tam-tam de l’Afrique” – IAM

Ils sont arrivs un matin par dizaines par centaines
Sur des monstres de bois aux entrailles de chanes.
Sans bonjours ni questions, pas mme de prsentations
Ils se sont installs et sont devenus les patrons,
Puis se sont transforms en vritables sauvages
Jusqu’ les humilier au plus profond de leur me.
Enfants battus, vieillards tus, mutils
Femmes salies, insultes et dshonores.
Impuissants, les hommes enchans subissaient
Les douloureuses lamentations de leur peuple opprim
Mais chacun d’entre eux en lui-mme se doutait
Qu’il partait pour un voyage don’t il ne rentrerait jamais,
Qu’il finirait dans un port pour y tre vendu.
Il pleurait dj son pays perdu.
Trait en infrieur cause d’une diffrence de couleur,
Chaque jour nouveau tait annonciateur de malheur.
Au fond des cales o on les entassait,
Dans leurs esprits les images dfilaient.
Larmes au got sal, larmes ensanglantes,
Dans leurs esprits, longtemps retentissaient
Les champs de la partie de leur tre qu’on leur a arrache
Mais sans jamais tuer l’espoir qui les nourrissait
Qu’un jour, il retrouveraient ces rivages feriques
D’o s’lvent jamais les tam tam de l’Afrique
Les tam tam de l’Afrique {2x}
Perchs sur une estrade, groups comme du btail,
Jets de droite gauche tels des ftus de paille,
Ils leur ont inculqu que leur couleur tait un crime.
Ils leur ont tout vol, jusqu’ leurs secrets les plus intimes,
Pill leur culture, brl leurs racines,
De l’Afrique du Sud, jusqu’aux rives du Nil
Et prsent pavoisent les usurpateurs
Ceux qui ont un bloc de granite la place du cur.
Ils se moquaient des pleurs et semaient la terreur
Au sein d’un monde qui avait faim, froid et peur
Et qui rvait de courir dans les plaines paisib

English Translation

They arrived one morning tens hundreds
Monsters on the wooden bowels of chan.
No hello or questions, not even of Presentation
They settled and became the patrons,
Until the deep humiliation of me.
Then turned into genuine wild
Battered children, the elderly tus, mutilated
Dirty women, insults and dishonors.
Helpless, men suffered in chains
The painful lamentations of their oppressed people
But each of them he even suspected
He left for a trip do not fall it does not,
He cried dj lost his country.
It would in a port to be sold.
Trait in infrieur because of a difference of color,
Each new day was harbinger of doom.
At the bottom of the holds were piled o,
In their minds the images dfilaient.
Got tears in sal, bloody tears,
In their minds, long loud
The fields in that part of their being that they were hard
But never kill the hope that feeds
One day it will find these shores Férique
D’o s’lvent never tam tam de l’Afrique
The tam tam de l’Afrique (2x)
Perched on a podium, groups like btail,
Jets right left like straw fetus,
They have taught that color was a crime.
They have a flight until their most intimate secrets,
Pill their culture, their roots behind,
From South Africa, to the shores of the Nile
And this pavoisent the thieves
Those who have a block of granite instead of the heart.
They were laughing and crying sowing terror
In a world that was hungry, cold and scared
And who run in the plains paisib

(lyrics from LyricsMode.com)

In other places, where there is less of an African population, hip-hop racial identity is often reinterpreted and adopted by minority groups. They identify with the marginalization of African-Americans and the resistance to this marginalization in hip-hop. This idea of “collective marginalization” or “connective marginalities,” refers to the “historic context of American racism” and the ability of global meanings of blackness to “signify parallel issues of marginality and difference marked already in other countries” (Osumare 62). Hip-hop allows people to become part of a larger global community when they are on the outskirts of their own society. Communities who “might be viewed as at the fringes of their respective societies, historically oppressed,” can become members of the connective marginality of hip-hop culture (Motley 246).

In Aotearoa, New Zealand, the Maori, the indigenous people who have been historically the oppressed minority group on the island, have adopted hip-hop as a method of resistance to the dominant social order (Mitchell 1). They have established a syncretic style of Maori music, African-American music, and global popular music with lyrics often sung in Maori (Mitchell 1). Maori hip-hop has adopted the global hip-hop culture, but associate it with a very strong, sometimes militant sense of local racial identity as an oppressed indigenous ethnic group.

“The Revolution Will Not Be Colonized.” – Revolution MCs

This song, by the Maori Aotearoa hip hop group, Revolution MCs, denounces the destructive history of European colonization. Though it is done in English, there are many groups who use Maori language, such as UHP, the Upper Hutt Posse including Dean Hupeta, the first Maori rapper to release a recording (Mitchell 1).

“Ngati” – Upper Hutt Posse

Across the world, hip-hop is being used and adapted to people with many different identities and many different goals. However, despite the importance given to location and specific identities, members of the global hip-hop communities are all linked through the the cosmopolitan art and culture of hip-hop. Today, hip-hop is incredibly widespread, permeating many aspects of life for various communities. As rapper Snoop Dog once said, “Hip-hop is what makes the world go ’round.”

Bibliography

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Keyes, Cheryl L. Rap Music and Street Consciousness. University of Illinois Press: Urbana and Chicago. 2002.

Mitchell, Tony. “Doin Damage in my Native Language: the use of “Resistance Vernaculars” in France, Italy, and Aotearoa / New Zealand.” Local Noise. Australian Research Council. 2007.

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