Rap Artists in the African-Nova Scotian Community

Rap Artists in the African-Nova Scotian Community:

“Speaking on My Past, My Present and Where I Wanna Be”

Alyssa Gerhardt

Thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the

requirements for the Degree of

Master of Arts

(Sociology)

Acadia University

Spring Convocation 2015

This thesis by Alyssa Gerhardt was defended successfully in an oral examination on April 9, 2015.

The examining committee for the thesis was:

______Dr. Anna Redden, Chair

______Dr. Afua Cooper, External Reader

______Dr. Claudine Bonner, Internal Reader

______Dr. Tony Thomson, Supervisor

______Dr. Jeff Hennessy, Acting Head/Director

This thesis is accepted in its present form by the Division of Research and Graduate Studies as satisfying the thesis requirements for the degree Master of Arts (Sociology).

………………………………..……………

I, Alyssa Gerhardt, grant permission to the University Librarian at Acadia University to reproduce, loan or distribute copies of my thesis in microform, paper or electronic formats on a non-profit basis. I however, retain the copyright in my thesis.

______

Alyssa Gerhardt

______

Dr. Tony Thomson

______

Date

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Table of Contents ABSTRACT ...... VII

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ...... VIII

CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION ...... 1

CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW ...... 5

SOCIAL HISTORY OF AFRICAN NOVA SCOTIANS ...... 5

Education ...... 8

Employment Opportunities ...... 11

Class/Poverty ...... 14

Militancy/Collectivism/Identity ...... 15

HISTORY OF RAP MUSIC ...... 20

QUESTIONS OF AUTHENTCITY: LITERATURE ON RAP MUSIC ...... 27

Rap’s Commercialization and Social Progress ...... 29

Race and Authenticity: Is it all Black and White? ...... 34

Women in Rap: Not Just One of the Boys ...... 37

Class, Community, Locality and Hybridity ...... 41

RAP MUSIC IN NOVA SCOTIA ...... 44

CHAPTER 3: THEORY ...... 53

MEDIA STUDIES/ POPULAR CULTURE THEORY ...... 53

SUBCULTURAL THEORY ...... 62

Class Consciousness and Resistance ...... 64

Commoditized Communication and Consumerism ...... 66

Localization of Subcultures ...... 69

Criticism of Subcultural Theory ...... 70

CRITICAL RACE/BLACK FEMINIST THEORY ...... 72

Critical Race Theory ...... 73

Black Feminist Theory ...... 75

Postfeminism ...... 78

CHAPTER 4: METHODOLOGY ...... 81

LIMITATIONS, OBSTACLES AND CHALLENGES ...... 85

ETHICAL CONSIDERATIONS ...... 87

CHAPTER 5: RESULTS AND DISCUSSION ...... 91

COMMUNITY LIFE ...... 91

Description of Community ...... 91

Extra-Curriculars, Community Work and Youth ...... 93

Family Life ...... 94

EDUCATION ...... 95

FANDOM AND MUSICAL INFLUENCES ...... 99

First Experiences Listening to Rap ...... 100

Favourite Artists and Artistic Influences ...... 100

Important Elements of Rap ...... 102

Other Genres of Music ...... 103

MAINSTREAM/UNDERGROUND DICHOTOMY ...... 104

PERSONAL RAP MUSIC ...... 108

Role of Community ...... 110

NOVA SCOTIA RAP SCENE ...... 113

THE ROLE OF GENDER IN RAP ...... 117

Appearance and Pressures to Conform ...... 118

Competition Among Female Artists ...... 122

THE ROLE OF RACE IN RAP ...... 123

THE ROLE OF CLASS IN RAP ...... 127

CHAPTER 6: CONCLUSION ...... 131

Future Research ...... 136

REFERENCES ...... 138

APPENDIX A: INTERVIEW GUIDE ...... 147

APPENDIX B: RESEARCH SUMMARY AND PARTICIPANT CONSENT FORM ...... 148

Abstract

This thesis investigates the role of rap music in the African-Nova Scotian context by examining Black rap artists’ experiences growing up in various local communities and their views on the contemporary rap scene. This study also provides an understanding of racial, gender and class dimensions of the rap subculture, and how Black participants view their music and experiences. There is an absence of scholarly attention paid to

African-Nova Scotian culture and the contemporary rap scene; this study combines the two topics. This study provides a basis for further research on African-Nova Scotian rap music and the contemporary Nova Scotian rap scene. The sample consists of six participants who are a part of the African Nova Scotian community; there is an equal representation of female and male participants. A qualitative semi-structured interview research method was utilized, which took place between April 2014 and December 2014.

The findings of this study indicate that participants use rap as a means of creative self-expression that is influenced by their life narratives and community experiences.

Experiences of participants in the Nova Scotia rap scene are diverse. There is a consensus that the scene is fragmented and there is a desire for a collective movement. Women are marginalized in the scene. They experience challenges as artists that their male counterparts do not; such as, an emphasis on appearance over artistry, and unhealthy competition with other female rappers. The majority of participants do not view race as a significant component of the music, while others critically contemplate its role. Class is viewed as an important aspect in regard to the financial costs of producing music, and offering different perspectives to the music.

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Acknowledgements

I would first and foremost like to thank Dr. Tony Thomson. As my thesis supervisor he has gone above and beyond to ensure that this project was successful. His patience, time and academic guidance are deeply appreciated. Thank you to Dr. Claudine

Bonner who has provided her extensive knowledge of race and African-Nova Scotian history to this project. I have thoroughly enjoyed our discussions of race and Black culture. Thank you to my interview participants who shared their time and their voices, making this study possible. I am so happy I had the chance to meet all of you. Thank you for sharing your experiences, your music and teaching me many different things.

Karen Turner, you are a friend, a lifesaver and so much more. Thank you for always sparing me a few moments to chat and thanks for all the candies over the years.

To Stacey Knickle, you are the one person who has been through it all with me. I am so proud of us! Thank you for always being a good friend to laugh with and someone who shares my passion for sociology. I can’t believe our Acadia chapter is over. I would also like to thank my mother Claudine for never censoring my taste in music and allowing me to discover this passion. Thank you to my sister Brittany for always believing in me.

Finally, Cody McGregor, who was there for it all behind the scenes. You have shown an immense amount of patience and support throughout this process. I will not say the last year and a half has been easy but you helped me rediscover my love for this project even in the moments where I wanted to give up. You always believe in me and I can’t thank you enough for that. I’m so excited for the next chapter and the new doors that this project will open!

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CHAPTER 1: Introduction

“You can do anything with rap music; you can go from the past to the future to what’s happening now.” -- Afrika Bambaataa

Rap music evolved out of the Hip-Hop movement originating in New York City, specifically the South Bronx area, during the early 1970s. This movement was a result of

African American voices of protest coming from the margins of postindustrial American society (Forman 2012: 250; Haines 1999: 56; Higgins 2009: 8; Keyes 2002: 1; Kitwana

2012: 454; Pough 2004: 4; Rose 1994: 2, 2012). Urban renewal in the 1960s and 1970s in

New York City had resulted in the rise of low-income housing projects, a shift to a low- income economy, displaced populations of African Americans and Hispanic populations and a gradual loss of federal funding for social services (Chang 2007: 11; Keyes 2002: 46;

Neal 2012: 477; Rose 1994: 33).

The result of these changes was identity crises for African American youth culture, because the traditional forms of community had eroded. The Hip-Hop movement became a method of alternative identity formation that focused on local experiences and attachment to the community. Hip-Hop provided an alternative method of status

attainment for African American youth in a society where they had few opportunities for formal education and social mobilization (Neal 2012: 481; Pough 2004: 7; Rose 1994: 34;

Wright 2012a: 519). Originally, the Hip-Hop movement consisted of rap music, breakdancing, DJing and graffiti as ways to express resistance to the social plagues facing

Black culture (Rose 1994: 2). As a combination of African cultural oral traditions and post-modern technology, rap music has become the most successfully commercialized and globalized aspect of the original Hip-Hop movement (Rose 1994: 63). Rap is today a multi-billion dollar industry and has crossed racial, class, and geographical barriers

(Higgins 2009: 74; Keyes 2002: 2; Neal 2012: 495; Perry 2012a: 510).

The Black population of Nova Scotia, Canada has struggled since their settlement with prejudice and discrimination on an institutional and behavioural level (Clairmont and Magill 1970: 27). Black populations are scattered over the entire province, with a concentration in the Halifax-Dartmouth area (Clairmont and Magill 1970: 36). African

Nova Scotian communities, because of their isolation from non-Black communities and other Black communities, have developed relatively independently, for example, in the

Prestons (Abucar 1988: 4). McGuire claims that the historical and institutional racism felt by African-Nova Scotians became a catalyst for the emergence of a Hip-Hop subculture

(2011: 24). Similar to the African American populations of New York City during the

1970’s, the lives of Halifax blacks were affected by urban renewal (McGuire 2011: 28).

Prior to the emergence of rap subcultures, Africville was closed during the 1960’s causing more than 2500 low-income and predominately Black families to be relocated into housing projects in areas such as Gottigen Street and Uniacke Square (McGuire

2011: 34-35; Nelson 2008: 57). There is a lack of contemporary academic literature on

African-Nova Scotian culture, as well as the Nova Scotian rap scene in general. This thesis combines the two topics attempting to close this noticeable gap in the literature while adding an important field of study to academia.

For the context of this thesis, rap is defined as, a rhymed and spoken narrative accompanied by strong rhythmic or electronically based music. This study examines rap music as a part of the larger Hip-Hop culture; it does not include the other elements of the culture, including breakdancing, DJing and graffiti, although they are important forms of creative expression in the Hip-Hop movement. Due to rap’s popularity and commercialization, Hip-Hop and rap are often interchangeable concepts. In the context of this thesis, Hip-Hop symbolizes the larger culture in which rap is a form of musical expression. While this thesis investigates the dimensions of race, gender and class in the contemporary Nova Scotian rap scene, sexual orientation and post-modern technology are excluded because of confidentiality reasons and the limited scope of this study.

My personal interest this topic can be traced back to the age of nine. I was shopping with my mother at the local mall and, through boredom I walked into the CD store by myself. I picked up an album with a Black female on the cover. She had tattoos on her breasts, symbolizing someone very unfamiliar to my upbringing in a predominately white rural area. With the little spending money I had, I went to the counter to purchase the album. The young woman at the counter hesitated to sell me the

CD because I was so young and there was a Parental Advisory Label on the album. In the end, she did sell it to me. I think back to this moment now and realize how her decision impacted my life. If she had not sold the album to me, I would still have been introduced to rap because of its popularity and mainstream success, but because I was introduced at

the age of impressionable age of nine, rap influenced me in a way that it did not for my peers. I was able to expand on my knowledge of the genre, by buying mainstream, underground, political, female, male, old school and new school rap. I read the history, I researched the culture and, as I got older, I began to acknowledge my own race, gender and geographical location and how I, (as an individual who was theoretically so far removed from the original context in which rap emerged), could love the music so much.

Chapter 2 of this thesis includes a social history of African-Nova Scotians, a history of Hip-Hop, a discussion of the contemporary literature on rap music, and the history of Hip-Hop in Nova Scotia. Chapter 3 presents and discusses various theoretical frameworks; such as cultural theory, popular culture and media studies, subcultural theory, critical race and feminist theory, and postfeminist theory. Chapter 4 outlines the methodological considerations, research methods used, the research process, and ethical considerations for this study. Chapter 5 presents the data from the interview process and discusses it in relation to the larger theoretical frameworks and literature. Finally, Chapter

6 concludes this study by presenting the main findings from the interview data and suggesting avenues for further research on this topic. The next chapter familiarizes the reader with African-Nova Scotian culture and the scholarly discussions about Hip-Hop culture and rap music, thus setting the context for this thesis.

CHAPTER 2: Literature Review

The art was disregarded for economy They played us, it ain’t like the labels let artists eat They bait us with dreams of escapin’ poverty VMA’ed ya, yet they pay us like minorities.” -- Cormega ft. Little Brother “The Rap Game”

SOCIAL HISTORY OF AFRICAN NOVA SCOTIANS

The social history of African-Nova Scotians is essential to this study because it provides an understanding of the socio-historical context in which Nova Scotia’s rap subculture emerged. A social history is also imperative because the sample population of this study belongs to the Black community in Nova Scotia and have been directly or indirectly racialized by the various social factors that have affected this community and culture. This section of the literature review includes: a brief history of Black settlement, education, employment opportunities, class and poverty, militancy/collectivism and identity.

I will also discuss historical events that affected Black culture in Nova Scotia.

Because of the familiarity Nova Scotians and other Canadians have with the Black community of Africville, it will be used as an ethnographic example presented throughout the social history. Africville is a prominent part of Nova Scotian Black history and it represents many facets of historical lived Black reality. Africville is one of the most studied aspects of Black history in Nova Scotia during the later twentieth-century.

The significance of this community in academic literature speaks to the lack of additional detailed ethnographies of African-Nova Scotians’ experiences. The effects of the 5

destruction of Africville will be noted while discussing social issues of the Nova Scotian

Black community.

It is important to communicate, before presenting the following information on

African Nova Scotian culture, that there is a noted absence of contemporary literature in this field; consequently, many of the sources utilized are outdated and some of the information may not be applicable to the present day. Furthermore, the history of

African-Nova Scotian culture is much more detailed and complex than what is presented in this section; however, it could not all be included because of the limited space and resources for this work. Some topics of importance that are not included are the important role of the church, and violence and addictions in the African-Nova Scotian community.

History of Black Settlement

Nova Scotia has the largest indigenous Black population in Canada. Residing in Nova

Scotia for over two hundred years, African-Nova Scotian roots date back to 1750 (Abucar

1988: 1; Sehatzadeh 2008: 408). Black slavery was apparent in Nova Scotia at the time of the first Black settlers and continued on for fifty years, until around 1800. The foundation of oppression and marginalization that has survived into the present was laid by a society where slavery was present (Clairmont and Magill 1970: 7; Pachai 1990: 61; Walker

1980:19, 1985: 9; Winks 1997: 44). While historically there has been a constant movement of migrants into and out of Nova Scotia, the original African-Nova Scotian population consisted of three major migrations of Blacks, which occurred during the early years of settlement; that of the Loyalists, Maroons and Refugees (Abucar 1988;

Clairmont and Magill 1970; Sehatzadeh 2008; Nelson 2008; Pachai 1990: 62; Winks

1997).

The Black Refugees and their descendants founded Africville, located on the shore of the Bedford Basin, in the 1840s (Nelson 2008: 12). Since its existence, Africville was denied basic amenities by the city of Halifax. This included; water and sewage lines; fire protection; garbage collection; police services; and building permits for residents to improve their homes (Nelson 2008: 12; Silver 2008: 11). Due to development and expansion in Halifax various industries invaded land that belonged to Africville, among them, an infectious disease hospital, slaughterhouses, railway lines, a dump etc. (Nelson

2008: 12; Pachai 1990: 224; Silver 2008: 11). The tendency to locate socially undesirable facilities near minority communities has been labeled environmental racism.

Along with “experts” who were responsible for evaluating the state of Africville, the city of Halifax and government officials claimed the appalling state of the community necessitated the relocation of its residents and the destruction of the community. In 1964, the Rose Report written by Albert Rose, a professor of social work stated that all the residents of Africville must be relocated to make the North End’s industrial development possible (Nelson 2008: 77). By the end of the 1960s, Halifax had destroyed Africville

(Nelson 2008: 13). Residents of Africville were dispersed throughout the city and placed in rental units or public housing projects (Nelson 2008: 57).

The difficulties faced by the Refugees since their settlement plays a key role in understanding the contemporary state of African-Nova Scotian culture, as the majority of present-day Black Nova Scotians are their descendants (Abucar 1988: 18; Clairmont and

Magill 1970: 130; Winks 1997: 127). These difficulties will be discussed in terms of

education, employment opportunities, lack a of a collective and militant identity and the everyday discrimination faced by African-Nova Scotians.

Education

Education is often viewed as a means for social mobility; for the African-

Canadian population of Nova Scotia, this was not the case. For many African-Nova

Scotians, low educational opportunities have reinforced their marginalization dating back to their settlement (Walker 1980: 45; Sehatzadeh 2008: 409). As a result of legislation, schooling in Nova Scotia was predominantly segregated until 1964 (Abucar 1988: 14;

Pachai 1990: 128) although the last segregated school in Nova Scotia did not close until

1983 (Black History Canada 2015). Schools began to be slowly integrated in the late

1960s; a positive effect of integration was noted in terms of opportunities for Black students. The academic achievements of Black students began to be recognized in comparison to White students, and Black and White students were able to compete for educational success (Abucar 1988: 48). Teaching standards also improved (Clairmont and Magill 1970: 25) and Black students gained access to other educational opportunities that were previously unavailable to them, such as, the French Immersion program, music and physical education programs. An integrated school system also allowed for a greater awareness about and interaction between students from ethnically diverse backgrounds

(Abucar 1988: 62), which can have both positive and negative consequences.

While there were noted positive effects of an integrated school system, it posed new problems for African Nova Scotian students, especially for those living in isolated, urban fringe communities. The School Board encouraged Black children to attend schools in White communities that were located close to their home communities. The

School Board implemented a policy that created new schools that would benefit White communities rather than improving the existing schools in Black communities. This inequity created concern in the Black communities because they did not want to depend on White communities to educate their children (Abucar 1988: 52). Given that Black children had to travel to attend school, the teachers usually knew very little about their communities and, consequently, they knew little about the specific needs of these students. This ignorance allowed for the teachers to have presumed ideas about both the

Black communities and Black students. Teachers were inadequately trained to deal with situations of discrimination and prejudice affecting Black students (Abucar 1988: 14). It is important to note that the last segregated school in Canada was in Nova Scotia. It closed in 1983, a fact that reveals the racism and discrimination inherent in the education system only three decades ago, which likely had an impact on the way communities and individuals self-identified and understood their experiences.

Abucar (1988) noted that some African-Nova Scotians who had acquired higher levels of education were able to obtain well-paying jobs in the urban centres of Halifax and Dartmouth. However, Abucar (1988), Clairmont and Magill (1970), and Walker

(1980) noted a decline in the number of African-Nova Scotian students enrolled in senior high school. Abucar argued that this diminution could be attributed to a number of different factors: Black students seeking employment immediately after completing junior high; hesitation to complete high school because they did not feel it would lead to improved economic opportunities through employment; lack of family support because of an increase in Black unemployment; and finally, the influence of the families’ generally poor economic situation and lack of family supervision (Abucar 1988: 62). Clairmont and

Magill also argue that the decline in African-Nova Scotians’ enrolled in high school could be attributed to Black students belief that post-school employment opportunities would not be available to them (1970: 61).

In 1994, the Black Learners Advisory Committee wrote the BLAC Report on

Education to address the issue that the Nova Scotia education system was not meeting the needs of Black students. The report names six factors that contribute to low success rates regarding education for the Black community and then provides possible solutions to these issues. These elements include racism and its manifestations within the school environment, teacher insensitivity and low expectations, curriculum deficiencies, student factors, parental issues and community problems (BLAC Report 1994). The report attributed Black students leaving school to the outcome of a long process of alienation and discouragement with the education system, accompanied by poverty. The students who did leave school did not recognize the structural mechanics at work because of the gradual nature of the process of alienation (BLAC Report 1994: 139).

Twenty years after the BLAC report had made recommendations to improve the cconditions facing Black students in Nova Scotia, the Chronicle Herald reported, in

“More work to be done to help black students in Nova Scotia,” that educators and members of the African-Nova Scotian community met and agreed that further improvements were needed (Chronicle Herald 2014). They did, however, acknowledge that progress had been made in terms of the African-Canadian Services Division of the provincial Education Department, the Council on African-Canadian Education, and the establishment of the Delmore Buddy Daye Learning Institute. Other initiatives include an emergence of courses centered on African history and heritage, scholarships and

bursaries for African-Nova Scotians, more student support workers, and more African-

Nova Scotians becoming elected members of school boards (Chronicle Herald 2014).

In 2014, the Chronicle Herald publicized the rising concern over falling literary rates for Black students. The article attested that literacy testing of Grade 3 and 6 showed that Halifax students were performing well overall except for those who identified as

African-Nova Scotian or were from low-income areas. For example, while Halifax students overall scored 70% on reading comprehension, African Nova Scotians scored 54% and students from low-income households scored 50% (Jeffrey 2014). Wright (2012b) claims that the deficit in educational attainment is one reason why African-Nova Scotians may be disproportionately participating in violence and crime. He argues that over the last few decades there has been an increased demand for education in order to find employment; however, African Nova Scotians are less integrated and supported by the education system (6-7).

Contemporary statistics suggest that the educational opportunities for African-

Nova Scotians continue to be poor compared to all Nova Scotians. The data indicate that

65% of African Nova Scotians over 15 years of age hold a degree, certificate or diploma, compared to 73% of Nova Scotians. Data also suggest that only 18% of African-Nova

Scotians have a university degree compared to 22% of all Nova Scotians (African Nova

Scotia Affairs 2014). As a consequence of the limited educational opportunities available to them, Nova Scotian Blacks have inevitably faced barriers in obtaining employment.

