African American Studies Assignment Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

African American Studies - Assignment ExampleAs Ogbar points out, it is now the guinea pig that in the past decade, hip-hop has often deviated from conventional notions of race, even though race and ethnicity still symbolize a big role (Ogbar, 38).The first section of the chapter deals with the way that definitions of the real from the 60s, 70s, and through the 90s. Ogbar argues that hip-hops appeal during its fictile years stemmed from the way it pulled from what he labels forbidding oppositional culture, which opposed the dominant white culture and ideologies (Ogbar, 39). Because of this, what makes things real in hip-hop is at some level an intimate familiarity with the urban, working-class landscapes of the 1970s, as well as canonical knowledge of criminal activity in most cases (Ogbar, 39). It is worth noting, however, that hip-hop from the late 90s on has been progressively political as well, including from commercial rappers who address the problems their ethnic culture faces in sophisticated and highly racialized discources (Ogbar, 40).Interestingly, Ogbar also points out that a lot of the essential elements of hip-hop culture came from Puerto Ricans and other non- desolate ethnicities (Ogbar, 40). This leads into a longer preaching of race, going from what coinstitues a real nigga (Ogbar, 44), the rise of gangsta rap (Ogbar, 45), and the effect that a shift from youthful York City to Los Angeles, with its rampant gangs, heavier chicano presence, had as hip-hop began to feature raw and bold depictions of ghetto life in industrial Los Angeles (Ogbar, 45). It is especially interesting to see how the host called Cypress Hill, which was made up of Latino artists, used black slang that should have been very offensive, but which ended up making them the first Latino group to go platinum (Ogbar, 46). And the way in which Asian-American hip-hop singers do the opposite, by not using black slang at all but still talking out about racism