Employment Opportunities

Many African-Nova Scotians have faced difficulties obtaining employment and entering the job market despite being skilled and qualified for a position. The challenges

and barriers to employment opportunities were notably created by human constraints

(Abucar 1988: 16, 29; Clairmont and Magill 1970: 56; Walker 1980: 92; Winks 1997:

452). In the past, Black employment was both limited and exploited. The participation of

Black communities in the economy was limited because of their isolation, as the majority of African Nova Scotian communities had been settled outside of the larger towns and communities in the province (Abucar 1988: 13; Walker 1980: 103). Labour was exploited because many Black communities depended on occupations outside of their community to sustain them without adequate compensation (Abucar 1988: 83; Walker 1980: 99,

1985: 9). With the rise of an urban economy, members of Black communities located close to urban centers experienced higher rates of employment. However, as the urbanization of places such as Halifax and Dartmouth increased, Black employment in the urban economy decreased. This decline was ruled in discrimination and preferences for White workers over Blacks. Many African-Nova Scotians had to migrate to other provinces to find work (Abucar 1988: 26; Walker 1985: 15).

Informal discrimination has led to the denial of employment for Blacks by unions and employers in both public and private institutions. Employment discrimination was most prominent during times of limited provincial economic growth (Abucar 1988: 27;

Walker 1985: 16). If African-Nova Scotians obtained employment, it consisted of low- skill and poor-pay jobs; for example, jobs in the service industry, seasonal work and construction (Abucar 1988: 29; BLAC Report 1994: 146; Clairmont and Magill 1970: 56;

Walker 1985: 21; Winks 1997: 452). Some African-Nova Scotians were subject to long- term unemployment and became dependent on government subsidies, such as unemployment insurance or social assistance (Abucar 1988: 91). African-Nova Scotians

were rarely represented in managerial positions, and Black women were especially disadvantaged in comparison to their male counterparts (Abucar 1988: 33).

Prior to the closing of Africville, few members of that community held regular positions of employment (Winks 1997: 453). Africville residents collectively were self- sustainable and sufficient, relying on very few financial resources to survive (Nelson

2008:63; Walker 1980: 103). The closing of Africville did not improve employment opportunities for Black residents; high-employment rates remained and a new-found dependency on welfare services developed, as old methods of sustainability and a sense of community were eroded (Nelson 2008: 94). The integration of Africville community members into the larger Halifax population also sparked a new wave of hostility and discrimination from Whites, especially working-class Whites, because they competed for low-wage jobs, services and resources. The White middle to high classes in Halifax exploited Blacks as cheap labour (Nelson 2008: 100).

Presently, the situation of African Nova Scotians in terms of employment opportunities continues to be poor. According to 2011 Canadian census data, the unemployment rate of Blacks was 14.5% compared to 9.9% for the rest of Nova Scotians.

The gap of unemployment is greater among males, with Black males representing 17.2% compared to 10.7% of other Nova Scotians (African Nova Scotia Affairs 2014). High unemployment rates, dependency on governmental subsidies and discrimination have contributed to the general socio-economic status of African Nova Scotians, and many continue to live in a perpetual state of poverty.

Class/Poverty

African-Nova Scotians have continually lived in a state of poverty that is a result of structural and historical conditions. On average, Black people experience lower socio- economic status than Whites in Nova Scotia (BLAC Report 1994: 154; Bonner 2012: 10;

Clairmont and Magill 1970: 5; Walker 1980: 77; Winks 1997: 59). However, Black poverty in Nova Scotia is part of a larger case of regional poverty within an economically depressed province (Clairmont and Magill 1970: 79). The vicious cycle of poverty experienced by Blacks can be attributed to both structural and personal discrimination, created and supported by historical oppression (Clairmont and Magill 1970: 36; Walker

1985: 10). In order to understand Blacks’ socio-economic position, it is important to examine basic structural and cultural components and look beyond education and job training, as many African- Nova Scotians attempt socio-economic betterment through legitimate means, yet remain unsuccessful (Clairmont and Magill 1970: 66; Walker 1985:

17).

The 2011 census data suggest that African-Nova Scotians continue to be worse off socio-economically than other Nova Scotians. The average income for Black males is

$29, 837, and for Black females it is $24, 929, compared to the average annual incomes for Nova Scotian males ($42, 545) and females ($29, 460). Furthermore, 34.8% of Black

Nova Scotians are considered low-income earners versus 16.5% of all Nova Scotians

(African Nova Scotia Affairs 2014). Living in poverty with few educational and employment opportunities, many Nova Scotia Blacks live in a perpetual state of hopelessness about improving their conditions. This hopelessness created a need for militancy and collective action as the last resort for leading to a brighter future.

Militancy/Collectivism/Identity

The lack of collectivism and militancy of African-Nova Scotians can, in part be attributed to the historical isolation of Black communities. Groups of African Nova

Scotians were dispersed across the province with a concentration of the population located in the urban centres of Halifax and Dartmouth (Abucar 1988: 3; Clairmont and

Magill 1970: 117; Walker 1980: 157; Winks 1997: 130). Historically, Black Nova

Scotians showed signs of separatism; this was especially apparent between the Black

Loyalists and Refugees. They shared a different history, a different religion and did not work together even in their own communities. Isolation and separatism made it easy for them to be victimized by White discrimination, as Whites viewed them as a monolithic group despite their refusal to work as a collective (Nelson 2008: 64; Winks 1997: 141).

As Abucar (1988) notes, competition is more likely than cooperation between disadvantaged groups (80). Lack of political leadership and initiative have also been attributed to low-educational opportunities and disorganization (Winks 1997: 135).

Separatism was not as apparent within communities as it was between communities. A sense of solidarity was crucial in order to successfully share resources, information and values, and escape from the discrimination of Whites. Community solidarity was remarkably apparent in the former Black community of Africville and continues to be seen in the communities of the Prestons and Cherrybrook (Abucar 1988: 15; Nelson 2008:

32).

African-Nova Scotians’ failure to mobilize as a collective may have contributed to their poverty (Clairmont and Magill 1970: 120). Until the 1960s, poverty in Canada was viewed as the result of an individual’s lack of hard work and achievement. As people

began to realize that there were structural barriers to socio-economic betterment, activism and militancy arose aimed at alleviating poverty in both urban and rural areas (Abucar

1988: 66; Clairmont and Magill 1970: 119). During the twentieth century many different organizations and groups were created in Nova Scotia, whose intentions were to initiate structural and social change (Bonner 2012: 3). For example, the Nova Scotia Association for the Advancement of Coloured People was founded in 1945 on the basis of collective engagement on issues such as housing, poverty, employment and education for Black

Nova Scotians (Pachai 1990: 159; Walker 1980: 124, 1985: 17). Clairmont and Magill

(1970) note, however, that until the 1970s there was little presence of a strong and distinct Black subcultural identity. The late 1960s and 1970s, a growing and active Black movement against racism arose. The primary disquiets of this activism were concerned with surrounded poor housing, unemployment, poverty, and everyday experiences of prejudice (Nelson 2008: 75; Pachai 1990: 246; Walker 1980: 169).

The motivation for Black militancy and collectivism in Nova Scotia was also inspired by African-American political and social movements, such as the Black Power

Movement and the Black Panthers. During the 1960s and lasting into the late 1980s, there was an active African-Nova Scotian Black Power Movement (Clairmont and Magill 1970:

91; Bonner 2012: 2; Walker 1985: 19). In 1968, members of the American Black Power

Movement and Black Panther Party visited Nova Scotia. Their visit sparked a sense of collective and militant social and political consciousness among the Black population

(Clairmont and Magill 1970: 139; Pachai 1990: 247; Walker 1980: 164). Participation of

African Nova Scotians in the Black Power Movement was influenced by a number of different factors including a history of activism in their community, family or church; a

desire not to face the challenges and barriers their parents had; negative sentiments toward the education system; influence of other activists; and needs associated with social mobility (including housing, employment and travel) (Bonner 2012: 11).

Changes during the 1960s and 1970s revealed a distinct Black subculture that previously had been hidden and ignored. The 1970s subculture was expressed through proud, Black identity, confrontation to oppose discrimination and marginality, the development of new organizations that advocated for social change, and the adaptation of principles of Black movements in America (Clairmont and Magill 1970: 87). During the late 1960s, the Black United Front was created in Nova Scotia. Its purpose was to reveal cases of racism and to unite all the Black communities in Nova Scotia to discuss actively issues of education, employment and cultural identity (Walker 1980:169; Walker 1985:

19). New cultural identity was also apparent in hairstyles and “Afro” dress, in addition to a self-identification as Black instead of other historically racial terms, such as “coloured” or “Negro”. These cultural changes were especially apparent in the urban centre of

Halifax (Clairmont and Magill 1970: 90). Black social clubs were also established, as well as study groups primarily focused on African-Nova Scotian history and heritage

(Clairmont and Magill 1970: 141).

Prior to the creation of an alternative Black identity in the 1960s and 1970s,

African-Nova Scotian identities were created and maintained through family structure, community and the church (Abucar 1988: 46; Clairmont and Magill 1970: 116; Walker

1980:138). Abucar (1988) states that, in the Prestons and Cherry Brook communities, residents identified with their “area family”. This was a network of families that often lived in blocks of houses that were attached to one another. The residents of the Prestons

and Cherry Brook also identified with the strong historical roots of their communities, where streets were named after their ancestors (Abucar 1988: 43).

Nelson presents an example of how Black identity was based on family structure in her discussion of Africville. The strong sense of community that was apparent in

Africville was rooted in part in the extended family networks that shared houses, passed down properties, and helped each other to survive on limited economic resources (Nelson

2008: 63). After the relocation of Africville residents, new single housing units and the dominant White, middle-class notion of the “nuclear family” disrupted former family structures. Single mothers who had formerly been the source of income for their families were forced onto welfare programs or forced to marry the fathers of their children, and extended families were broken up and dispersed across the city. This inevitably caused an identity crisis among the displaced population, as their former sense of community and identity had been eroded (Nelson 2008: 98). Wright (2012b) notes an emerging contemporary social problem as a result of community displacement. He argues that bi- racial children, who were often raised without a firm understanding of their African-Nova

Scotian identity, experienced a loss of coping mechanisms and skills that would aid them as racialized individuals living in a racist society (6).

Understanding the dissipating identity of former Africville residents shows the need for black collectivism and militancy in Nova Scotia that was absent when the community was destroyed. The rise of Black militancy in Nova Scotia happened near the end of the dislocation of Africville, providing a reason for a Black united front (Abucar

1988: 3; Nelson 2008: 120). The relocation of Africville residents was a further method of isolation and dispersion, the very problem that African-Nova Scotians had faced since

their settlement. This made it nearly impossible to organize and fight for their interests and the un-kept promises of the city of Halifax. Unfortunately, the militancy of the 1960s and 1970s came too late to save the community; however, there have been contemporary acts of protest inspired by the destruction of the community (Nelson 2008: 99). In 1994, two brothers, Irving and Eddie Carvery camped out on the land that had formerly been

Africville, where they had grown up. They remained there for several years and Eddie remains on the land to this day (Tattrie 2010). The protest of the Carvery brothers coincided with the Africville’s Genealogical Society’s pressure on the city of Halifax to compensate former residents of Africville who had been relocated (Nelson 2008: 133).

Despite the formation of a black collective consciousness in Nova Scotia, there have been cases of blatant violent and discriminatory racist acts during recent years. In

2006, both the Black Cultural Centre in Dartmouth and the Loyalist Heritage Society’s office in Birchtown were firebombed (Nelson 2008: 148). In 2010, a two-metre-tall cross was burned on the lawn of an African Nova Scotian man and his family in Hants County

(Moore 2010). Although, progress has been made in relieving issues of African-Nova

Scotian marginality, Blacks nevertheless continue to face structural barriers related to education, employment, social mobility, and everyday life experiences of racial discrimination and prejudice. It is out of this background that resistance in the African-

Nova Scotian community took a cultural turn in the emergence of a Hip-Hop culture and rap music. These developments were not primarily indigenous. Hip-Hop and rap emerged in marginalized African-American communities. The following section outlines the major influences, developments and historical moments of the Hip-Hop movement outside

Nova Scotia.

HISTORY OF RAP MUSIC

This section focuses on influences of the African diaspora and how it shaped the music and culture of Hip-Hop. Again, due to the limited scope of this work, it is impossible to include all historical details, and important influences such as Black funk and gospel music are omitted from this history. This section also ends at the late 1980s because, in the 90s’, after rap had become hypercommercialized, there was a rush of involvement by many different demographics around the world, adding a new complexity to the genre.

The Hip-Hop movement originated in the South Bronx of New York City during the 1970s. As a youth subculture and counterculture, it consisted of four key elements: graffiti, DJing, rap music and breakdancing (Forman 2012: 250; Haines 1999: 56;

Higgins 2009: 8; Keyes 2002: 1; Kitwana 2012: 454; Pough 2004: 4; Rose 1994: 2; Rose

2012). Beat boxing is arguably the fifth element (Higgins 2009: 28; McGuire 2012: 20).

While Hip-Hop is indigenous to the socio-historical context of the South Bronx in the

1970s, its cultural roots are much deeper because it was influenced by Afrodiasporic expressive and narrative traditions (Haines 1999: 57; Judy 2012: 105; Kelley 2012: 149;

Keyes 2002: 21; Neal 2012: 485; Potter 1995: 26; Rose 1994: 27, 2012). Rose (2012) explains that Hip-Hop is a monumental collision of the diasporic world with the absence of social and cultural services in the urban city. To assume it has no origins is disconcerting; something that happens to Black diasporic culture too frequently.

African, specifically West African cultural practices have arguably influenced the aesthetics of rap music. The African “griot” was a storyteller, poet or musician who traveled and spoke to the people of history, current events, and cultural traditions through

performance (Chang 2007: 275; Haines 1999: 57; Higgins 2009: 18&19; Keyes 2002: 19;

Pough 2004: 6). During the slave trade, various griots were relocated to the Western world, bringing their traditions along with them. Narrative poetics were vital to the slaves of the New World because they used them to understand their everyday experiences and express their future hopes (Keyes 2002: 22). In the rural South of the United States, stories told in rhymes were called “toasts”(Keyes 2002: 24). After the end of slavery, with the large migration of Blacks to the urban North, toasting and African bardic traditions evolved into a new street style of speaking, called “jive talk” or later, “rap”

(Keyes 2002: 28-29). At this point, “rap” was not associated with a particular genre of music. Another major influence on Hip-Hop’s aesthetic was the Afro-Caribbean influence, specifically reggae, the Jamaican sound system, and “dub” music (Chang 2007:

23; Rose 1994: 23; Rose 2012; Higgins 2009: 22; Keyes 2002: 50; Potter 1995: 37).

Reggae is referred to as “rap’s elder kin” (Chang 2007: 23), because it shares many similarities with rap music. They both have had a successful cultural impact as narratives of ghettoization, poverty, race, oppression, socio-cultural exclusion and marginalization (Higgins 2009: 22; Potter 1995: 38). Another Caribbean musical influence was the development of sound system or dance hall culture in Kingston,

Jamaica, which was predominately a working-class culture that influenced the simultaneous practice of DJing and toasting (Keyes 2002: 50; Potter 1995: 39). The

Caribbean influence on Hip-Hop can be seen in Deejay U-Roy’s toasting rhymes, which predated rap music by ten years (Higgins 2009: 22). The other major contribution of

Afro-Caribbean music to the Hip-Hop movement was “Dub” which emerged accidently during the 1960s. Dub versions allowed for the mixing engineer to become central to the

performance, experimenting with effects and challenging the stylistic constrictions of an average recording. “Dub” created a new space in music, one that was open for toasting, sufferer’s narratives and histories that could not be represented in the original version

(Chang 2007: 30; Keyes 2002: 53; Potter 1995: 37). During the 1970s toasting over recorded and dub music became popular; this phenomenon was called “talk overs”. Talk overs and sound system culture directly impacted the origins of Hip-Hop through the immigration of West Indians (Keyes 2002: 54; Potter 1995: 37). Of these West Indian immigrants were the three founding fathers of the Hip-Hop movement: Kool “DJ” Herc,

Afrikaa Bambaataa and DJ Grandmaster Flash (Chang 2007: 90; Higgins 2009: 21;

Keyes 2002: 54; McGuire 2012: 14).

The state of the South Bronx in the 1970s for the Black population allowed for

Afrodiasporic influences to find relevance and generated a creative expansion to what would be known as the Hip-Hop movement. The active destruction of diverse communities, thriving businesses and social resources began with Robert Moses, a prominent urban planner who proposed the Cross-Bronx Expressway. During the building of the Expressway in the 1940s to early 1970s, 60,000 homes were razed and

170,000 residents were relocated (Rose 1994: 31). Black and Hispanic residents were moved to the South Bronx where they found themselves living segregated from whites, in low-income housing projects, among gang violence, with intense poverty, and a lack of social services, leadership and political power (Chang 2007: 11; Keyes 2002: 46; Neal

2012: 477; Rose 1994: 33). There local government made substantial cuts to educational outlets, such as music and arts programs, and eventually basic educational necessities for youth (Chang 2007: 18; Higgins 2009: 11; Keyes 2002:44; Pough 2004: 7). With few

legitimate outlets for creative expression, coupled with the destruction of older local support systems, the youth of the South Bronx turned Hip-Hop into a public voice centered on the urban streets, that provided them meaningful identity formation and informal status attainment (Neal 2012: 481; Pough 2004: 7; Rose 1994: 34; Wright 2012a:

519).

The rise of Hip-Hop replaced, in part, the colonization of gangs throughout the

Bronx with the colonization of Hip-Hop crews, each crew claiming its own turf (Chang

2007: 80; Rose 1994: 55-56). DJ Kool Herc along with his friend and emcee, Coke La

Rock, distinguished their music from that of disco DJs through an inspired Jamaican sound and a replication of yard dance style in New York local parks and other urban public spaces (Chang 2007: 78). DJ Kool Herc was also credited for reciting rhymes while mixing records, a new phenomenon (Haines 1999: 56; Keyes 2002: 55). Afrikaa

Bambaataa, who occupied another musical turf, founded the Universal Zulu Nation, the first Hip-Hop establishment; one based on social consciousness (Chang 2007: 90). The goal of the group was to desegregate the Bronx through music, end gang violence with an emphasis on creativity, and return the Bronx to a celebration of optimism and style

(Chang 2007: 101; Keyes 2002: 47). Freedom of creative expression in the Bronx was a new revolutionary art form (Chang 2007: 106).

As Hip-Hop became more popular with youth and travelled beyond the seven- mile radius of the South Bronx, it began to gain attention from music professionals. In

1979 “Rapper’s Delight” by the Sugar Hill Gang went mainstream and crossed over into the American Top 40. It became the first rap recording and the first time Hip-Hop was accessible to people around the world. Record labels began to acknowledge that rap was

profitable and hurried to make deals with MCs (mic controllers or rappers) and DJs

(Chang 2007: 132; Haines 1999: 57; Higgins 2009: 20; Keyes 2002: 66; McGuire 2012:

20; Potter 1995: 45; Rose 1994: 3) “Rapper’s Delight” changed the face of Hip-Hop music, not only because it brought rap to the commercial front, but it made rap the focal point of Hip-Hop music. DJs, who had once been the center of the music, no longer dominated the performance. Additionally, the prevailing notion of the Hip-Hop “crew”

(graffiti artists, breakdancing B-boys, DJs and emcees), were no longer considered as important as the individual rappers (Chang 2007: 133-134; Rose 1994: 55).

Women’s participation is rarely acknowledged in the historical accounts of Hip-

Hop and, if it is it is briefly mentioned. Females during the early period of the 1970s to

1980s included Sugar Hill Record’s female group, Sequence, and other female MCs such as the Mercedes Ladies, Finesse, Salt-N-Pepper, BWP, JJ Fad, Sweet Tee and Jazzy

Joyce, Roxanne Shante, Nefertiti, Pebblee Poo, Sister Soulijah, Dimples Dee, Sparky D,

MC Lyte, Queen Latifah, Boss and Yo Yo. Their influence led to a second wave of female MCs in the 1990s and 2000s including Da Brat, Trina, Lil’Kim, Eve, Left Eye,

Missy Elliot, Foxy Brown and today, Nicki Minaj (Keyes 2006: 98; Pough 2004: 84;

Potter 1994: 92; Rose 1994: 4).

As rap became a popular commodity in the 1980s, issues plaguing the Black communities in the United States continued. Numerous cases of police misconduct and police brutality were reported in New York (Chang 2007: 196), crack cocaine was being introduced to big cities across America (Chang 2007: 209), and the age of “Reganomics” encouraged resegregation through urban development and deepening social inequality

(Chang 2007: 223; Higgins 2009: 10&11; Keyes 2002: 4; Neal 2012: 482; Potter 1995:

48). There was also the pressing question of who would fill the space of Black leadership that had dispersed since the Civil Rights Movement.

Contrasting popular belief, Hip-Hop was not created with a political agenda. It emerged from a unique political and social landscape; however, its intent was not political. The late 1980s, after rap had gone mainstream, marked the rise of politicized rap lyrics (Potter 1995: 48; Watkins 2012: 705). The controversial rap group known as

“Public Enemy” or “The Prophets of Rage” rose in popularity during the late 1980s and dubbed themselves the “Black Panthers of rap” with an emphasis on Black radicalism,

Afrocentric ideals and collectivity (Chang 2007: 250; Keyes 2002: 87; Neal 2012: 488).

On the other side of the country, during the 1980s and the era of Reaganomics, a completely different form of rap was evolving, specifically in South Central and Watts,

Los Angeles. Similar social issues to those in the Bronx in New York, such as high unemployment and poverty rates, police brutality, gang violence, deindustrialization and lack of social services made rap a relevant art form to those living in marginalized Los

Angeles communities (Chang 2007: 315; Potter 1995: 49; Rose 1994: 59). There is some uncertainty on when and who can be credited for the emergence of a commercial West

Coast, and later Gangsta rap aesthetic. It is argued that it started with a Philadelphia rapper, Schooly D’s song, “P.S.K. (Chang 2007: 209) or with Tracy “Ice-T” Marrow’s

1985 single, “Six in the Morning” (Keyes 2002: 91) or with O’Shea “Ice Cube” Jackson penning “Boyz-N-The-Hood”, a song full of local detail and violence (Chang 2007: 303).

Rapped by Eric “Eazy-E” Wright, “Boyz-N-The-Hood” became an anthem for urban youth on the West Coast. After the acclaimed popularity of the song, Eazy-E and Ice

Cube, along with three other members formed what would be known as the supergroup,

N.W.A (Niggaz With Attitude) in 1987 (Chang 2007: 306; Keyes 2002: 92; McGuire

2012: 62; Potter 1995: 50). The group released their first album, Straight Outta Compton

(1988) and with its new and powerful sound, it was appointed as the essence of “Gangsta

Rap” (Chang 2007: 320; Kelley 2012: 235; Watts 2012: 720). “Gangsta Rap” made rap narratives more specific to the local community with everyday references and slang, and an emphasis on violence and aggression (Chang 2007: 321). Coming straight from the margins of society, Gangsta Rap also marked a new preoccupation with “authenticity” in rap, in terms of where you were from and if you were “real” (Chang 2007: 329; Rose

1994: 59).

During the time that Straight Outta Compton was released, MTV released Yo!

MTV Raps in 1988, making rap culture accessible to millions of young people, and for one of the first times, White suburban youth (Chang 2007: 320; Keyes 2002: 99; Neal

2012: 490; Rodriquez 2006: 649; Rose 1994: 8). The high visibility of rap music sparked the media’s fascination with rap and violence, brought about a rightwing backlash, and began the ongoing fight to censor rap music (Chang 2007: 325; Kitwana 2012: 455;

McGuire 2012: 62; Rose 1994: 17). For example, N.W.A. received a letter from the FBI after the release of their controversial song, “Fuck tha Police”, warning them to stop their verbal attack on police officers (Keyes 2002: 94; Neal 2012: 490-492). Gangsta rap and its consumption by white middle class youth marked the point of rap’s hypercommercialization, because it had become extremely profitable as a genre of mainstream music (Rose 2012; Wright 2012a: 522). It is at this point, when rap became mainstream and appropriated by global communities, that it presented new tensions and

new dimensions between races, class, and gender. Thus, it is critical to examine the contemporary literature on rap music.

QUESTIONS OF AUTHENTCITY: LITERATURE ON RAP MUSIC

As rap becomes increasingly heterogeneous by accommodating appropriation by various ethnic, class and geographical backgrounds, an emphasis on the cultural boundaries of authenticity becomes a subject of utmost significance. As Harkness (2012) explains,

“authenticity is one of the most salient boundaries -- who is and who is not ‘keeping it real’ is of central importance (2012: 285). Due to its prominence in scholarly discussions about Hip-Hop culture, authenticity is a principal theme in examining the literature.

Debates surrounding authenticity centre on an authentic/inauthentic dichotomy of participation and production of the genre. This dichotomy encompasses questions of race, commercialization, geographic location, class and gender. The literature also addresses the complexity of defining authenticity in a binary form. The boundaries of authenticity become much more malleable as issues in the literature are presented and navigated.

Thoughts regarding authenticity represent the larger cultural and political struggle of marginalized populations whose cultural identity and community are threatened by being assimilated into a mainstream economy (Lipsitz 2001: 184; Haines 1999: 82;

Harkness 2012: 297; McLeod 2012: 165). Boundaries of authenticity are created as a way to regulate who does and who does not have cultural ownership and access to the art form (Higgins 2000: 51; Harkness 2012: 297; McLeod 2012; 166; Potter 1995: 131;

Pough 2004: 194; Rodman 2012: 186). These boundaries reflect the social norms of Hip-

Hop culture and are negotiated by producers and audiences of the music (Harkness 2012:

288). The struggle of maintaining rap’s authentic form provides a platform for

meaningful dialogue about race, capitalism, commodification, class, gender and co- optation (Pough 2004: 194). The themes that have emerged from the literature and are examined in this section reflect the findings of Harkness (2012) and McLeod (2012).

Harkness’ study of Chicago’s underground rap scene provide a description of the

“archetypal” authentic rapper as Black, male, urban, working-class, underground, skilled, true to himself and resistive to commercialization (2012: 288). McLeod postulates similar results from his semantic analysis of Hip Hop texts and interviews. He provides six dimensions of authenticity; all reflect a form of an authentic/inauthentic binary. These dimensions include, Social-Psychological Dimension (staying true to yourself vs. following mass trends), Racial Dimension (Black vs. White), Political-Economic

Dimension (underground vs. commercial), Gender-Sexual Dimension (hard vs. soft),

Social-Locational Dimension (the street vs. the suburbs) and Cultural Dimension (the old school vs. the mainstream) (McLeod 2012: 169-172).

The following sub-sections deconstruct the relationship between authenticity and rap music. The literature shows the difficulties in reducing it to binary form. Scholarly discussions of authenticity are presented under the following themes: commercialization and social progress; race; gender; class, community, locality and hybridity. Some of the literature addresses multiple themes; however, it is presented in the sub-section that is the most relevant. Many of the debates in these sub-sections, and the scholarly attention itself, exist because of the high visibility of rap in popular culture, as well its longevity as a genre; both are results of its commercialization and mainstream success.

Rap’s Commercialization and Social Progress

Rap music had been a part of the mainstream since the late 1970s, but it became hypercommercialized in the 1990s and early 2000s with West Coast Gangster Rap and its growing popularity with White middle-class consumers (Rose 2012; Wright 2012a: 522).

Rap music today is a multi-billion dollar industry (Higgins 2000: 74; Keyes 2002: 2; Neal

2012:495; Perry 2012a: 510). The presence of rap as a form of mainstream music is commonly viewed as undermining its authenticity and social power (Rose 1994: 139;

Watkins 2012: 703), especially when regarded in opposition to the underground scene, which is often accredited with preserving the original elements of the Hip-Hop movement and upholding a revolutionary essence (Wright 2012a: 524). Commodities have always been used to articulate Hip-Hop culture; however, it is the shift from Black and Hispanic local entrepreneurs’ control of meanings to their re-contextualization by White- dominated corporations that is problematic (Rose 1994: 40-41). Popular culture represents a capitalist model of censorship, exploitation and domination; conversely, it is one of the few public spaces available for the representation of African American expressive cultures. The spectacle and cultural representation (similar to Gramsci’s argument of culture spreading political ideas) brings attention to issues that otherwise may not have been possible. Essentially, the very spectacle of the Black Public Sphere in popular culture becomes a form of resistance (Baldwin 2012: 231; Lipsitz 2001: 188;

Perry 2012b: 297; Potter 1995: 110; Pough 2004: 17; Rose 1994: 101; Watkins 2012:

692).

The literature suggests that commercialization is a two-way street that serves the interests of capitalist enterprises as well as social progress for the Black public sphere. To

view it as solely one or the other is limiting its true potential, as Kitwana (2012) claims:

“until hip-hop is recognized as a broad cultural movement, rather than simply an influential moneymaker, those who seek to tap into hip-hop’s potential to impact social change should not expect substantive progress” (456). Mainstream rap is a complex area of study because the music simultaneously celebrates social criticism and the status quo

(Haines 1999: 55; Perry 2012a: 509; Potter 1995: 134; Rose 1994: 103).

Higgins (2000), Kitwana (2012), Rose (2012) and Wright (2012a) recognize social progress as a result of rap’s mainstream success and its presence in communicative media. While financial support from rappers devoted to political efforts is rare, various social programs and foundations have been created by rap artists to give back to their communities and help urban youth; for example, Russell Simmons’s Hip Hop Action

Network protested educational budget cuts in New York City Schools (Kitwana 2012:

458; Wright 2012a: 525). Higgins labels rappers with strong social awareness;

“raptivists”, and provides various examples of successful rappers who offer political and social commentary; for example; Dead Prez who raps about slavery and the Jim Crow era;

Emmanuel Jal, a Sudanese rapper who was a former child solider; and Mos Def who is an advocate for the restoration of poor neighbourhoods in New Orleans after Hurricane

Katrina (Higgins 2000: 98-100). He also notes how rap has inspired collective movements, for example in France and Cuba (Higgins 2000: 104-107). Rose also acknowledges the political influence of rap music in places like Brazil and Egypt during civil unrest.

Rose’s main argument, however, suggests that hypercommerccialization has had more negative than positive effects on rap, Hip-Hop culture and the Black community,

especially in North America (2012). Ironically, as the market for rap music expanded immensely during its hypercommercialization, the narratives and imagery of rap became narrower, and street culture dominated as an authentic and legitimate storyline for commercial Hip-Hop. During the rise to dominance of street narratives, political and critical content increasingly disappeared, debatably because of the discomfort certain issues created for white consumers who were listening to the music (Rose 2012). Wright

(2012a) agrees with Rose that stories in rap are becoming increasingly homogeneous, with the dominant image of the violent, misogynistic, materialist street gangster (522).

The phenomenon of mainstream rap reflects a larger issue of global hypercommodification of cultural production where the cultural object is removed from its creators to an extent that it no longer reflects a political agenda (Judy 2012: 112). The emphasis on Black expressive culture as simply a political and resistive vehicle is problematic to certain scholars because it denies the agency of Black artistry and ability to create fictional and pleasurable narratives.

There is no denying the corporate-driven stereotypical glamorization of ghetto life and street culture in mainstream rap music (Kitwana 2012: 460; Neal 2012: 493; Rose

1994: 11, Rose 2012; Watts 2012: 723; Wright 2012a: 522). Yet scholars argue that taking all narratives from the street literally denies the artistic capabilities of African

Americans. Generally, many stories present in popular culture are regarded as performances; why is this assumption different when considering rap music? Issues of authenticity arise when there is a reductionist view of rap as a political text, and the influence of popular culture and other cultural producers on artists is denied. Youth growing up prior to and during the generation of Hip-Hop were the first consumers of an

iconography of “Blackness” made accessible by television. Rap’s glamorization of the ghetto can be associated with the fictional Blaxaplotiation and mob films’ characters of drug dealers, pimps and gangsters (Baldwin 2012: 231; Neal 2012: 483; Pough 2004: 26;

Watkins 2012: 694). In fact, rap represents a nostalgic art form as it continuously pays homage to Black cultural producers in history (Perry 2012a: 513; Potter 1995: 118).

Kelley (2012) argues against the reductionist view of mainstream rap as a mirror of social life and anxiety: “the assumption that rappers are merely street journalists does not allow for the playfulness and storytelling that is central to Hip-Hop specifically, and black vernacular culture generally. For example, violent lyrics in rap music are rarely meant to be literal” (146). Rodman notes that artistic license, as well as use of a fictional

“I” is disproportionately denied to women and/or people of colour in cultural production.

Their ability to create fiction is regarded as merely making minor modifications to their daily and personal experiences, therefore denying them the freedom to separate authentic music from their everyday lives (Rodman 2012: 184-186).

Black music must be recognized as a pleasurable and creative performance for the

Black population (Baldwin 2012: 235; Kelley 2012: 147). The stories and imagery of violence in ghetto life are highly selective from a variety of mundane life experiences

(Forman 2012: 259). The glamorization of ghetto life is also used as a form of resistance in itself. Many rappers choose to adopt and exploit stereotypical constructions as a way of expressing power, for example the reclamation of the word “nigga” in Gangsta rap or the reclamation of the word “bitch” for female artists (Baldwin 2012; Keyes 2006: 103;

Perry 2012a: 510; Pough 2004: 183; Potter 1995: 88, 93). Despite acknowledging the creativity and agency of rap artists to create fictional contributions to popular culture,

scholarly discussion suggests that commercial rap’s problematic images are not created in a vacuum, but reflect North American culture and society.

Similar to the influence of popular culture on mainstream rap is the influence of

North America’s capitalist system, especially in terms of consumerism, materialism and individualism. Mainstream rap is often criticized for internalizing values already present in society, for example, misogyny, heterosexism and homophobia (Potter 1995: 90, 97;

Pough 2004: 167; Rodman 2012: 183). The inauthenticity associated with “selling-out” mirrors the rapper’s desire to achieve what was once the unachievable for the Black population, the “American Dream” (Neal 2012: 495; Watts 2012: 728). Boasting about wealth and fancy material objects is equally as popular in commercial rap as the street code and ghetto life; consumption represents acclaimed status, but is arguably an act of resistance that counters the invisibility and misery of Black life (Neal 2012: 495; Perry

2012a: 508; Rose 1994: 38).

Material wealth does not end the struggle for the Black rapper; their authenticity becomes the subject of scrutiny by the rap world because they are labeled “sell-outs”, and they receive another form of rejection by the Black middle class because of their behaviour (Baldwin 2012: 231; Neal 2012: 487). Baldwin notes this struggle by using the term “Black bourgeois aesthetic”. He claims this aesthetic rejects both Black middle-class respectability and ghetto authenticity. Those who achieve this form of status accept Black bourgeois ideals of social mobility but at the same time preserve the desires and consumption habits of a Black working-class (Baldwin 2012: 231). At the same time that artists are the focus of questions concerning authenticity, they are challenging the notions

of Black social mobilization and the Black middle class, as well as appropriating the culture industry as a space for Black institution building (Baldwin 2012: 231).

Due to the commercialization of rap, many African Americans have legal employment and entrepreneurial opportunities (Kitwana 2012: 454; Neal 2012: 495;

Potter 1995: 111; Watkins 2012: 705; Wright 2012a: 520). Nevertheless, individual employment opportunities do not provide a solution to Black social immobility on a mass scale. They also should not be used to counter the exploitation of Black artists and music by corporate capitalist motivations (Neal 2012: 493). Large music industry corporations exploit labour and culture in an effort for financial gain, but they also exert hegemonic and ideological power through the control of cultural imagery (Perry 2012a: 510; Wright

2012a; 522). The debate concerning whether the commercialization of rap can be viewed as social progress for the Black community or a method of containment, exploitation and censorship of Black culture, also includes a discussion about how rap is consumed and by whom. Commercial forms of popular culture are often central to the way race, as a social construction, is experienced and reproduced (Rodman 2012: 187; Watkins 2012: 692).

The following sub-section will present the literature on race in rap music in terms of production and consumption.

Race and Authenticity: Is it all Black and White?

Hip-Hop culture, and more specifically, rap music transcends racial barriers, creating the need for discussion surrounding cultural ownership, especially where Black cultural practices have been subject to exploitation throughout history (the blues, jazz and rock n’ roll) (Higgins 2000: 51; Wright 2012a: 523). The performance of rap music as a

Black cultural art form indicates an “authentic” Blackness. By fashioning a “racial

authenticity,” there is reassurance that the music remains pure and un-diluted. Thus, it is the members of the Black rap community who position themselves as “different” from other appropriators of the art form (Baldwin 2012: 230; McLeod 2012: 170; Rose 1994:

5). Wright notes that defining the music as “Black” does not just reinforce cultural ownership, it resonates Blackness with larger issues of oppression, racialization and victimization (2012a: 523).

Labeling rap as authentic Black culture may be problematic for the Black population because, while it creates boundaries around cultural ownership, it simultaneously creates a notion of essentialized Blackness that is inherent in the music.

Categorization of music with race is culturally constructed and not natural (Rodman

2012: 187). It is especially problematic when Black culture and rap become interchangeable concepts. Criticisms of rap in popular culture are a way of targeting the

Black community itself without having to frame such condemnations in racial terms

(Rodman 2012: 186). Higgins (2000) provides an example of the difficulty in separating rap music from Black culture for Japanese fans. The Japanese who appropriated rap music went to tanning salons or bought products to darken their skin, styled their hair in

Afros or dreadlocks and some Japanese artists actually painted their faces Black. Their inclusiveness in the genre rested on a literal Black appearance (Higgins 2000: 82).

Associating rap with an essentialized Blackness undermines the power of White consumers who play a large part in determining what type of music and the content of the music that is popular in the mainstream. Rose claims that 70% of all consumption of rap in the U.S. is by white males between the ages of twelve and thirty (2012). The subject of the “gangsta” that is prevalent in commercial rap is influenced by white youth’s

consumption habits. The fact that it has managed to exist in the mainstream for so long indicates more about its buyers’ desires than the practitioners, yet the subject of “gangsta” has continuously been problematized as the result of pathological differences between races. Violence, promiscuity and masculinity are naturalized as intrinsically Black

(Baldwin 2012: 236; Potter 1995: 104). Pough (2004) provides an example while teaching a Woman’s Studies course:

I had students who did not listen to rap and who voiced their opinions on the music’s negativity. These students also attached their own ideas about Blackness and Black culture to the music. There were also white students who listened to the music, but it was their only link to Black cultural practices, thus they were getting all their ideas about Black people from the contemporary rap CDs in their collection. Their own experiences did not provide them with a context for the music. (199)

Equally as problematic as associating rap with an essential Black culture is viewing it through a lens of colour-blindness. Rodriquez (2006) conducted a study with white rap fans and found that colour-blindness was a recurring mechanism used by whites to navigate in a space that racial boundaries are salient (661). Many of his interviewees displayed sensitivity to the topic of race, especially in terms of not wanting to sound prejudiced (Rodriquez 2006: 658). When participants did acknowledge race, it was in terms of the growing number of White MCs and/or how rap was a way for them as

White fans to connect to Black culture (Rodriquez 2006: 661). Many of the participants argued that race was not a factor that could allow or inhibit their participation in the genre, which Rodriquez viewed as problematic because it allowed White individuals, who have more racial power, to decontextualize the music from the experiences and history from which it was created, showing how popular culture provides a space for the production and re-production of colour-blind ideology (2006: 664). Similarly, Haines’ (1999) content analysis of Canadian rap music concluded that, though Whites appropriate the 36

musical style and slang of rap, they are less likely to discuss race, ethnicity and the politics of location in their music (77).

Harkness (2012) provides similar results to Rodriquez (2006) in his study on situational authenticity in the underground Chicago rap scene. Harkness defines situational authenticity as occurring when “a person makes a claim to ‘realness’ that emphasizes certain categories within the normative cluster of conditions that govern authenticity, while downplaying others” (2012: 288). Essentially, emphasis is placed on interpretive categories, for example, skill and staying true to yourself, and downplaying fixed categories, for example race, class or gender (Harkness 2012: 290). Higgins (2000) notes that there is a democratizing function in rap where anyone with a substantial amount of skill surpasses anyone with racial or cultural ownership who displays less skill

(39). However, when ‘skills’ become all that matters, it allows for unquestioned cultural appropriation by whites (Rodriquez 2006: 662).

If whites, middle to upper class (suburban) individuals, and women continuously challenge the normative cluster of conditions of authenticity, it will eventually lead to cultural change in the genre. If they are rejected, it will affirm the normative boundaries around the authentic Black, male, working-class rapper (Harkness 2012: 297). Though

Black women share race with their Black male counterparts, their participation in rap is often viewed as inauthentic. Despite this, their presence in the genre is un-ignorable. The next subsection will highlight the scholarly attention paid to female rap artists.

Women in Rap: Not Just One of the Boys

Women have been active in Hip-Hop culture since it originated in the 1970s, and they have made substantial contributions to the genre (Higgins 2000; Keyes 2006: 97;

Oware 2009: 787; Potter 1995: 92; Pough 2004: 9, 39; Rose 2012). Yet, women’s voices have been silenced by the strongly held belief that rap is exclusively male dominated and created, instead of being shaped in complex ways by both male and female participation

(Gaunt 1995: 277; Potter 1995: 92). The invisibility of women in rap reflects their place in most expressive cultures and histories (Kelley 2012: 139; Pough 2004: 8; Rose 1994:

58); additionally, it mirrors the denial of their access to the public sphere because they are both Black and female (Pough 2004: 18). Women’s voices in general have been systematically silenced (Pough 2004: 68), and their fight for representation has been ongoing throughout history (Pough 2004: 217). While rap is subject to oppression and critique, and it speaks against injustice, it is also oppressive for women in the community

(Higgins 2000: 92-93; Pough 2004: 19-20; Rose 1994: 104). Females who reflect the narratives of their male counterparts -- narratives of gaining status, power and wealth, and dissatisfaction with sex partners -- are viewed as abnormal and deviant (Baldwin

2012: 241).

Gilroy (2012) attributes the assumed inauthenticity of female rap artists to traditional gender roles of the Black family. The family is an approved site of racial and cultural reproduction, and women are central to this process. Therefore women’s authenticity is defined through nurturance and responsibility to the family through fixed gender roles; roles that female rappers consistently challenge (Gilroy 2012: 97). In male

Gangster rap, women who deviate from these norms are used as scapegoats for problems in the community. For example, while critiquing poverty as a result of the racialized political economy, narratives in Gangster rap attribute female poverty to pathological issues (Baldwin 2012: 237) and Black women are continuously referred to as “bitches” or

“hoes” who scheme against Black men by using their sexuality to get money (Watts 2012:

720). Chuck D’s track, “She Watch Channel Zero” provides an example of this phenomenon. The track reflects Reagan’s attack on “welfare queens” as a plague on the

Black community (Neal 2012: 489).

The polarization of male and female, masculine and feminine, hard and soft limits the space available to both women and men to discuss women’s subjectivity in the music

(Gaunt 1995: 285). There is an inauthentic connotation with “being soft” in Hip-Hop; in many cases, selling-out is an example of going soft in opposition to being praised for being “hard”. Both of these concepts are framed as gender-specific, with soft being associated with feminine attributes and hard with masculine. In rap, being hard does not only refer to being a man, but acting in a hypermasculine way, which is conveyed through claims of manhood and heterosexuality, for example, by using derogatory terms such as “pussy” and “faggot” in the music (Gaunt 1995: 288; McLeod 2012: 171; Potter

1995: 97, 111; Pough 2004: 19). Gaunt also attributes the notion of the inauthentic female rapper to the discourse of the street. The street in rap is primarily considered a male domain; therefore, women’s invisibility in the streets further reinforces their invisibility in the genre (1995: 300).

Gender serves as a form of subcultural capital in rap; thus, some women will adopt a masculine persona as a way to justify their presence in the scene (Harkness 2012:

288, 292; Gaunt 1995: 302). In her categorization of female rap artists, Keyes (2006) refers to women who adapt male personas as “Sistas with Attitude” and characterizes them as artists who,

brag about partying and smoking “blunts” with their men, seducing, repressing, and sexually emasculating male characters; or “dissin” their

would-be female or male competitors-- all through figurative speech. These artists are not highly respected for their creative skills; rather they are viewed as misusing sex and feminism and devaluing Black men. (104)

Two controversial female rap artists who Keyes refers to in this categorization are Foxy

Brown and Lil’Kim. Both are popular and successful rappers who peaked to fame in the

1990s and early 2000s and are frequently mentioned in scholarly discussions of female rap music. Both artists portray masculine characteristics, hypersexuality and materialistic values in their music.

The debate regarding Lil’Kim and Foxy Brown’s image and music, centers on whether they challenge existing notions of female participation in rap or reproduce patriarchy through exploitation. Their music brings to light the double standards that have plagued Black women, and women in general, throughout history (Pough 2004: 100). By embracing sexuality and speaking as sexual subjects, Foxy Brown and Lil’Kim exhibit a kind of agency (Pough 2004: 188). Their raps and style focuses on haute couture fashion, expensive cars and jewelry, which allows them to contest previous notions of racialized space in society. Their mere presence symbolizes a transgression of class, race, and gender norms, and creates new ideas about the Black woman as consumer, Black wealth, and celebrity (Perry 2012a: 508).

Their image and music is criticized for reinforcing stereotypical and pornographic images of Black women and they are accused of lacking agency and self-definition (Perry

2012a: 508). Oware (2009) discusses the contradictions in female rap during the 1990s; he names this period the second wave of female rap. He claims that while there were emboldening messages about domestic abuse, female power and control, the sexually explicit lyrics had an un-ignorable presence, as well. This contradiction in messages undermines any empowerment that the women may have possessed (Oware 2009: 796). 40

Like male rappers with narratives of violence, females may be pressured by record companies to embrace the motto “sex sells” and co-opt this image in their music to satisfy consumer desires (Baldwin 2012: 242; Oware 2009: 798).

Despite the criticisms faced by female artists, the positives of their presence in popular culture cannot be denied. Black women in rap reconstruct essentialzed Black womanhood by challenging stereotypes and norms, illustrate female power and agency, critique sexism and patriarchy, and celebrate their sexuality (Baldwin 2012: 241; Gaunt

1995: 294; Keyes 2006: 97, 105; Oware 2009: 787; Pough 2004: 74; Rose 1994: 147).

Female rap artists provide a public platform for Black feminism, and for combating sexism and misogyny (Pough 2004: 73; Potter 1995: 92), thereby creating a space of validation for Black women’s resistant voices to be heard (Pough 2004: 85; Rose 1994:

146). Their presence as subjects, not objects or symbols, reconstructs notions of a

“woman’s place” in rap music (Pough 2004: 98; Rose 1994: 182). Scholarly attention in the literature also focuses on other definitions of place, such as class, community and locality in producing authentic rap music.

Class, Community, Locality and Hybridity

By the mid-1990s, due to commercialization, electronic dissemination and communicative media, Hip-Hop had transcended geographical barriers and had connected Black youth around the world (Kitwana 2012: 454; Potter 1995: 144; Watkins

2012: 702). The hybridity of Hip-Hop culture and local communities is also attributed to international social conditions that mirrored those of America’s inner cities (Kelley 2012:

147; Rose 1994: 26). Hip-Hop has played a massive role in shaping a contemporary global Black identity (Perry 2012b: 297). African-descendent youth are using the

performative aspects of Hip-Hop to transcend national hegemonic conceptions of race and to create meaningful and critical self-expressions (Perry 2012b: 295). Lipsitz (2001) states that the African diaspora “functions throughout the world as a crucial force for opening up cultural, social and political space for struggles over identity, autonomy and power” (182). Post-colonial cultural expressions, such as Hip-Hop, are based on experiences of the people and communities, rather than on the dominant narratives of the nation state (Lipsitz 2001: 186). Rappers occupy the self-proclaimed responsibility as the representatives of their community (Haines 1999: 70; Perry 2012a: 504).

Identity in Hip-Hop maintains deep roots to the specific local experience (Potter

1995: 53; Rose 1994: 34). The recontexualization of Hip-Hop at a local level embodies various forms of social meaning (Perry 2012b: 296) and geographies are bestowed with different values (Forman 2012: 250). Each artist’s music simultaneously represents their region and the global Hip-Hop culture (Kitwana 2012: 454; Potter 1995: 146; Rose 1994:

60). Populations around the world create meaningful social commentary through rap and social criticism which often reflects the conditions present in communities on the local level (Forman 2012: 261; Higgins 2009: 57). For example, South African rap addresses issues about HIV and AIDS, while in Canada Aboriginal youth speak about racism and the results of physical, emotional and sexual abuse pertaining to residential schools

(Higgins 2009: 57, 63). The importance of local community is furthermore apparent in the aesthetics and style of the music.

There has been a gradual shift in rap music since the 1970s regarding its relationship to place. When once the music focused on very broad and generalized spaces, it now focuses on representing detailed and smaller-scale places (Forman 2012: 249), for

example Halifax, Nova Scotia. Emphasis on community is apparent in the style, sound, lyrics and song titles of artists (Forman 2012: 251; Rose 1994: 60) because their perspectives are largely shaped by their localized experiences (Forman 2012: 255). Also central to community is the rap crew or posse, a collective identity of producers and rap artists who commonly engage in the creative process and provide one another with a mutual support system (Forman 2012: 255; Rose 1994: 34). The local community subsequently can predetermine whether an artist will be successful because the artist’s music, lyrics and style must be meaningful to the community from which it emerges before it can be viewed as unique elsewhere (Forman 2012: 255). Rap provides a method of re-imagining and reconstructing geographical places (Forman 2012: 264), and it brings the ghetto into public consciousness and allows for different neighbourhoods to be acknowledged and celebrated (Rose 1994: 11). Place in rap is also used to determine who is able to appropriate the genre authentically, and who is not.

Social location is a substantial part of rap music because it refers to the community with which an artist or fan is associated. Social location is a means to identify inauthentic or authentic participation in rap; for example, inauthentic, White-dominated suburbia is often contrasted with authentic, African-American, inner-city neighbourhoods or “the streets” (McLeod 2012: 171). Keyes explains that “the streets” is identified as “a subculture of the urban milieu that operates by its own rules, economics, lifestyle and aesthetics” (2002: 6). Where you’re from is a key element of rap; for example, rappers who disassociate themselves from their communities are often regarded as “sell-outs”

(McLeod 2012: 171) and suburban rappers will often adopt elements of the streets and inner-city neighbourhoods to gain acceptance in the genre (Haines 1999: 58; Harkness

2012: 286). Conceptions of the suburbs versus the inner city not only symbolize geographical location, but socio-economic status.

Black urban youth are frequently associated with social instability and labeled as the “underclass” (Kelley 2012: 135;Watkins 2012: 695). A discourse of the underclass uses social pathologies of ghetto youth to explain the poor social conditions in which they live (Kelley 2012: 136; Watkins 2012: 697). A result of this discourse is the false conviction that there is one homogenous ghetto culture, which continues to shape mass media representations of the “inner city” (Kelley 2012: 138). Kelley argues that what is viewed as authentic ghetto culture in rap is equally as much a product of the commercialization of urban life and this “underclass” discourse as it is the experience and individual creativity of the artist (2012: 140). This “underclass” is in a constant state of struggle with the “bourgeoise” for power and dominance in rap (Potter 1995: 91).

Tanner, Asbridge and Wortley (2009) suggest, “rap’s appeal is as much about class as it is race” (697). Class, like gender and race serves as a form of subcultural capital in rap (Harkness 2012: 294). In Harkness’s study, artists used class to maintain boundaries of authentic participation in the Chicago rap scene; being ‘real’ was associated with lower and working-class rappers whereas being ‘fake’ was associated with being from a middle to upper class (Harkness 2012: 294). Black youth proclaim pride in being from lower-economic backgrounds, and whites that share this status use it to claim a position of marginalization (Haines 1999: 73).

RAP MUSIC IN NOVA SCOTIA

There is an absence of scholarly attention paid to rap music in Nova Scotia, particularly regarding the contemporary scene. This section will present the limited

academic literature on the Nova Scotian rap subculture. Two primary works will be discussed: Michael McGuire’s masters thesis, “How the East Coast Rocks: A History of

Hip Hop in Halifax: 1985-1998” (2011), which will adequately set the context for the study of contemporary Nova Scotian Black rap production. The second work on the Nova

Scotia rap scene that will be discussed is my undergraduate thesis, entitled “Rappin’

Rurality: An Investigation of White Rural Rap Production” (2013), which examines rap music and marginalization in rural Nova Scotia.

Haines (1999) provides an overview on the Canadian rap scene in her article,

“Break North: Rap Music and Hip-Hop Culture in Canada.” She recognizes that

Canadian rap has been inspired by American rap since the late 1970s and has been appropriated as a form of cultural expression for Black youth, who are also marginalized in Canadian society (Haines 1999: 55). Major centres of rap production in Canada are focused in the urban centres of Ottawa, Windsor, Montreal, Toronto, Vancouver and

Halifax (Haines 1999: 61). Canadian rappers experience great difficulty pursuing professional careers in music because of a smaller Black community and market for

Black music compared to the U.S. They also face high financial costs of recording and marketing, and lack of support from the recording industries and businesses in Canada

(Haines 1999: 69). Despite these challenges, there is a great sense of pride in being

Canadian that is reflected through the music of Canadian rappers. Rap also provides a medium to criticize the specific injustices of Canadian society (Haines 1999: 75).

Interestingly enough, the first rapper to gain success and sign an American record deal was a female artist, Michee Mee (Haines 1999: 73). Michee Mee was born in

Kingston, Jamaica and moved to Toronto, Canada when she was young. Her unique

musical style combines reggae and dancehall with Hip-Hop. Her ability to shift back and forth between North American English and the Jamaican form of English known as

Creole during rap battles gained substantial recognition from both Canadian and

American rap artists. She was influential in creating this innovative musical style and many artists have since adopted her technique. Michee Mee is an inspiration to female

Hip-Hop artists and Canadian Hip-Hop artists in general (Michee Mee Blog 2015).

McGuire’s thesis traces the history of the Hip-Hop subculture in Nova Scotia from its beginning in 1985 until 1997. In his thesis, he discusses the post-industrial urban landscape and racial politics prior to the emergence of the scene. He argues that the City of Halifax created a social space similar to that of the South Bronx in the 1970s that allowed for Hip-Hop’s meaning to transcend geographical barriers. However, he notes that because of differences in regional identity, members of the Nova Scotian Hip-Hop community created their own unique cultural representation of the genre: “the Halifax

Hip-Hop community grew out of uniquely Nova Scotian conditions and, because of rap music’s representational nature, speaks to a uniquely Nova Scotian experience” (2011:

153). McGuire traces stylistic and racial changes in the community over time. The history of rap music in the specific socio-cultural context of Nova Scotia is important to this study because the aesthetics and actors in the past have influenced rap production in the present day.

During the 1960s, Africville was destroyed as a result of urban development plans to modernize the City of Halifax. Low-income housing projects accompanied the destruction of Africville to accommodate the newly-displaced residents, for example,

Uniacke Square on Gottingen Street in the North End of Halifax. Residents of Jacob

Street in Halifax were also relocated when their homes were bulldozed in order to build the Scotia Square Shopping Mall and development (Silver 2008: 13). During this time, more than 2500 Black and low-income residents were moved to housing projects

(McGuire 2011: 33-34). Similar to New York in the age of Reganomics, Halifax’s economic priorities were to expand suburban communities and upscale business districts located downtown, neglecting the new Black communities of Uniacke Square and

Mulgrave Park (another housing project). Gottingen Street soon became stigmatized because it housed a predominately Black and low-income population, along with an abundance of social and community services (McGuire 2011: 36).

Popular mainstream Hip-Hop music, such as “Rapper’s Delight” by Sugarhill

Gang and “The Message” by Grandmaster Flash, were played by DJs in Halifax. One of the first public exposures to Hip-Hop music was at Wheelies, a roller-skating rink in

Dartmouth (McGuire 2011: 37). In the early 1980s, numerous break-dancing crews were formed in Uniacke Square, Mulgrave Park, Jellybean Square (Dartmouth) and Sackville.

Additionally, freestyle ciphers took place in Uniacke Square, where MCs and beatboxers would congregate to show their skills (McGuire 2011: 39). JB and the Cosmic Crew was an early Hip-Hop breakdance group that also included a DJ and MC. They traveled to public venues in the Maritimes, for example shopping malls, and were significant in showing the hybridity of imported and local Hip-Hop style (McGuire 2011: 38).

Possibly the most notable part of Nova Scotia’s unique Hip-Hop history was the

Malbranche tapes. In 1984, a teenager named Eric “Rico” Malbranche travelled to New

York City for the summer to visit family. During his stay, he used blank tapes to record radio broadcasts on Hip-Hop radio stations. Offered on these stations was new music

coming straight from the underground Hip-Hop scene in New York. Later, when he returned to Halifax, he distributed these tapes, beginning in Uniacke Square, but soon they expanded much further because of social networking through schools, family and friends. The Malbranche tapes allowed for Hip-Hop to reach Halifax “unfiltered by corporate influence”. Thus, Halifax was one of the first places introduced to rap culture prior to its accessibility in North America through mainstream media (McGuire 2011: 39,

40, 41).

The growing Hip-Hop community was predominately, but not exclusively, Black.

It developed from the Black community in Halifax, and the influence and involvement of

Black youth could be attributed to the Cultural Awareness Youth Group (CAYG) in the community. The CAYG offered a place and support for cultural expression through Hip-

Hop (McGuire 2011: 47). The first rap group to sign a major record deal was MC J &

Cool G. They had roots in the Cosmic Crew and another prominent Hip-Hop group called

New Beginning. Unfortunately, they had to move to Montreal before they could find a label that wanted to sign them, showing the unlikelihood of being discovered in Halifax

(McGuire 2011: 54). They gained mainstream success by touring with big names in the industry and having their hit, “So Listen”, played repeatedly on radio stations and Much

Music (Canada’s music channel) (McGuire 2011: 56). Although they no longer resided in

Nova Scotia, they maintained strong ties with their community and issues close to home.

For example, their single, “Back Ta Fax”, discussed their life living in Uniacke Square and Mulgrave Park and their single, “Dope Enuff”, attacked issues in Uniacke Square connected with crack cocaine. Their focus on everyday narratives regarding the local

reflected the larger theme in rap music at the time which was inspired by Gangsta rap

(McGuire 2011: 62-63).

The Malbranche tapes’ influence continued to be apparent in Hip Hop music created in Nova Scotia. It could be argued that the tapes had more of an effect on the subculture than mainstream music because they served as a cultural guide to lyrical content and rhyme schemes. The Malbranche tapes also expanded far beyond Gottingen

Street to other communities in Nova Scotia. Richard Terfry, from Sackville, was greatly influenced by the Malbranche tapes, and he became one of the most prominent people in the Nova Scotian Hip-Hop scene. He was originally known as DJ Critical and hosted a radio show called The Basement (McGuire 2011: 72-75). Later, when he began to rap, he called himself Haslam or Stinkin’ Rich to distinguish himself from his DJ persona; and later, Buck 65 to represent himself as a producer (McGuire 2011: 79, 109).

He was deeply entrenched in the tradition of East Coast Hip-Hop. He even formed what he entitled the “Ten Commandments” of Hip-Hop, a code of ethics guiding how he would represent himself as a DJ, MC and fan of the music. Subsequently, the commandments were passed on to his fans through his success (McGuire 2011: 86).

Hip Club Groove (HCG) from Truro formed in 1990 as a predominately White

Hip-Hop group. Along with Terfry, and Jorun Bombay (an important producer and studio owner), who were also White, there was a turn from a predominately Black scene in the

1980s to a rush of White involvement in the 1990s. This shift generated some critical questions and tensions concerning the racial demographic of the scene, reflecting larger racial issues and relationships in the province (McGuire 2011: 92). Furthermore, the

1990s emphasized attention from independent record companies, and the “Do It Yourself”

(DIY) mentality that had always been a part of the scene. Haltown Meltdown, produced by Jorun, was a collective project that represented the DIY community efforts in the absence of support from record labels (McGuire 2011: 101). The Hip-Hop scene in

Halifax had managed to grow and survive despite being isolated from major cities and major music industry opportunities. Essentially, this is how a unique sound was able to develop in Nova Scotian Hip-Hop music (McGuire 2011: 105).

In 1994, murderecords, an independent record company, had signed Hip Club

Groove and Stinkin’ Rich. The signing of these artists began the disunion of the overall

Hip-Hop scene (McGuire 2011: 115-116). Claims were made that murderecords had intentionally chosen White artists over Blacks to sign to their label, creating a racial divide between the Haltown collective and HCG and Stinkin’ Rich. It is important to note that, although this divide was visibly racial, it was not exclusively racial because there were members of the Haltown collective who were White, and a member of HCG who was Black. However, race was a major factor that divided the scene personally and stylistically (McGuire 2011: 133).

In 1997, there were two diverse Hip-Hop scenes in the Halifax area that had originated due to personal disputes. However, they now represented two distinctive artistic approaches to Hip-Hop music. While, it was apparent that the Malbranche tapes had influenced the scene as a whole, one side represented an experimental outlook, while the other maintained a purely traditional position (McGuire 2011: 138). One thing both sides had in common was an emphasis on indie culture and the DIY mentally, which produced a unique form of underground rap emphasizing personal expression over commercial interests (McGuire 2011: 142). Similarly, my small undergraduate study of

rural White rap production concluded that the participants I had interviewed also emphasized personal expression over economic gains as the intent of their music.

The participants from rural communities localized rap music as an expression of personal narratives created by marginality, especially in the forms of education and employment opportunities. The main goal of their music was to communicate to others about their lives and their stories. Their opinions, personalities, communities and frustrations were often expressed through the content of their music, which inevitably had been shaped by their social conditioning. Although, they did not directly rap about marginalization or social inequality, they discussed things like poverty, working class traditions, rejection of formal education and unemployment as issues they had encountered in their everyday lives. As a musical scene, they viewed themselves as isolated from rap production and musical opportunities present in urban settings, providing them with a strictly underground sensibility and sound. Due to their isolation, they viewed their music as necessary for providing a voice for their rural communities and rural life in general (Gerhardt 2013).

It is critical to acknowledge the relative absence of female rappers in both the history of Hip Hop in Nova Scotia and in contemporary rural rap production. McGuire observes that there was female participation in the scene, specifically during the late

1980s, but that it was difficult to examine the role of women during the timeframe of his research because there were very few sources documenting their participation (2011: 28).

Likewise, my own study was conducted with a male sample due to the lack of female participation in rural rap music.

The following chapter examines various theoretical frameworks to try and conceptualize the topic of African-Nova Scotian rap music. The frameworks that are presented and discussed are, cultural theory, popular culture and media studies, subcultural theory, critical race and feminist theory, and postfeminism.

CHAPTER 3: Theory

In this chapter, a cultural theoretical framework is utilized to understand the Nova

Scotia rap subculture. This chapter begins with an introduction to cultural studies, outlining its history, developments, and critiques. Both popular culture studies and media studies are examined, particularly the production of culture, audience reception/consumption of culture, and, race and gender representations in popular culture.

MEDIA STUDIES/ POPULAR CULTURE THEORY

Culture is a complex and diverse area of academic study. Not only is there no distinct method or approach of investigation and analysis (Hall 1980: 59; Kellner and

Durham 2001: 1; Storey 1993), “culture” is an ambiguous term in itself (Hebdige 2005:

66). Williams (2006) defines three components of the social definition of culture. First, culture is a particular way of life; culture is an expression of that particular way of life; and culture is a way to construct the values, interests, traditions and behaviours of that particular way of life. For example, culture refers to the particular life experiences of those who are members of the Black community in Nova Scotia; culture refers to how these experiences become expressions, for example as rap or gospel music; and finally, culture refers to the values and traditions in the Black community. Cultural construction can take place through societal institutions, such as education, law, church, and media

(Williams 2006: 32). Cultural theory, as defined by Williams, is “the study of relationships between elements in a whole way of life. The analysis of culture is the attempt to discover the nature of…. the complex of these relationships” (2006: 35).

Cultural studies examine society’s institutional forces and their role in constructing

individuals’ perceptions of their everyday lives (Hall 1996: 271). An understanding of cultural theory is important to this thesis because it provides a way to understand rap music in Nova Scotia and the context from which it emerges. As Williams explained, culture is influenced by many factors in society; therefore, rap music production by Black

Nova Scotians cannot be viewed as an isolated aspect of their lives. It must be viewed as inter-related and influenced by other social factors and experiences.

Cultural theory borrows two basic principles from Marxism. First, the meaning of culture must be understood within the socio-historical context in which it is a part; and second, it is assumed that capitalist society is divided inequitably along class, race, and gender lines. Culture, therefore, becomes an important ground of contestation over meaning, in which dominant groups oppress and subordinate groups resist (Storey 1993).

The cultural context of contemporary society is structured along the lines of capitalism, and a logical thread of cultural theory has been developed from Marx’s analysis of the capitalist mode of production.

Cultural theory draws on the Marxist concept of ideology and how it constructs the meaning of everyday life experiences (Hebdige 2005: 70; Storey 1993). Certain groups in capitalist society have greater opportunities to access the means of production and, consequently, are able to enforce their interests and values on others through the organization of meaning (Marx and Engels 2001: 39; Hebdige: 2005: 71). While Marxist thought has contributed to the analysis of commodified cultural production under the capitalist system, which is discussed below, Marx’s contribution is limited because it focuses solely on economics and politics. Antonio Gramsci built on Marxist thought and

the concept of ideology. Gramsci provides a cultural context of analysis and coins the term “hegemony,” which is significant to the field of cultural studies.

Gramsci argued that the science and art of politics were based on the fact that there was a relationship between the rulers and the ruled (1996: 295), which was expressed as a relationship between the opinions of an elite minority and the masses. In order for the political relationship to reach its ideal state, there required homogeneity between the leaders’ interests and the social actions of their mass following (Gramsci

1996: 305). For homogeneity to be achieved, dominant ideology could not be limited to political and economic discourse; it must be transmitted to the public through culture

(cultural propaganda, cultural artifacts, popular culture) (Gramsci 1996: 298). Gramsci argues that cultural activity and a cultural front is equally essential for gaining and maintaining political power (1985: 106). The use of cultural propaganda to diffuse dominant ideologies allows these ideologies to be viewed as “natural” or “spontaneous”, reinforcing hierarchy in society; the masses are believed to be active in forming their own position in society but are, instead, passively conforming to a continuity of disadvantage and powerlessness (Gramsci 1996: 308). Essentially, hegemony is this juxtaposition of the masses’ passive conformism disguised as active choice. The idea of cultural hegemony has an important place in popular culture literature.

The discussions of the political and social consequences of popular culture developed with the critical theorists of the Frankfurt School. The Frankfurt School theorists were the first to analyze and critique mass culture. The majority of Frankfurt

School thought argued that dominant groups controlled the means of production,

allowing producers of media and popular culture to reproduce the existing order of society in their interests (Kellner and Durham 2001: 9).

Theodor Adorno and Max Horkheimer’s, “The Culture Industry: Enlightenment as Mass Deception” (1944) presented influential ideas about the technological creation of a homogenic mass culture and assumed passive consumer. As Adorno and Horkeimer state, “In the culture industry the individual is an illusion not merely because of the standardization of the means of production. He is tolerated only so long as his complete identification with the generality is unquestioned” (Adorno and Horkehneimer 2005: 62).

They argued that the resistance of the masses was being suppressed through control of the individual consumer by mass cultural production (Adorno and Horkheimer 2005: 55).

The sound film, as discussed by Adorno and Horkeimer, is an example of this phenomenon. Because of the fast pace of the film and the attentiveness needed to consume the images, the observer is left with no time for critical and empowering reflection (2005: 57). Therefore, the sound film, which is argued to provide an “escape” or “pleasure” from the routine of mundane everyday life, actually offers neither, because it reproduces dominant ideology. Adorno and Horkeimer indicate this in more detail:

The culture industry perpetually cheats its consumers of what it perpetually promises. The promise, which is actually all the spectacle consists of, is illusory; all it actually confirms is that the real point will never be reached, that the diner must be satisfied with the menu. (2005: 60)

The model of cultural production or “culture industry” presented by Adorno and

Horkheimer was comparable to the industrial model of Fordism, wherein consumers were considered as metaphorical cogs in the machine owned and operated by dominant interests (Adorno and Horkeimer 2005: 60: Kellner and Durham 2001: 11), since “culture now impresses the same stamp on everything” (Adorno and Horkeimer 2005: 54). The

masses became submissive to the dominant values inherent in the production of popular culture (Adorno and Horkheimer 2005: 55; Firth 1980: 165).

The idea of the “culture industry” elaborated on both Marxist thought, specifically the importance of the capitalist mode of production, and Antonio Gramsci’s idea of cultural hegemony but in the context of mass popular culture. The work of Adorno and

Horkheimer is significant because it created the prevailing image of the “passive consumer” in popular culture literature. Adorno and Horkheimer neglected to see that mass culture, because of its accessibility to all, could create an “active” consumer as well.

Walter Benjamin, another Frankfurt thinker, opted for a more optimistic view of mass cultural production and the potential it allowed consumers to have. He believed that the authenticity or “aura” of a piece of work may be lost through mechanical reproduction (Benjamin 2005: 78); however, this loss was the sacrifice that allowed it to be accessible to everyone, allowing the consumer to become an expert despite his or her class status (Benjamin 2005: 82). In his piece, “The Work of Art in the Age of

Mechanical Production” (1936), Benjamin examines the notion of consumer power in his discussion of media technology:

By close-ups of the things around us, by focusing on hidden details of familiar objects, by exploring commonplace milieus under the ingenious guidance of the camera, the film, on the one hand, extends our comprehension of the necessities which rule our lives; on the other hand, it manages to assure us of an immense and unexpected field of action. (2005: 83)

While he agreed there was an ideological dimension to cultural artifacts, he believed that its significance was in consuming practices rather than production (Firth 1997: 165), permitting the consumer to dictate what mass culture entailed. Benjamin argued that the mechanical and mass reproduction of art allowed for consumers to critically contemplate

and analyze cultural forms (Benjamin 2005: 82; Kellner and Durham 2001: 10).

Benjamin is an important thinker in the development of cultural studies because he recognized the significance of the consumer and their choices in the process of cultural production. His ideas presented a framework for the later discussions of audience reception that were prevalent among the Birmingham Centre for Contemporary Cultural

Studies.

There is a noticeable gap in cultural theory between the Frankfurt scholars of the

1930s and the Birmingham School of the 1960s. Although there were important thinkers and ideas during this intervening time, it may be assumed that the radicalism of the 1960s, including the civil rights, feminist, and anti-nuclear war movements had sparked the revival of critical theory in cultural studies. A significant development in the academic field of cultural studies occurred with the emergence of the University of Birmingham

Centre for Contemporary Cultural Studies in 1964 and the development of various critical perspectives on cultural texts (Kellner and Durham 2001: 15). Of significance to popular culture studies and media studies, the Birmingham thinkers analyzed the ideological dimensions and representations of class, gender, ethnicity and nationality. Additionally, they were some of the first to study audience reception to the media. They also focused on representations and ideologies of class, gender, and race in the media (Kellner and

Durham 2001: 15). Most importantly, through these studies, the Birmingham Centre presented an alternative to the passive, submissive and manipulated audience assumed by their predecessors of the Frankfurt School. The Birmingham Centre recognized that culture had the potential to both reproduce the dominant order but also to plant the seeds for social and political resistance (Kellner and Durham 2001: 17).

One such work, which touched on audience reception and the potential for resistance to dominant discourse, was Stuart Hall’s “Encoding/Decoding” model (1973).

Hall’s model was based on televisual discourse, in which messages may be produced and circulated with ideological meanings by dominant groups, but that message may not be received or used in the intended or expected way. He identified three possibilities for audience reception. In the dominant hegemonic position, the viewer decodes the message in the exact way it was intended to be decoded (Hall 1993: 101). In the negotiated code or position, the viewer understands the message but shows degrees of both acceptance and rejection of the message (Hall 1993: 102). Finally, audience reception entails oppositional resistance, indicating that the viewer understands the literal message but forms its own resistive interpretations and actions based on their social situation, which has placed them in opposition to the code (Hall 1993: 103).

A Black man who had grown up in Kingston, Jamaica and later moved to England,

Stuart Hall showed a profound academic and personal interest in the subject of cultural identity and the Black diaspora. In his work, “Cultural Identity and Diaspora”, Hall discusses Caribbean identity in film. He argues that identity is not something that is already fixed or complete, but something progressive and continuously in motion (1990:

222). He presents two ways of thinking about cultural identity. The first line of thought views cultural identity as a collective identity. This concept of cultural identity played a vital role in the post-colonial struggles of marginalized populations. As a collective identity, many global populations are united through their shared histories and struggles

(Hall 1990: 223). Hall asserts that the acknowledgement of a shared identity is important

to many social movements, for example, Pan-Africanism and feminist movements (Hall

1990: 224).

The second line of thought regarding cultural identity acknowledges that, although there are many similarities between certain global populations, there are crucial differences that constitute specific cultural identities, which must also be recognized

(Hall 1990: 225). In this sense, the Black diaspora is a point of hybridity, heterogeneity and diversity (Hall 1990: 235). Hall’s work on cultural identity is important to this thesis in two ways. First, the sample of rap music producers in this study identify as Black or

African Nova Scotian, indicating a hybrid Black culture. Second, rap music, as a genre, is a hybridized subculture constantly in motion. It was created in New York City during the

1970s but has become a globalized genre that remains relevant to the present.

Paul Gilroy, another Black scholar from the Birmingham School, also focused his work on Black identity in the Black diaspora. Many of his works discuss the significance of expression in Black music. Gilroy argues that a diasporic dimension of Black life is created by Black expressive cultures, which typically reflect a multitude of Black histories and politics. For example, the Hip-Hop representative, Afrikaa Bambaataa, appropriates the name of an African chief. The complexity of Black culture is articulated by the cultural and political links that connect Black populations around the world. Yet, at the same time, each individual Black population is linked to the social situation of its own locality (Gilroy 1997: 340). For example, as it originated, rap was a hybrid consisting of youth social protest in their local community of the South Bronx, the sound system and dub culture from Jamaica, and the innovative technology of popular culture in

America (Gilroy 1993: 125). Gilroy traces the emancipatory nature of artistic expression

for Black culture back to the era of slavery. Unlike Marxism, which claims emancipatory hope by the individual’s’ self-creation through labour, Gilroy argues that;

for the descendants of slaves, work signifies only servitude, misery and subordination. Artistic expression expanded beyond recognition from the grudging gifts offered by the masters as a token substitute for freedom from bondage, therefore becomes the means towards both individual self- fashioning and communal liberation. (1993: 138)

It is important to note the essential differences between labour and work, in Marx’s perspective labour is something that can be viewed as self-sustaining and therefore creative and emancipatory, whereas work symbolizes exploitation because creative energy goes to producing something the worker cannot claim ownership of. The importance of Black expressive culture, as stated by Gilroy, can explain the desire of maintaining cultural ownership and the resistance to it becoming a form of exploited labour for the Black community.

While stressing the significance of Black expressive culture, Gilroy criticizes its commodification. The expanding market and privatization of Black expressive culture allows for its passive consumption. It also produces images of representation that dominate the old resistive and active uses of Black culture derived from slavery (Gilroy

1993: 5). The problem with the commodification of Black culture is that objects and processes become passive moneymaking commodities that deny any political connotations. Culture (in its commodified form) becomes marketable to Blacks as well as white consumers. Black consumers may suffer a disconnection from their history and struggles for political and social autonomy, creating a false sense of cultural identity that is based on market representations. White culture consumes Black culture as exotic and dangerous without acknowledging the social and historical struggles of the Black population (Gilroy 1993: 4). This struggle can be understood in Hip-Hop culture and its 61

tensions between expressing Black vernacular culture and the tendency of commercialization to censor the cultural content (Gilroy 1993: 125).

A noteworthy branch of the Birmingham tradition during the 1970s was subcultural theory. This branch of academic study represented a convergence between the

Chicago School’s study of subcultures and the Frankfurt School’s study of mass society.

Subsequently, this convergence created the Birmingham School’s study of subcultures

(Thornton 1997a: 3), which is discussed in the following section.

SUBCULTURAL THEORY

The Chicago School of Sociology dominated sociological studies and perspectives in America from the opening of the University of Chicago in 1892 and for the following forty years. Subcultural studies originated from the Chicago School, as sociologists of the school focused their attention on marginal groups and social behaviour classified as “deviant” (Gelder 2007: 27). The method most commonly used by sociologists of the Chicago School was ethnographic research because they often went into the field to study various populations. The city of Chicago was the main source of subjects to study at this time because the city was an attractive destination for diverse immigrant populations (Gelder 2007: 27).

Although people tended to live in ethnic and class specific communities, migration tended to cause the loss of social solidarity because people were exposed to interactions with many different populations. A notable scholar of the Chicago school was Robert E. Park, who viewed Chicago as having a “social ecology”. He treated the city as an ecosystem, allowing him to study social differences and issues associated with cross-cultural contact of immigrant populations (Gelder 2007: 28). Two other prominent

studies to emerge from the Chicago School tradition were Nels Anderson’s The Hobo

(1923) and Frederic M. Thrasher’s The Gang: A Study of 1313 Gangs in Chicago (1927).

Both studies focused on disenfranchised groups in Chicago and how they created their own social networks and boundaries from within the margins of the city.

Subcultures were originally defined as groups of people who shared common interests, problems and practices, which distinguished them from other groups of people.

However, this definition was problematic because of its generality; it could be used to describe whole “communities”, “societies” or “cultures” (Thornton 1997a: 2-3). Clarke,

Hall, Jefferson and Roberts (1975) provide a more extensive definition of subcultures:

Subcultures must exhibit a distinctive enough shape and structure to make them identifiably different from their ‘parent’ culture. They must be focused around certain activities, values, certain uses of material artifacts, territorial spaces, etc. which significantly differentiate them from the wider culture. But, since they are sub-sets, there must also be significant things, which bind and articulate them with the ‘parent’ culture. (1997:100)

While differentiated, subcultures are not exempt from the issues, experiences and conditions that shape the ‘parent’ culture from which they emerge. In this sense, subcultures are highly influenced by social status and class culture (Clarke et al. 1997:

101; Willis 1997: 121). Consequently, subcultures are a collective response to a shared perceived issue (Clarke 1997: 175; Cohen 1997: 155; Willis 1997: 121).

A major focus of subcultural study has been on youth style and youth problem- solving (Clarke 1997: 175). Subcultural studies have also focused on marginalized populations including Hispanic, Black and working-class cultures (Clarke et al. 1997:

103; Cohen 1997: 97; Thorton 1997a: 4). Subcultural studies have also been undeniably male (Thornton 1997a: 6), as McRobbie and Garber (1975) point out: “very little seems to have been written about the role of girls in youth cultural groupings. They are absent

from the classic subcultural ethnographic studies, the pop histories, the personal accounts and the journalistic surveys of the field” (1997: 112).

A subcultural theoretical framework is useful in examining how marginalized populations form a collective identity to address social issues through the use of cultural artifacts and consumption practices. This theoretical framework is also useful in examining how populations are perceived by society based on class, ethnicity and other defining characteristics. Subcultural theory is relevant to this thesis because the Hip-Hop subculture (in which rap is one component) emerged during the 1970s in New York City as youths’ response to shared issues in the Black community. Rap, like many other subcultures, is an expressive outlet for a marginalized community, although it has been commoditized through the capitalist system.

Class Consciousness and Resistance

The Bimingham’s structuralist approach to subcultural studies depicts subcultures as meaning systems, providing collective yet illusory solutions to actual problems. Based on this form of youths’ problem solving, the specificity of socio-cultural positioning

(specifically class) becomes a significant factor in understanding subcultures (Clarke et al.

1997: 101; Cohen 1997: 94; Stratton 1997: 181). Cohen notes that, because of the class system, certain populations have fewer opportunities to achieve prestige and attain formal status. In the ideology of the subculture, worth and value is reinstated for the individual

(Cohen 1997: 52). The subculture represents a staging group where a group of people, in particular, the oppressed can achieve solidarity and then challenge the values of the dominant group.

Subcultures tend to arise from different forms of conflicts surrounding the young working-class and/or other disenfranchised groups. Cohen’s 1972 piece, “Subcultural

Conflict and Working-Class Community,” depicts the state of East London in the 1950s as an antecedent to the emergence of different youth subcultures. With the development of new towns and estates, families from the slums were displaced causing a dispersion of traditional kinship networks and an identity crisis for the youth (1997: 91). The outcome was a rise in youth subcultures (the mods, parkas, skinheads and crombies) who, although operating under different meaning systems, communicated an attempt to reassert what had been destroyed in their parent culture (Cohen 1997: 94). Similarly, Hip Hop was used as a voice by displaced populations during a time of extensive post-industrial urban renewal in New York City, where old kinship networks and traditional identity formation had been rendered unrecognizable and forsaken (Rose 1994: 22).

Building on Bourdieu’s concepts of economic, social and cultural capital,

Thornton uses the term “subcultural capital” to refer to the status of an individual as

“currency” in the context of the subculture (1997b: 202). According to Thornton, “being in the know” projects subcultural capital. This includes knowing the slang, dance moves, style, music, etc. of the subculture (1997b: 203). Subcultural capital is the prerequisite to determining an alternative hierarchy of the subculture; those who possess greater subcultural capital hold a higher place in the hierarchy. The hierarchical structure of the subculture emphasizes authenticity based on gender, age, race and sexuality rather than the determinations of class and income (Thornton 1997b: 208). Essentially, subcultural capital is what powers the resistance to, and escape from, the social immobility of the parent culture (Thornton 1997b: 204).

One issue with the resistance of subcultures is their ineffectiveness. The problematic experience of the subordinate class can be conveyed through the subculture and its capital but it cannot be resolved. Subcultures rarely provide a solution to issues of class, such as, youth unemployment and low educational opportunities (Clarke et al. 1997:

104). Subcultural capital can rarely be transformed into economic capital, other than in the case of occupations such as DJs, fashion designers, club promoters etc. Therefore, subcultural capital as resistance is not generally a form of economic betterment for its members (Thornton 1997b: 203). Somewhat contradictory to subcultures’ idea of classlessness as resistance is an emphasis on identification and communication through style, commodities and consumer practices.

Commoditized Communication and Consumerism

It is important to recognize that subcultures could not function without an economic base. During the period after the Second World War, disposable income for youth grew substantially, allowing them economic freedom (that their working- class parents did not share) to purchase commodities and create their own style. There was also a growing consumer market specifically aimed at the youth demographic (Clarke et al.

1997: 109). Part of the identification of the subculture as oppositional to the parent culture is indicated in subcultural style. Each subculture adopts and reworks material objects into a unique “style” that is used to express the solidarity of the group (Clarke et al. 1997: 104). Material objects alone do not represent a subcultural “style”; rather, it is the way the objects are organized to represent activities and views of the group, and the way the original meanings of the objects are transformed (Clarke et al. 1997: 108;

Hebdige 1997: 132). An example of this transformation is the British working-class

Teddy Boys’ reworking of the bourgeois, Edwardian fashion (Hebdige 1997: 136).

An important work when discussing subcultural style is Dick Hebdige’s

“Subculture: The meaning of style”. This piece introduces the concept of the spectacular subculture, which is described as “expressing forbidden contents (consciousness of class, consciousness of difference) in forbidden forms (transgressions of sartorial and behavioral codes, law breaking etc.)” (1997: 130). The emergence of such a subculture is typically followed by a frenzy in the media that expresses mixed feelings of fear and fascination (Hebdige 1997: 131). In an effort to place the spectacular subculture back into the dominant framework of meaning, two characteristic forms take place: the commodity form and the ideological form. The commodity form consists of taking subcultural style and signs and converting them into mass-produced objects and mainstream style. Once the style is made available to the masses, it loses a considerable amount of oppositional meaning that had been given to it by the subculture (Hebdige 1997: 132). The ideological form consists of the media familiarizing the subculture to the masses in such a way that it is no longer something exotic and resistive, but natural (Hebdige 1997: 133).

Hebdige provides an example of the ideological form. During the summer of 1977,

People and News of the World included many references to the punk subculture, including pieces on punk babies and punk weddings, in an effort to domesticate and subvert the subcultures’ oppositional nature (1997: 135). Both processes of the commodity form and the ideological form are also evident in the normalization of the

Hip-Hop subculture. Baggy clothing, snap-back hats, and boom boxes became popular commodities marketable to the masses, including White suburbia. As well, the

commercialization of rap music by large White-owned corporations made it accessible to many different demographics, normalizing its imagery yet simultaneously subverting its original meanings in favor of financial interests (Rose 1994: 40).

The distinction between the spectacular and the commodity-oriented subculture is also important when examining subcultural style. Stratton presents the distinction in his work, “On the Importance of Subcultural Origins”. Stratton argues that, out of the three white subcultures to emerge from America, two of them were considered to be commodity-oriented subcultures (excluding the hippies) (1997: 182). The surfies were a subculture based on the leisure activity of surfing represented by the commodity of the

Malibu surfboard. The surfies emulated the dream of bourgeoisie leisure and relaxation with an emphasis on individual skill and enjoyment (Stratton 1997: 184). The bikies resembled early working-class gangs and were based on ownership of the motorbike. The bikies asserted not only “sexist working-class values but a celebration of the bourgeois- originated myth of consumerism” (Stratton 1997: 187). Both subcultures represent two fundamentals of capitalism: consumerism and individualism. Unlike spectacular subcultures, whose aim was to resolve the inconsistencies of capitalism, the surfies and the bikies were created by capitalist ideologies of consumption (Stratton 1997: 184).

Differing from the spectacular subcultures, which are less exportable because they are more locally and culturally bound, commodity-oriented subcultures were easily interchangeable between other cultures with the same capitalist economic system

(Stratton 1997: 184).

Localization of Subcultures

The transcendence of local boundaries is another important aspect of subcultural theory. The community, territoriality and locality of a subculture is essential in understanding its’ meaning system. Territoriality is the process through which environmental boundaries become invested with subcultural capital. Territoriality represents the collective lived experience that produces a subculture, and it shows how the subculture is embedded in the issues and “focal” concerns of that community (Clarke et al. 1997: 104; Cohen 1997: 97). As the concerns of the community are addressed through the subculture, they become available as resources to others in similar social situations (Willis 1997: 121).

Understanding the state of a community during the emergence of a subculture provides an explanation of why that meaning system has transcended local boundaries into another region. A commodity or style that originates in a subculture may be easily exported into another region; however, the meaning of that style is not exportable unless the same combination of social, economic and ideological institutions are present to give it coherence (Stratton 1997: 182). Another social group will appropriate subcultural style and principles if they believe them to be relevant or effectual in understanding their own social situation (Stratton 1997: 189). These instances of subcultural resistance are developed on the local level and articulated into a larger class logic that otherwise would not be available if not for regional and community struggles (Willis 1997: 122).

Rap music is intrinsically bound to the concept of community and locality.

Because of similar situations to those in the South Bronx in the 1970s, rap has become a

meaningful art form for many different populations around the world. As Rose (1994) explains,

Substantial postindustrial shifts in economic conditions, access to housing, demographics, and communication networks were crucial to the formation of the conditions that nurtured the cultural hybrids and sociopolitical tenor of hip-hop’s lyrics and music. (26)

Straw describes a “musical community” as being composed of people sharing a similar social demographic. Their involvement in music is an exploration of the musical expressions that are rooted in a geographically specific historical tradition (1997: 494).

Similarly, Rose (1994) describes rap music as a hybridity between black music, oral forms and technology that asserts the history and narrative of the African diasporic populations (64). While subcultural study provides a relevant theoretical framework for discussing rap music, critiques of this framework must be addressed.

Criticism of Subcultural Theory

The Birmingham tradition has been criticized for over-politicizing youth leisure and subcultures. The Birmingham tradition perceives every instance of cultural consumption as “oppositional” to the parent culture and the mainstream (Cohen 1997:

156; Thornton 1997b: 201). The persistent trend to decode subcultural style as resistant ignores occurrences where the style is supportive of dominant culture. Also, the tendency to assert the creativity of subcultural youth may misrepresent the origins of style. It is an assumption of the Birmingham School that style has developed inherently within the subculture, avoiding the possibility that it has been shaped by mainstream consumer practices (Cohen 1997: 156).

The parameters of the subculture are additionally problematic for certain scholars.

Bennett (1999) suggests that, instead of viewing identity in the subculture as ‘given’ and

‘fixed’, it should be considered ‘fluid’ and ‘constructed’ (599). Bennett further argues this point:

At the most fundamental level, there is very little evidence to suggest that even the most committed groups of youth stylists are in any way as ‘coherent’ or ‘fixed’ as the term ‘subculture’ implies. On the contrary, it seems to me that so-called youth ‘subcultures’ are prime examples of the unstable and shifting cultural affiliations which characterize late modern consumer-based societies. (1999: 605)

An alternative to the rigidity of subcultural theory is Bennett’s proposition of neo- tribalism. He argues that neo-tribalism accounts for the individuals’ choice as a consumer.

Freedom of consumption allows youth to experiment with a variety of styles and musical tastes rather than being limited to stylistic and group boundaries with meanings inherent in those boundaries (1999: 610). It is also important to be aware of the way meanings change over time.

Clarke, like Bennett demonstrates the problem of the ‘fixed’ boundaries of subcultural theory. He poses the question, “if each subculture is a specific problem- solving option, how are we to understand how individuals move in and out of different subcultures?” (1997: 176). The Birmingham School analysis is arguably flawed due to the conclusions pulled from a limited amount of observations of styles and subcultural artifacts. The anthropological analyses of examining “authentic” subcultures in a frozen historical moment, do not account for the way subcultures are sustained and transformed

(Clarke 1997: 176-177). Subcultural theory predominately examines youths’ resistive behavior in the leisure sphere; this primary focus ignores hegemonic institutions (such as, school, work, and home), which could provide a greater understanding of the working- class (Clarke 1997: 178). Despite these discrepancies in subcultural theory, the term remains widely used in sociological discourse (Bennett 1999: 604).

The term subculture is utilized in the context of this thesis to differentiate the

Black community in Nova Scotia from the overall population. Additionally it is used to differentiate the Black rap subculture from the larger Nova Scotian Black community; assuming that there are different values, styles, norms, and social relations present among those who produce rap music. The experiences of producers of rap will reflect many aspects of the larger Black community. By using the term subculture, participants’ experiences and music will not be over politicized or simply reduced to oppositional meaning, but instead, will be analyzed through an acknowledgment of both their participation in an alternative social grouping and as consumers of dominant and popular culture. Rap is clearly identified with a Black subculture, specifically as an expressive culture of Black Americans; therefore in order to gain a coherent understanding of the sample population for this thesis, it is necessary to present a critical theoretical framework regarding race in North America.

CRITICAL RACE/BLACK FEMINIST THEORY

This section will present a discussion of critical social theory, specifically, critical race and Black feminist theory. These frameworks are important to the understanding of rap music produced from members of Nova Scotia’s Black community because they theorize Black identity construction, Afrocentrism, Black female identity construction, intersectionality, and representations of race and gender in the mass media. A main focus of this discussion is on the works of theorists and methodologists, bell hooks and Patricia

Hill Collins.

Social theory generally works to either reproduce existing hierarchical relations in society through elite discourses, or it serves to promote social and economic justice through critical contemplation and action. What constitutes social theory as “critical” is its commitment to the emancipation of populations affected by political, social, historical, and economical injustices (Collins 1998). Using critical social theory, oppressed individuals are empowered by providing new meanings to their everyday life experiences that are shaped by racism, poverty, sexism, and heterosexism (Collins 1988: 48). It is through the lens of critical social theory that race and gender is examined in this thesis.

Critical Race Theory

Conceptualizing race as critical social theory requires an understanding of the way racism works in North American society. Contemporarily, during the period after the Black Power Movement and beginning of hip-hop culture, there was a shift in the way racism was perceived in America. The shift was viewed as a move away from a colour-conscious racism based on racial segregation to a colour-blind racism that in theory promised equal rights and opportunities for the Black population but in practice failed to fulfill these promises (hooks 1992: 11; Collins 2006: 3). Through the institution of mass media, colour-blind racism was reinforced by a tension between hyper-visibility and invisibility of the Black population. For instance, successful Black rap artists and athletes were highly visible in popular culture, yet the actual conditions of poverty and ghettoization experienced by the majority of the Black population remained virtually invisible (Collins 2006: 3).

Popular culture and media institutions have the power to shape global consciousness through representations of racial imagery. Consequently, an important

component of the new colour-blind racism is the communication of the false beliefs of

Black social mobilization and economic betterment to populations currently segregated from Black communities. However, the new Black middle class works on an individual basis and has failed in terms of providing radical change to social conditions affecting the majority of African Americans (Collins 2006: 9).

Similarly, bell hooks notes the important role of the mass media in producing dominant images of Black culture. Racist mass media, coupled with socialization through an education system dominated by White interests, allows both Black and White people to view Black culture without complexity and critical contemplation (hooks 1992: 2).

Furthermore, representations are problematic as they create racist stereotypes surrounding

Black culture, such as, excessive White consumption of Black misogynist rap music that depicts Black males as violent (hooks 1992: 19). Collins reiterates this argument: “mass media has created a seemingly authentic Black American culture that glamourized poverty, drugs, violence and hypersexuality” (2006: 4).

hooks problematizes the uses of Black culture in mass media in terms of “eating the other”, arguing that there is pleasure found in consuming racial difference (1992: 21).

Consumption of cultural difference is detrimental to the resistive and political qualities of racial communities. Consuming difference placates anger stemming from historically oppressed groups (Collins 1998: 147). Discussed further, hooks states:

Currently, the commodification of difference promotes the paradigms of consumption wherein whatever difference the Other inhabits is eradicated, via exchange, by a consumer cannibalism that not only displaces the Other but denies the significance of that Other’s history through a process of decontextualization. (1992: 31) hooks uses rap as a specific example of this power: while rap articulates critical narratives of the Black community, the commodified version of rap, normalized by mass 74

media, simultaneously produces racial stereotypes and a false essentialism of Black culture, allowing the White population to consume at market value without an accurate understanding of Black communities (1992: 34).

Because of the socialization of the masses by White Supremacist institutions, such as the mass media, concerns arise regarding the absence of Black worldviews that celebrate and “love” Black culture. One such worldview is arguably “Afrocentrism”. As a worldview, cultural ideology and critical social theory, Afrocentrism centers on everyday Black experiences and ways to alleviate economic and social injustices (Collins

1998: 158). The principles of Afrocentrism emphasize a reconstruction of Black identity, racial solidarity in Black community development and Black identity constitution

(Collins 1998: 174). Although, Afrocentrism promisingly provides Black culture with a niche of self-reliance and self-empowerment in White society, it also provides an example of complexities associated with gender in Black worldviews based on racial solidarity that is explained in the following section on Black Feminist Theory.

Black Feminist Theory

Black women inhabit a multifaceted space in a system of oppression. Diverse groups of women find difficulty in discovering a collective identity because of racial segregation coupled with social-class organization (Collins 2006: 167). This divide can be seen in the many Black women who have a lack of trust in feminism. While there is support for global feminist philosophies, many Black American women reject feminism because of the assumption that it is a White women’s political ideology (Collins 1998:

67). Scepticism of identifying with the term “feminism” derives from the absence of feminist involvement at the grassroots and local level of the Black community, and the

lack of attention paid to the specific issues plaguing Black women. The concepts of race and gender are inseparable for Black women, implying that their racial reality links them to Black men before White women (Rose 1994: 177). Alternatively, Alice Walker coined the term womanism in 1979. Womanism allows Black women to address gender inequity while maintaining racial solidarity with their male counterparts by critically addressing women’s racial and class position and actively opposing a separatist ideology from Black men (Collins 1998: 63). Further clarified by Collins:

Although womanism raises the issue of gender, it simultaneously offers a distance from the “enemy”, in this case, Whites generally and White women in particular. Because of its seeming endorsement of racial separatism, this interpretation of womanism offers a vocabulary for addressing gender issues within African American communities without violating norms of racial solidarity of Black civil society. (Collins 1998: 62)

However, devotion to racial solidarity without critical contemplation can be problematic for Black women, for example, in Afrocentrism.

Afrocentrism provides a point of contestation between racial solidarity and gender.

The Afrocentric worldview has different implications for men and women. These differences are rooted in an emphasis on community, which reproduces traditional family and gender roles (Collins 2006: 167). Collins emphasizes the key ideas regarding gender in Afrocentric worldviews:

Four areas are of special significance. They are the importance attached to controlling Black women’s reproduction and sexuality; the significance of Black mothers in passing on Black culture; the notion of complementary gender roles as points of departure in constructing Black masculinity and femininity; and the symbolic association of Black women with the nation. (1998: 196)

Women who challenge these criteria (lesbians, socialists, Black feminists, etc.) are regarded with uncertainty in the Afrocentric ideology. Ironically, Afrocentrism may

reproduce hierarchical power relations within its own boundaries, similar to those it is trying to resist in the form of institutionalized racism (Collins 1998: 180).

The concept of intersectionality is an accurate way to understand the social position of women in unjust power relations. It recognizes the problem of viewing women’s social issues through an exclusive lens of race-, class-, or gender- (Collins 1998:

205). Intersectionality provides an understanding of shared Black women’s experiences in relation to hierarchical power, yet it understands that individuals in a collective have experiences that can be interpreted differently. Such experiences are determined by age, sexuality, class, religion, urban or rural residence, hair texture, citizenship, political beliefs, region, etc. Essentially, it is how these factors intersect that determines daily experiences for Black women (Collins 1998: 224). The importance of developing a Black feminist critical social theory is the recognition of the many differences between Black females that emerge from a common standpoint in society and the need for group solidarity despite these differences (Collins 1998: 228).

Difficulties confronting Black women in terms of mobilizing themselves as a collective are also apparent in the privatization and the individualization of feminism.

Unlike the 1960s and 1970s when feminism was a mass and un-ignorable movement, it is now relatively limited to academic studies and university classes on Women’s Studies; therefore, women who are educated are more likely to find feminism than those who are not. Unfortunately, education is not accessible to everyone and other means are necessary to transmit feminist ideology. Black women in Hip-Hop symbolize a significant break from education as the sole method of accessing feminist politics for racial/ethnic women

(Collins 2006: 189). Hip-Hop culture as a fixture in mass media communication has

reached more women than the small representation of Black women in advanced education.

Female rap signifies a feminist dialogue created by women for women, which is represented through female Hip-Hop culture. It also opens a dialogue between men and women in the genre. This new feminist dialogue is highly accessible and addresses the complexities of women’s social positioning and individual experience (Collins 2006:

192). The presence of Black female rappers in popular culture creates a notable public space for narratives that would otherwise not exist. It not only teaches Black women about issues connected to their location in society, but also gives them a voice to challenge them. They also challenge existing hierarchies in popular culture by celebrating

Black women’s history, voice, and bodies (Rose 1994: 182). Yet, women’s hyper visualization in the media and popular culture may also be viewed as problematic, especially when seeing it through a postfeminist framework.

Postfeminism

This chapter ends with a brief consideration of postfeminism, particularly concerning its relationship to mass media and popular culture. Postfeminist discourse is fundamental to this study because it is a postmodern and contemporary conception that the goals of feminism have been achieved. Therefore, the female participants’ experiences presented in this study can be assessed using a postfeminist framework.

However, the focus on postfeminism in this chapter will be on its criticisms by scholars such as Angela McRobbie, Yvonne Tasker, Diane Negra, Sarah Banet-Wesier, Kimberly

Springer, and Rosalind Gill. Postfeminism will be discussed as a problematic framework for understanding and analyzing women’s experiences in popular culture.

Postfeminism is one of the most frequently challenged terms in feminist cultural study. Scholarship of postfeminist discourse centers on the mutual relationship between transformations of feminism and transformations of media/popular culture (Gill 2007:

147; McRobbie 2007: 27). Postfeminist discourse symbolizes for women representations of women as powerful consumers; as individualists; as equal in educational and employment opportunities; as having freedom of choice in relation to parenting; and as sexually empowered. Yet, the characteristics of postfeminism conveniently hide and remain structured by the social inequality and exclusion of women (Gill 2007: 152;

Tasker & Yvonne 2007: 2). Gill critically contemplates the postfeminist notion of female agency: “girls and women are invited to become a particular kind of self, and are endowed with agency on condition that it is used to construct oneself as a subject closely resembling the heterosexual male fantasy found in pornography” (152). Postfeminism portrayed in the media and popular culture normalizes feminism in such a way that it becomes apolitical, eradicating critical consideration of structural inequalities (Banet-

Weiser 2007: 211).

Similar to postmodernism, postfeminism constitutes a close relationship with capitalist culture and its components, particularly consumerism. Under a postfeminist regime, difference is commodified rather than politicized (Banet-Weiser 2007: 204;

Tasker & Negra 2007: 8). Springer (2007) indicates that postfeminism in media culture is equally problematic for racial representations as gender representations. Postfeminism dispels differences among women of various ethnic/racial backgrounds through an emphasis on individual success. It also presents a post-civil-rights language that implies all goals pertaining to racial equality have been achieved. This allows for women’s

problems, especially those of Black women, because of race, to be viewed as personal and not institutional (Springer 2007: 258). Understanding the various issues of a postfeminist theoretical framework is very important to the study of rap music in Nova

Scotia because the Black female participants are both producers and consumers of contemporary popular culture and media. Therefore, the use of postfeminist discourse as analysis needs to be critically considered and confronted.

Many successful women in popular culture reflect a postfeminist sensibility because they possess individual wealth, sexual agency, and privilege. Some women even claim the word “feminist” and argue that their hypersexualization is, in itself, a form of resistance. It is problematic to view postfeminsm as including all women, simply because many women who do not occupy a place of celebrity in popular culture, nevertheless emulate the style of those celebrities despite occupying a very different space in a society, that is structured as male. Hypersexualization and individualization may put these women in positions of vulnerability and danger. Because very few women hold places of power in popular culture, postfeminist implications on women in general must be challenged.

CHAPTER 4: Methodology

This thesis seeks to understand the significance of rap music in the African-Nova

Scotian context by examining Black rap artists’ experiences growing up in various local communities and their views on the contemporary rap scene. This study also provides an understanding of racial, gender and class dimensions of the rap subculture, and how

Black participants view their music and experiences. This topic is important to the field of sociology and cultural studies because there is an absence of academic literature on both contemporary African Nova Scotian culture and the rap scene in Nova Scotia. This thesis combines the two topics to provide an understanding of both the rap subculture and how Black participants view their music and experiences in this context.

The sample of research participants consists of six African-Nova Scotian producers of rap music who grew up and/or lived in Nova Scotia for most of their lives.

The sample consists of an equal representation of three males and three females. Three out of the six participants grew up and lived/live in neighbourhoods in the urban centres of Halifax/Dartmouth, while the other three represent the experiences of living in predominantly Black communities located in Nova Scotia. The representation of a variety of different communities allowed findings to be applied more generally to Nova Scotia than had they all resided in the same community. All participants were in their twenties.

A standpoint epistemology and methodology were used to approach the research topic, which will be discussed later in the chapter, thus a qualitative research method was obligatory. The primary method of data collection consisted of six semi-structured, in- depth interviews. A qualitative research method was necessary for this topic because it allowed the participants to provide detailed accounts of their experiences, music and life narratives. Using a semi-structured interview method, opposed to a structured or unstructured method, allowed me to examine all the topics I was seeking to understand through the use of an interview guide. Additionally, it provided the participants freedom to elaborate on their responses and possibly lead the interviews into unanticipated, but nonetheless, important directions.

A convenience sample and snowball sample were used to locate and recruit participants. A convenience sample is a type of nonprobability sampling that is easily accessible and obtainable to the researcher (Lunneborg 2007). A snowball sample is often used in addition to a convenience sample where the initial participants of the convenience sample provide additional subjects for recruitment, and so on. Snowball samples are often used when a population is hidden or difficult to access (Heckathorn 2011). I began with contacting rappers with whom I was familiar and then asked them for names of others who may be interested in the study. I also located names of potential participants through media outlets, for example, The Coast, Halifax’s newsweekly that frequently features pieces about rap music and artists from the area. I contacted and communicated with all participants through the social media-networking site, Facebook. Initially when contacting potential participants, I stated who I was, what the project was about, what their participation would entail, and asked if they would be interested. Some participants

gave me their personal cell-phone numbers so I was able to text them throughout the recruitment process.

The interviews took place in a variety of public areas including study rooms in the

DAL Killam Library, Tim Hortons and a community studio in Halifax. Two of the interviews took place on Skype, a software application that permits audio and video communication. The two interviews that took place over Skype were required because the participant was either travelling because of musical opportunities or they had recently moved to another province. All interviews were completed in a nine-month period of

April 2014 to December 2014.

Prior to the interview, each participant was provided with an interview consent form that included all relevant information about the study and their participation in the study, including but not exclusive to my own and my supervisors contact information, intent of research, involvement in the study, research harms and benefits, and how confidentiality would be protected. Each participant signed the interview consent form indicating that they had read and understood the consent form, agreed to participate, agreed to be audio-recorded for transcription purposes, and agreed to a brief follow-up interview if necessary. In the two cases of Skype interviews, the consent form was sent in an attachment twenty-four hours before the interview, permitting the participants to read it over, and verbal consent was obtained on the audio-recording before the interview commenced. After consent was given, all interviewees were made aware of the structure of the interview and that they had the right to refuse to respond to a question if they were not comfortable answering it. Interviews were recorded using the software program,

Audacity, on my personal laptop. The interviews were made secure through frequent

updates of anti-virus software and password protection. The consent form can be viewed in Appendix B of this thesis.

Interview questions were divided into four sections: general demographic questions (age, marital status, community they grew up in etc.); life growing up; fandom of rap music; and their own music/Nova Scotian rap scene. The interviews ranged in length from forty-five minutes to two hours and fifteen minutes. At the end of all interviews I asked participants if they would like to say anything that they felt was important and not been touched on during the interview. Prior to and throughout the entire interview process, I developed a positive rapport with my participants by staying in touch with them through Facebook and/or text message and by following their music, allowing for a comfortable interview atmosphere. I still maintain contact with them now that the data collection process is finished.

After all interviews were completed, each was transcribed into a Word document.

To ensure anonymity of my participants, all original audio recordings were destroyed after transcription due to the possibility of voice recognition. In the transcriptions, all personal names or indicator of identity, names of songs, and specific communities are omitted. Participants are given pseudonyms to ensure their anonymity in the presentation of results in this thesis. Pseudonyms also allowed me to differentiate between the interviews. The gender, pseudonym name and age are provided to the reader in the results chapter. In a few cases in which a response may incidentally provide identifying information, I did not name the interviewee.

After all interviews were recorded and transcribed, they were coded for themes in the data. The first step in this process consisted of open coding by reading the data line by

line while identifying different categories (Esterberg 2002: 158). Subsequently, after open coding was used, axial coding was used. Axial coding or focused coding (Esterberg

2002: 161) allowed the themes from open coding to be tied into one another, creating general themes that could be applied to the theoretical framework and the literature review. All coding was done by hand; open coding consisted of writing notes pertaining to each line of the interview in the margins of the interview, and a colour-coding system was used during the step of focused coding, where each colour represented a theme that had emerged from the data. The themes that emerged from the data and are presented in the results and discussion chapter of this thesis are; community life, education, fandom and musical influences, the mainstream/underground dichotomy, personal rap music, the

Nova Scotia rap scene, the role of gender, race, and finally, class in rap.

LIMITATIONS, OBSTACLES AND CHALLENGES

Originally, the intent of this study was to include eight to ten semi-structured in- depth interviews. All potential participants showed initial interest in the study; many thanked me for the opportunity and for reaching out to them. Over the course of the interview process I had a total of twelve interested subjects, eleven of whom I was able to set up a date and time for an interview. The greatest challenge of the research process was participants following through with the interviews we had scheduled. Since I do not own a personal means of transportation I had to travel by bus to Halifax/Dartmouth or pay friends to drive to other communities, which was financially taxing at times. Each time I travelled to an interview I confirmed the interview twenty-four hours before it was to take place. On four of the occasions that I commuted to Halifax/Dartmouth by bus, and one occasion where I paid my partner to drive to a community outside of Halifax,

potential participants either did not show or they cancelled at the last minute. In an attempt to save the interview opportunity, I rescheduled with potential participants for the following day. On two occasions I scheduled interviews twice after the subject had missed the first interview, amounting to three consecutive days where they either did not show or cancelled.

Because of the difficulty of subjects not committing to the interview and a limited time resource to complete this thesis, the sample consists of six participants out of the original twelve. The overall population of African Nova Scotian rap artists is relatively small; six interviews is a reasonable representation of the population. Crouch and

Mackenzie (2006) stress the importance of a small sample in qualitative research, specifically when using in-depth interview method, they argue that “it is much more important for the research to be intensive, and thus persuasive at the conceptual level, rather than aim to be extensive with intent to be convincing, at least in part, through enumeration” (494). However, a larger sample may have provided additional themes, the rethinking of themes based on different perspectives and theoretical saturation.

I am unsure of why the participants did not come to the interviews. I tried my best to ensure they took place at a time and location convenient for the subject. Some reasons for the lower participation rate may have included unexpected commitments on the day of the interview, the interview not being a priority to them and nervousness about meeting with a stranger. I cannot speculate why they did not follow through with the interview process because they may face challenges in their everyday lives of which I am unaware. Yet, the trouble I had in regard to ensuring participants committed to the

interviews demonstrates the general difficulty of accessing marginalized populations, especially as a White researcher.

While I tried to build a rapport with subjects before the interview, my status as a

White educated female researcher may have made me a less than ideal candidate as interviewer. I felt that the overall interview process with the individuals who did participate was very comfortable with few exceptions. The few exceptions of discomfort

I did note stemmed from participants being asked unexpected questions about race, and one noted interviewee who displayed an apparent awareness of difference between him as subject and myself as a researcher representing a group. This was noticeable in his responses to questions where on numerous occasions he referred to me in the plural, as

“you guys”, therefore placing me as the “other”. The issue of my position as researcher in regard to race, education and gender will be noted in the following section concerning ethical considerations.

ETHICAL CONSIDERATIONS

In order to have been able to use a qualitative interview approach, ethical approval from the Research Ethics Bored (REB) was necessary. My application to the REB included a detailed research summary; an interview guide and a copy of the participant consent form.

The interview guide is available in Appendix A, and the interview consent form is available in Appendix B of the thesis. REB approval for this study was granted on 21

January, 2014. In addition to gaining formal ethics approval from Acadia University, I had many personal questions to reflect on as an educated White researcher studying a marginalized population. Before beginning the research process some of the questions I reflected on were: what are my responsibilities to the communities I am researching?

How can my presence as a researcher be justified? How can I represent these communities in such a way that I respect and acknowledge their unique social history and situation? How is my position as a researcher influenced by dominant discourses of race?

During the entire research process I have noted other researchers’ methodological experiences and reflections while working with marginalized groups. I began with a reflection on bell hooks’ work as a methodologist. As a black feminist, hooks is critical of White researchers in the field of cultural studies. She argues that White scholars are able to research and write about Black culture without considering how their work reproduces traditions of White supremacy and perpetuates racial domination (hooks

2004: 150). She suggests that cultural studies, if not approached with caution, can reflect colonialism because it is often a White researcher who enters a minority group and interprets or appropriates them as an “object” of study (hooks 2004: 151). Kelley writes that social scientists are at times quick to generalize about marginalized populations.

They often ignore what cultural forms symbolize for their practitioners, and fail to acknowledge hybridity and internal differences within Black cultures. The subjects’ voices are often absent from their work; therefore, expressive cultures are reduced by researchers to coping mechanisms and narratives of opposition to racism (Kelley 2012:

138, 145). It was imperative to this study that the subjects’ voice was preserved. In order to adequately do so, a standpoint epistemology and methodological approach was used.

The basic principle of a standpoint methodology is for marginalized populations to gain a public voice and to understand that knowledge exists in a socio-historical context and not outside of it (Harding 1993: 57). Standpoint asserts that truth and power do not issue from the same locations in society, namely that of dominat discourse and

empirical science (Harding 2004: 39). It enables a group consciousness to be formed on the part of the marginalized through the comprehension of how their everyday lives are shaped by dominant institutions, values and interests (Harding 1993: 54). Standpoint can provide insight not only into marginalized lives, but the lives of the dominant and the causal relationship between them (Harding 1993: 55). Most importantly, through the use of a standpoint methodology, subjects are present and visible in the work, and heterogeneity is celebrated (Harding 1993: 65). Potter expresses the importance of the relationship between academia and the subject in his book entitled, “Specatacular

Vernaculars: Hip-Hop and the Politics of Postmodernism”:

It is the ultimate point of my work to insist that academic knowledge and hip-hop knowledge need at least to be on speaking terms, and that such dialogue depends upon academics seeing that rappers have their own protocols, their own epistemologies, which cannot simply be read according to an academic laundry list of theoretical questions. (1995: 152)

It was with all this in mind that I navigated and critically contemplated my role as researcher.

Through the entire process of trying to understand identity in the context of the

African Nova Scotian rap subculture, I have had to come to terms with my own identity as well. I have never been so confronted by my own White privilege, racial, and class identity as while researching and writing this thesis. A pivotal moment occurred during one of the interviews with a male participant. As he described police harassment in his neighbourhood and his experiences living in a low-income housing project, my thought was; “I have read so much about this, but you have lived this,” and that is when I realized

I would never be able to truly comprehend many of these experiences. That moment also indicated how crucial it was to have the subjects’ voices present in this work.

I have conducted this research to offer my participants an outlet to represent themselves and to explain their experiences and music to the academic world. My race is one characteristic of self I do not share with the participants; however, there are many traits and experiences I do share with them, for example, my longstanding love and respect for Hip-Hop culture. I acknowledge that my race has given me an “outsider” status and I acknowledge that I will not be able to fully understand African-Nova Scotian

Culture, but I do not feel that because of this status the topic should not be explored and have this opportunity to find its place in the academic literature.

CHAPTER 5: Results and Discussion

In this chapter, the primary data from the interviews are presented and discussed under various themes and subthemes. The general themes include: community life, education, fandom and musical influences, the mainstream/underground dichotomy, personal rap music, the Nova Scotia rap scene, the role of gender, race, and finally, class in rap. Summarized results and quotes are used to discuss the data in relation to the larger theoretical framework and literature. In order to ensure the confidentiality and anonymity of participants, each participant is given a pseudonym that does not relate to their true identity in any way. The female participants are given the pseudonyms Colleen, Mya and

Angelique, and male participants are given the pseudonyms Ty, Mikhail, and Kyle.

COMMUNITY LIFE

During the interview each participant was asked about their experiences growing up in various communities in Nova Scotia. Respondents discussed several things in relation to their community that will be presented under subthemes in this section. These subthemes include; description of community; extra curriculars, community work and youth; and family life.

Description of Community

Participants represented different communities in Nova Scotia and when asked to describe their communities, the answers varied. Due to confidentiality considerations the names of communities cannot be disclosed in this section. Colleen, Kyle, Angelique and

Mikhail described their communities as “close-knit” and “supportive”. Both Colleen and 91

Mikhail acknowledged that there were social problems in their communities, but they didn’t believe that these issues undermined the overall feeling of cohesiveness. Colleen elucidates:

If I could explain it in one word I’d say “tight”. We have a very tight-knit community. We all take care of each other. As in any community you’re gonna have your problems but, for the most part, we’re just a big family…. We’re always there for each other, little things, big things. (Colleen, Interview)

Mikhail acknowledges that, because of the closeness of his community, everyone knows each other but this sometimes creates divisions:

Everybody knows everybody in this community and that means a lot of people have friendships with each other, and then there’s a lot of people who’ve grown to not like each other. So I mean, you know, that’s where kinda a lot of violence happens when people disagree but all in all the community is very friendly and like family-oriented because it’s small. (Mikhail, Interview)

Mya and Ty responded differently, focusing on more negative aspects and challenges present in their communities. Ty states;

My community, it was hard cause a lot of people looked down on us, they would think that we were just like the bad community where all the violence and situations like that would happen. So I mean like it was tough tryin’ to grow up and prove everybody wrong…. That’s what I’m tryin’ to do right now; I’m tryin’ to show our community that we can be better, we don’t have to go through the gun violences and violence. (Ty, Interview)

Mya’s negative perspective of her community had to do with the mentality of other community members that were around her. She referred to this as the “Scotia Mentality” and described her community growing up: “I didn’t want to be there just like anybody else. Nobody really wants to be here. It’s still the same way but back then you could tell but just nobody would say it or admit it.” Mya grew up in low-income public housing project for some of her life.

Extra-curriculars, Community Work and Youth

Five out of six of the participants talked about extra-curriculars activities in which they had engaged while growing up. These activities consisted of sports, music, after- school programs and clubs. Extra-curriculars represented an outlet for the participants to invest their time and build skills for the future, Mya noted that an extra-curricular activity

“taught me to be persistent and it taught me unity.” For two of the participants, commitment to extra-curriculars was a way of keeping them out of trouble. Ty explains that “the majority of us try to keep out of trouble. We played ball a lot. A lot of the guys in the community would go to the court, play ball, any sport, basketball, baseball, hockey.”

All of the female participants noted that they engaged and continue to engage with community work. Two of the three female participants are presently invested in community work and projects, and while the other female participant is not presently committed to any community work, she was very involved growing up. Although the investment in community work was gender-specific, commitment and concern for the youth was noted by five of the participants, specifically the participants who had been involved in extra-curriculars growing up and saw them as an important part of their own lives.

Responsibility to youth was a recurring theme in the interviews. As already an older generation, participants voiced concern for the future of the youth in their communities, and in Nova Scotia more generally. Some concerns that were discussed were the need for more awareness of mental health issues, and outlets for youth such as more after-school programs and clubs. Mikhail identifies that the core problem of

communities is their failure to keep youth off the streets and to provide them with productive and creative outlets. He explains this in his interview:

When I was younger there was a lot more things to do for the youth like I was always into sports, I was always at like Boys Night, Youth Night and stuff like that and just now… now it’s kinda like there’s not the same things anymore. The community doesn’t honestly put those Youth Night/Boys Night/Girls Night stuff like that on no more. So a lot of like them kids… don’t have people to guide them, the community is not keepin’ them out of trouble so a lot of trouble’s been happenin’ for those reasons. (Mikhail, Interview)

Participants’ concern about the need for social investment in youth demonstrates that they care about the future of their communities and feel a responsibility to their communities.

They also recognize that youth are a marginalized population in general and are at an impressionable age where the need for outlets, role models, and programs to motivate them, build their skill sets and provide structure is at its greatest.

Family Life

During the interviews, participants briefly referred to their families, especially in terms of community, support and music. Some participants touched on this aspect more than others, and for two participants, family life was discussed in a negative manner as they described instability and, in one case, violence in their home life.

An emerging theme from the data was the role that family played in the interviewees’ participation in music or love for music. Often family members introduced them to rap or music in general, and musicality was something they had seen through the family unit while growing up. Kyle talks about how he was introduced to Hip-Hop music:

I grew up with Hip Hop and music in general in my life because of my father and my uncle and stuff like, so I was able to, you know, hear, you know, Hip Hop legends and listen to old albums and stuff like that at a very young age… I wasn’t shied away from it. (Kyle, Interview)

Creating rap music was, and still is for some, a family affair. Mya, Colleen and Kyle had older relatives who were successful in the Nova Scotian Hip-Hop scene before them and

Colleen and Angelique still make music with family members. Colleen also talks about how the church played a significant role in the musicality of her family.

EDUCATION

The literature suggests that African-Nova Scotians are in a position of disadvantage in terms of educational opportunities. This is reflected in the fact they have disproportionately higher dropout rates and a lower representation in post-secondary education, and face many other challenges. All participants in this study had completed a high school level education. One participant dropped out of school in Grade 11 but later completed a GED, and one participant has a post-secondary education. During the interviews, participants were asked about their experiences with the education system and how they felt about school while growing up. The general sentiment in responses was an impartial attitude towards school; none of the participants talked about loving school or being highly invested in their education. Instead, school was viewed as something they had to do. The BLAC Report on Education is an important reference for this section because some participants would have been in the school system during the time the report was written. As African-Nova Scotian students, they would have possibly been facing many of the challenges noted in the report.

Two female participants talked about confronting serious challenges in the education system, including bullies, boredom with schoolwork, lack of support from teachers, problems with authority, expulsion and suspension, and lack of encouragement

provided by the school during times of personal/family problems. These issues are put into perspective by a number of responses from the interviews. Mya commented:

So it was like you would go to school and it’s kinda like well, I’m at school, none of my problems are changing, school’s a problem now because I’m just bored or you know I just don’t want to listen to them and then it just became overwhelming at that point. (Mya, Interview)

Mya had referred to the poor mentality of community members as the “Scotian

Mentality”, and she refers to this mindset again while discussing teachers and students:

It’s like you know they’re a teacher and they’re stuck being a teacher to like these kids that have the “Scotian mentality” and some even feel like they can’t help these students. It’s like… you’re just gonna end up like everybody else and it’s like they’ve given up and it’s just like I don’t want to be taught by you like you don’t believe in me. (Mya, Interview)

She admits that low personal aspirations coupled with a shortcoming in the school system contributed to her negative personal feelings about school. She also talks about the lack of encouragement the school provided when there were obvious issues in her personal and home life:

I remember I went to one school and I couldn’t attend school because there was problems going on at home and they were well aware of it but I still got kicked out of school. It wasn’t like they were trying to work with me. And then I got older and I got wiser and I, just became, like I got my chip on my shoulder from my personal reasons, but it’s like what else are you doing to other people? And then it just became this total hate for them and everybody else around me. (Mya, Interview).

Mya’s experiences in the school system reflect three major challenges faced by African-

Nova Scotian students that were included in the 1994 BLAC report: teacher insensitivity and low expectations, parental issues, and community issues (BLAC Report 1994).

Angelique faced similar challenges; she talks about school while growing up:

Uhh I didn’t like school at all… .I think just like I always liked bein’ away from home because like my stepdad and stuff, so I just got used to runnin’ the roads and school. I didn’t like authority. I didn’t like anything, you know what I mean, I never liked any of that kind of stuff so I would just

fight against it, I just would get kicked out of school. I’d be fighting, just anything so I would go on my own time and do what I wanted…. I got expelled in grade 10…. I was allowed to write my exams in a different building. I wasn’t allowed on the property but I was allowed to write my exams so that’s what made me be able to pass cause I was really smart. When I came to school, I just never applied myself. (Angelique, Interview)

Mya talked about the poor mentality of other community members, and both Mya and

Angelique noted instability in their family life while growing up, suggesting that the lack of stability in their home lives negatively affected their school lives.

Two participants stated that they “stuck with” school until graduation but didn’t feel like post-secondary education would provide them with what they wanted for the future. Ty started working full time immediately after school and refrained from a post- secondary education because, he explains, “I started seeing the paychecks and switchin’ jobs and gettin’ more money so it was just like, why should I go back?” He did show some regret during the interview about not pursuing a college/university education:

I should have did more in school and should have went through university and stuff but I didn’t, I tried to take the fast way out…. I wanted to get money fast… so I got a job soon as I got out of school and I always told my teachers, my gym teachers and all that I would go back to school, but I didn’t. (Ty, Interview)

Mikhail acknowledges that, because of his intent on making music, he did not see further education as necessary. In regards to school he states:

I got through it but I also knew that it wasn’t that important in my life…. I learned but it wasn’t never, school was never gonna bring me to where I wanted to be, I wanted to rap for a long time…. I took little things but it had nothin’ to do with my life so I knew like after high school I was just gonna pursue music…. I mean like after high school it’s like “thank you, I know what I know” and I think like that’s enough for me to be where I want to be in music. (Mikhail, Interview)

The lack of enthusiasm exhibited by participants regarding school could suggest a number of different things. Because African Nova Scotians have a history of

marginalization in the education system, participants may not have viewed education as being a sufficient means to success. Statistical data indicates that 65% of African Nova

Scotians over 15 years of age hold a degree, certificate or diploma, compared to 73% of

Nova Scotians. Data also suggests that only 18% of African Nova Scotians have a university degree compared to 22% of all Nova Scotians (African Nova Scotia Affairs).

Therefore the five participants who have only a high school certificate reflect the marginalized 35% with no post-secondary education.

Another barrier facing African Nova Scotian students that was discussed in the

1994 BLAC report was curriculum deficiencies. The limited presence of Black history and culture in the school curriculum is problematic because of education’s role in transmitting knowledge of and the heritage of the past. One of the failures of the Nova

Scotia school system, as noted in 1994, was a failure to provide a cultural education for

Black students (BLAC Report 1994: 41). This absence was somewhat reflected in the interviews. Only two participants talked about African Nova Scotian history being included in their education growing up.

Colleen talks about her experiences in a predominately Black elementary school:

“history always played a big part because we always learned about the history of our community…. We got to learn a lot about the things that happened back in the day and how everything came to be with Black history and African Nova Scotian history and things like that.” She said that her knowledge of community history was part of the reason why she felt so comfortable in her community. Mikhail briefly discussed African

Nova Scotian history in school growing up, although he portrayed a more critical stance

and noted discrepancies between what he had learned through formal education and what family members had told him about his history. He explains:

my mother taught my a lot of stuff about it… but I know what they taught me in school is like completely different than what she has told me and what I have learned myself. And when I go to talk to other people about this issue, they disagree with this issue also. So it’s like somebody else’s opinion, someone else’s story and why they tryin’ to make me believe this? (Mikhail, Interview)

Mikhail’s experience suggests a distancing between his knowledge of African Nova

Scotian history through his community and family, and the formal knowledge provided by the school curriculum, which he feels is the history created by the school system rather than the history created by his culture. His experience speaks to a larger issue of identity for the African Nova Scotian community, especially if there is an absence of family or community members to pass down valuable cultural, Afrocentric knowledge. Colleen’s account of history being a central part of her elementary school was most likely due to the fact that she lives in a very tight-knit Black community and attended a predominately

Black school where there would be more of an emphasis on this kind of cultural education. This is not the case for many African Nova Scotians who live in large urban centres or predominately White neighbourhoods.

FANDOM AND MUSICAL INFLUENCES

In this section, participants’ fandom of rap music and music in general will be discussed. This section will show the influence of popular culture on the artists and how it has shaped their own music. Subthemes that emerged in this section are: first experiences listening to rap, favourite artists, influences and important elements of rap and other genres of music.

First Experiences Listening to Rap

All participants were asked about their first experiences listening to rap music.

Not all could remember the exact moment, but all claimed they began listening to it at a very young age. Four out of six participants said that family members or other people in the community introduced them to rap. Two male participants talked about watching rap videos on TV channels like BET (Black Entertainment Channel) and Much Music. Two of the female participants stated that, when they were young, they either didn’t like it or didn’t listen to it. Mya shared this experience in her interview:

I hated rap. When I was like really really young, my brother he used to listen to just rap music and I didn’t really care about it... so one day he said “you know you can learn from these people, they tell their stories” you know and that’s when I started listening… and it was like they’re actually telling me about their experiences. Like right there plain and simple, it’s just right there and I can learn about these people and I can learn about myself. (Mya, Interview)

Interestingly enough, one of the male participants first memories listening to rap was listening to a female rapper, Da Brat. This fact stood out in the interviews because, when discussing favourite artists, none of the participants named females, they discussed females only when they were asked.

Favourite Artists and Artistic Influences

A major theme in the data was the influence of participants’ favourite artists on their own music. Each interviewee was asked who their favourite rap artists were and why they were favoured. In each interview, there was a connection between the values of artists they admired and the values that are instilled in them as artists. For example, Kyle admired Kanye West as a major influence because,

he has the overall package like it’s never one thing with him whether it’s the music or outside of the music. When it comes to clothes, production,

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lyrics, the way he records, everything, the theatrics in his shows … it’s like 110% and a lot of artists don’t have that same vision. (Kyle, Interview)

When Kyle describes his own music and himself as an artist he emphasizes the music business aspect, he explains the importance of maintaining creative control of the music and marketing himself as an artist. His vision as an artist reflects his view of Kanye West.

Similarly, Colleen portrays this connection with her fandom of “conscious” rappers such as Styles P, the Lox, and Joe Budden. She claims throughout her interview that she strives to make conscious rap. Mikhail also projected this aspect in his fandom of

Tupac and Jay-Z:

Tupac Shakur… I understood him cause that’s what he really means by like his fans live him and stuff… because he was really community- oriented and like he was really opinionated…. I like Jay-Z also because when he first started out you could feel like the pain, like you watch his old videos so then you could see like honestly like where he’s come from, what he used to talk about and his progression. So I just like to see people’s growth and see where you are and like I mean music changes, but if you can see the person growin’ that really like that’s just motivation for me so I like listenin’ to motivational people. (Mikhail, Interview)

Throughout Mikhail’s interview he claims to be a motivational speaker for his community and its youth, he also talks a lot about where he has come from and how he has grown as a person, all of which are things he admires in other artists. While talking about the influence of other artists on his music, Mikhail refers to himself as “sponging” and says,

when you look at these people if they’re really bein’ honest about who they are… they’re talkin’ to their fans and their talkin’ to their people. So if I can take that and help me like get to where I need to be that’s what I’ma do…. I try to watch as much of their life as I can cause you know I’m a fan of them and I’m just spongin’. (Mikhail, Interview)

“Sponging” refers to taking what you admire from different artists and letting it influence your own music. The influence of other artists on participants through their fandom of

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rap demonstrates that, although Halifax is relatively isolated from large centres of rap production, popular culture has influenced the style, values and sound of the music that is produced in this geographical context.

Important Elements of Rap

As fans of rap music, participants were asked what they thought was the most important element of rap music. Each participant named something different, but there was a consensus that “being real” and staying true to yourself were of utmost importance.

The results from McLeod’s semantic analysis of Hip Hop texts and interviews also demonstrates the importance of staying true to yourself in rap music. In his analysis of the different dimensions of authenticity, McLeod places this aspect under the Social-

Psychological Dimension (staying true to yourself vs. following mass trends) (2012: 169).

As the interview data of fandom has shown, there is a complexity to this dichotomy that should not be oversimplified. Participants emphasized staying true to themselves but they also revealed how popular culture has had a great influence on their music, sound and style; therefore, it may not be worthwhile to view this relationship as mutually opposed, but instead view them as mutually influencing one another.

Mikhail claimed the most important element of rap, to him, is the culture, “the whole culture of honestly where we came from and like how we live. I just love like it’s like a struggle but yet it’s a good struggle, music, it’s like a story.” Kyle noted the role of technology in rap as he discussed the most important element for him, which is the artist as a person: “the most important thing is the artist themselves, you know thanks to social media and other aspects like that you really know who the artist is and they allow you to know through… their online presence.” The important elements of rap named by the

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other participants were honesty, flow and skill, lyrics and message, and heart. While discussing their fandom of rap, participants also discussed fandom of other genres of music.

Other Genres of Music

Each participant was asked about their fandom of other genres of music and what it was that appealed to them about the genres. Four of the six participants said that rhythm and blues (R&B) music was either their second favourite genre or equally as loved as rap music. Mikhail stated that he liked R&B music because; “it’s just like rap is just always so, I wouldn’t want to say angry… it’s always just going so fast, moving so fast like it’s always so up-tempo. R&B… is honestly when I wanna relax and sit back.”

Similar to Mikhail’s response, Mya and Kyle’s fandom for other genres is explained by the way they differentiate them from rap. Mya talks about her favourite genres of music as techno and dubstep; “there’s times where you just don’t wanna hear anybody talk and you just wanna let the music move you… like dub… it can be happy then all of a sudden it just gets real grimy and it’s just like that’s life.” Kyle’s love for rock is explained by how it shows a different side of the story, and a different life perspective. He elaborates:

It’s because you know those people come from a different walk of life and they have different ideas and thoughts… the concepts or ideas that they base around songs are you know it’s not something that’s gonna come from a Hip Hop background which would be predominately Black in a poor neighbourhood or something so they don’t have the same ideas or thoughts… it’s something you’re not used to. (Kyle, Interview)

Kyle also frames this discussion around race, and talks about how his fandom for rock is similar to White fandom of rap: “I think it’s vice versa because you might have someone that came from a middle class family in the suburbs or something… that you know have

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never seen a lot of the things a rapper would talk about on an album.” Kyle’s response questions a considerable amount of the literature, as well as hooks’ and Gilroy’s theoretical arguments that White desire for the exotic other allows White culture to consume Black culture as a commodity. To Kyle, this works both ways, as the exotic

“other” can also be represented by suburban White culture consumed by a Black lower class.

MAINSTREAM/UNDERGROUND DICHOTOMY

As the literature has elucidated, there is an abundance of scholarly debate surrounding the topic of authenticity in rap music. This debate centres on the commercialization of rap and whether it has compromised its authenticity and true political and social nature (Rose 1994: 139; Watkins 2012: 703). Mainstream or commercial rap is often regarded in opposition to an underground rap sensibility, and the underground scene is often recognized as preserving the original elements of the Hip-Hop movement and upholding a revolutionary principle (Wright 2012a: 524). There is no concrete definition of mainstream and underground rap, and differentiating the two has proved to be complex process. Therefore, one of the important parts of the interview was to understand artists’ perspective on the subject. Participants were asked to define and share their views on both mainstream and underground rap.

All participants agreed that, if an artist was considered mainstream, they had achieved some level of fame and success and had a larger fan base and audience. Mya,

Kyle and Ty talked about mainstream music in a progressive manner because they viewed mainstream artists as evolving to suit the needs of a larger audience. They did agree that the content of the music was different than underground music, but they

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viewed this as not compromising for the artist; instead, it was a strategic way to guarantee success. Mya talked about compromise when discussing mainstream music: “you always have to compromise when it comes to being in the music industry because once you take it seriously it’s like… you’re not doing it for yourself anymore. You have to make sure that you keep your loyal fans happy, you draw in other fans.” She notes this compromise in her own music: “I was speaking with somebody and they told me that my style of rap… is dead and that if I would want to move to the next level that I need to compromise my style and make it meet the mainstream music. So it could work in a positive way, it could work in a negative way.” Similarly, Colleen notes the pressure to conform to reach a larger audience, but she refused to do so:

I feel like some people… take their morals a lot more stronger than others. Personally, I’ve had people wanna work with me but wanna change my whole style, try to get me to put on some girly girl clothes and some heels and I’m just like “no man, that’s not me.”… That’s how people are for some reason, they wanna try and change you…. Everybody wants to be successful… but at the same time it’s like there’s a lot behind that. (Colleen, Interview)

Angelique also noted pressure to change,

I would say like mainstream is more media made like more what the world wants and I think underground is moreso real, more real…. People used to tell me all the time, you have to start rappin’ for the hood and rap for the world. So there’s a difference between rappin’ for your community and talkin’ about that kind of stuff and then rappin’ for the world. So there’s… for me it was difficult for me to do that, it was really difficult, I feel, like for me to crossover like I had to change myself, I guess, if that makes sense. (Angelique, Interview)

Ty also notes the role of community in underground rap: “underground rappers that I listen to… they’re talkin’ bout more street, street cred and sellin’ this and you know what

I mean and like really where they came from…. Underground guys, they’re just keepin’ it just for pretty much their hood and where they grew up.” The pressure on females to

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conform to a certain style that was noted above, especially in Mya and Colleen’s quotes, has a lot to do with the fact that they are female artists, which will be discussed later in this chapter.

Participants had difficulties differentiating between underground and mainstream.

Kyle puts this difficulty into perspective by explaining that, because of technological advances in society, the lines between the two are becoming more and more blurred. He attributes this merging to the accessibility of recording equipment, artists’ ability to promote themselves through social media, and the heterogeneity of messages in the mainstream. He also argues that, because of these factors, large record labels have less artistic control over the sound and content of the music: “I listen to a major artist… the sound isn’t really determined anymore by like a major label…. I think those lines, the

Internet is totally blurred, has got rid of those lines…. Just with the cost of technology and how we’ve learned to use computers to benefit ourselves, those lines have just disappeared.” Kyle asserts that through greater access to equipment, messages in the mainstream are becoming more heterogeneous, and rap is becoming more diverse. Kyle’s responses challenge both Rose’s argument that the content in rap has become increasingly homogenous through commercialization (2012) and scholarly argument that there is a capitalist model of censorship and control associated with commercialized or mainstream rap (Baldwin 2012: 231; Lipsitz 2001: 188; Perry 2012b: 297; Potter 1995:

110; Pough 2004: 2217; Rose 1994: 101; Watkins 2012: 692).

Mikhail and Colleen’s perspectives on mainstream rap differed from Kyle’s.

Mikhail stressed corporate control of the music in his response:

Mainstream is just like you’re just, you’re polished. You’re polished to look this way, you’re polished to sound this way, you’re polished to speak

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this way…. You’re a product of a record label and you have to do what you’re told…. When you go mainstream like you’re totally goin’ against like what you feel because maybe if you could do it your way you wouldn’t even be doin’ it this way…. The music sounds the same, a lot of music sounds the same and a lot of people have the same idea. (Mikhail, Interview)

Mikahil’s response differs exponentially from Kyle’s because he stresses homogeneity in the content and sound of the music and argues that mainstream is a product or commodity of a record label. Similarly, Colleen viewed mainstream music as going against an artist’s true intent and creative freedom. She puts this into perspective when speaking on underground and mainstream music:

when you’re an underground rapper you’re doin’ it for you because you wanna get somewhere. I feel once you hit that level and you feel like you’re getting’ somewhere or you’re mainstream or you’re starting to get all the attention that you want, then you’re doing it for somebody else. You’re startin’ to lose touch with yourself. And that could be why a lot of the music is turning the way that it is now cause people feel like they have to please other people. (Colleen, Interview)

Interestingly, both Mikhail and Colleen use the phrase “selling your soul” in their interviews when speaking about how artists’ compromise themselves for success, which could be related to the concept of “selling out” that is apparent in the literature. Colleen also briefly talks about the fan base for mainstream as an inactive fan base that is not actively engaging with the music:

well also think who’s listening too… the fan base, the person that you’re reaching out to with this music, you’re rapping about you’re rich, you’re that, and you’re everything, is that person really educated or even you know what I mean? That person is just listening. (Colleen, Interview)

Colleen and Mikhail’s responses convey Adorno and Horkheimer’s (2005) conceptualization of mass popular culture as a technological machine and the concept of the passive consumer. What Colleen’s response suggests is that when you compromise yourself as an artist by changing your style and content, you are allowing your music to

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be accessed by the masses who may not understand the culture and the music, but instead they are only listening because it’s popular and more accessible. Therefore, they are not active consumers of the music and are not critically engaging and questioning the content.

PERSONAL RAP MUSIC

This section discusses the participants’ personal music in terms of when and why they began to create their own music, messages and content of their music, and the role of community in their music. Four participants began rapping at a young age. Angelique began to rap in her twenties and Kyle in his mid-teens. Two of the female participants wrote poetry before they began to rap and ended up putting their poetry to music. Kyle was a producer for other people before he started rapping for himself. Although participants noted different reasons why they began to make music, they all viewed rap as a way to have a voice, creative self-expression and tell their stories. Mya points out, “it was just my point of being like, I don’t wanna shut up anymore.”

For Angelique, music was a way for her to escape the alternative of work and school, as she explains: “with my school and stuff, and like me with jobs like, I don’t like workin’ 9-5 jobs like for me it’s just like it causes stress and stress causes cancers and stuff. I just want to do what I want to do and make money off it.”

Ty noted the influence of an older rap group from East Preston, Nova Scotia:

It was a group from East Preston…. I listened to one of their songs and I loved it… and then at eleven, and twelve I started like tryin’ to record my own stuff and goin’ to a friends house to actually start recording and yeah I would say the guys from East Preston really got me into it… cause like I hadn’t heard anyone like rap like that from our area. (Ty, Interview)

Mikhail was also eleven when he first started to record music. As he explains, during his teenage years he got into trouble with the law and went to a Juvenile Detention Centre.

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After he returned home he decided to invest in his own music, this decision was a substantial moment in his life, as he explains:

I got out, did home schoolin’ for a bit cause I was on house arrest, I couldn’t go to school or nothin’ and I started really writin’ music when I was sittin’ home and I was like man… like if I keep getting into trouble like this then I’m seein’ what’s happenin’ with my life like I can’t do what I need to do. So I honestly just said, “you know what I’m gonna write and write until I pass over this hump and once I get over this hump, I’m not lookin’ back.” So I got over the hump… that’s how it went for me. Really tryin’… to take my whole life and look at my life and what I need to do with my life and that’s how it went… and I never got in trouble after that… and that’s why I try to make positive music cause I’d be the biggest hypocrite in this world if I sat there promotin’ violence in my music. That’s why a lot of people respect my music cause I’m not out here just tryin’ to look like a rapper…. I’m a motivational speaker to some people. (Mikhail, Interview)

Mikhail views his music as a way to communicate to others the lessons he has learned.

He also continuously stresses throughout his interview the need for rappers to stay away from violence for the sake of violence. Instead, he explained the difference between self- defense, which he think is okay to rap about, and stereotypical violence. He also notes how stereotypical violence in rap has implications for the Black community:

I know what protecting myself means… but don’t be out here like just bein’ violent just for no reason… don’t be out here promotin’ the culture of violence and it’s kind of making us Black neighbourhoods and Black people look really bad…. I mean, I’m all for Black people comin’ up and makin’ it… but like us as Black people wer’re makin’ our music and we’re makin’ us look violent…. But also I do know what protecting myself means and my family and nobody can ever ever try to come to me and try to threaten me and I’m gonna have to defend myself (Mikhail, Interview).

The literature suggests that dominant narratives in rap centre on the violent Black man, which is problematic because it reproduces negatively stereotypical images of Black culture (Wright 2012a: 522). However, scholars also argue that the use of violence could be a way for the marginalized to assert power by using stereotypical images to their

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advantage (Baldwin 2012; Keyes 2006: 103; Perry 2012a: 510; Pough 2004: 183; Potter

1995: 88&93). From personal listening experience of Nova Scotian rap in general, violent content is apparent in some of the music, although I would argue it is not a dominant narrative.

Similar to Mikhail’s reflection on his own life experience and decision to start making music, personal life and experiences were significant to the other participants as well and shaped the content of their music. Truthfulness and only rapping about things you had experienced yourself were very important to participants. One participant suffers from mental health issues and, consequently mental health awareness is a large part of that person’s musical content. Others want to send the message of positivity that, even if you are faced with tribulations, you can stay strong and keep going. Ty explained that his content is relatively diverse: “I really like rappin’ like as if I’m rapping to a female… I’ve been doin’ a lot of club songs lately too…. Yeah, other than that it’s just I rap about my guys that are locked up… yeah I just rap about anything pretty much…. It’s all fun to me

(Ty, Interview). Data from the interviews also suggested that community experiences played a large role in the personal music of African Nova Scotian rap artists.

Role of Community

Community played a significant role in the content of the participants’ music and the support they received in regard to their music. Community is present in the music whether indirectly through participants’ rapping about experiences growing up, directly talking about their own communities, or representing the larger Nova Scotian community in general. Kyle claims that he raps indirectly about his community and Nova Scotia through his personal experiences. He elaborates on this theme:

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the type of music I find I connect with and a younger generation connects with is… what’s happening to me type of situation… or like my own experiences because I know that somebody else has felt them. Whereas if I just try and do something for like the Maritimes and all these different people and cultures, I’m never gonna do it. (Kyle, Interview)

Colleen says she speaks to her community through different phrases in her songs that can be identified by people from her home community because of language and slang. She wants to write a song specifically for her community, she says:

I’ve always wanted to put one song that’s just strictly about my community but I haven’t got to that point yet…. Like I always try to put it out there cause I never want people to think that I’m forgettin’ where I come cause that would never be the case. I don’t have one particular song that’s just about that and the reason for that being is cause I wanna make sure that I’m puttin’ all the facts in there that I should like.… I wanna add somethin’ about the historic value…. I wanna add somethin’ about… the family traditions like wanna have everything in there…. I wanna make it like something that I can really, really be proud of. (Colleen, Interview)

Mikhail says he talks about his community all the time in his music, and he shared some things he might discuss. His music is socially conscious and critically examines things going on in his neighbourhood. Some of these things include poverty, police harassment, racism, etc. He talked about this in his interview:

I talk about the police harassment, I talk about the racial profiling; I talk about when I’m walking down the street with my hood up cause it’s cold, I walk past the person and their holding their stuff and they’re lookin’…. I talk to people that are from like poverty, like low-income neighbourhoods so I’m just like you know the cops are around here a lot, there’s things that you have to do to try and get by…. I’m just tryin’ to tell these people like “man you’re in the hood, you’re in the same place I grew up, look at me.”…. You can get your mind on the same level that I am and not really be provoked by this stuff no more and feel trapped by it anymore. (Mikhail, Interview)

Mikhail went on to say that he is angry and this is something that reflects through his music: “I could look angry in my video cause I am angry. Like I’m angry at the racial profiling, I’m angry at police, I’m angry when I’m rappin’, I’m really bein’ emotional.”

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Mikhail views himself as educating youth on issues in the community and being a source of motivation for people living there. The literature claims that rappers frequently occupy a self-proclaimed position of responsibility as the representative of their community

(Haines 1999: 70; Perry 2012a: 504), and this was very apparent with Mikhail’s commitment to his community. Mikhail’s experiences reflects the literature, which suggests that populations around the world create meaningful social commentary through rap and social criticism that reflects the conditions present in communities on the local level (Forman 2012: 261; Higgins 2009: 57).

Unlike Mikhail, Ty says he stays away from rapping about specific social issues in his community because he thinks that too many rappers are doing that and wants to do something different. Angelique and Mya boasted about representing the Nova Scotian community as a whole rather than specific communities. In both their interviews, they stated that they lived in many places in Nova Scotia, which may be why they would rather identify with the province than specific places. Mya also talks about representing

Nova Scotia in general because of tensions between specific communities:

I rep Nova Scotia, period.… It’s like we’re all from Nova Scotia, we’re all from the same place. It doesn’t matter what your street name is called. It’s cool if you rep it and say, “I’m proud to be from here, but it’s like you also have to understand there’s gangs, there’s hate just by being from a place because somebody they don’t like is from there… like at Nova Scotia as a province, as a whole cause, other than that, nobody knows what Nova Scotia is anyway. We’re the capital ghost town. (Mya, Interview)

Mya’s quote speaks to the invisibility of Nova Scotia as a centre of rap production, which is problematic for all of the participants. The Nova Scotian rap scene will be discussed in the following section.

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NOVA SCOTIA RAP SCENE

During each interview participants were asked to describe the rap scene in Nova

Scotia. Given the virtual absence of literature on rap music in Nova Scotia, it was essential for this thesis to understand African-Nova Scotians’ experiences and to understand the rap scene as a whole. All participants viewed the rap scene as inclusive to anyone of any race, ethnicity, class, music style or gender; instead, they emphasized making quality music, skill and being true to who you are. Mikhail stresses the importance of staying true to who you are by denouncing other rappers who he thinks play a character in their music. He says,

next thing you know they’re on a mic rappin’ and a video poppin’ bottles and stuff but you live in the same conditions as me. You live in the same struggle…. Some people are really looked at as characters because when you see my videos I’m in my neighbourhood and I’m speakin’ on some real stuff but some people out here are characters.

“Poppin’ bottles” is often used as an indicator of an acclaimed status through consumption and wealth. Some scholars argue that this consumption is an act of resistance that counters the invisibility and misery of Black life (Neal 2012: 495; Perry

2012a: 508; Rose 1994: 38). Mikhail’s views suggest that he associates inauthenticity with a rappers who distance themselves from their community. His views on rap/Hip Hop culture explain this point:

It’s just deeper than it became… people feel like it’s grab a mic and try to get famous. It’s like a lifestyle; it’s how you live. Like I know when I go to a party and my buddies still beatbox and try to get me to rap and I do it every time. I know some of these people out here won’t even get on a cipher and rap 16 bars because they’re not true artists. They are not true rappers and one thing about it, I’m gonna speak on it all the time, and if you’re not a rapper don’t call yourself a rapper…. To me, it’s a lifestyle…. It’s what I live, it’s what I see, it’s what I’ve been gon’ through, it’s where I wanna be, it’s a speaker to my young nephews and nieces…. That’s all music is to me. (Mikhail, Interview).

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The boundaries of authenticity governing the scene are extremely important to Mikhail, and he continuously speaks on maintaining the principles, the culture and the lifestyle of the Hip-Hop movement.

An overriding theme in the interviews and possibly the largest theme that emerged from the data was the divisiveness of the Nova Scotia rap scene. McGuire (2011) noted in the history of the Nova Scotian rap scene that in 1997 the scene was divided both racially and stylistically. There has been no research on the scene between 1997 and

2014, when my research was conducted. At some point during this decade and a half, racial tensions have appeared to dissipate. However, the emergence of many different cliques and a lack of one collective movement has left the scene even more divided. This was an issue noted by all the participants in the interviews, and the desire for a collective movement was apparent among all of the interviewees.

Each participant claimed to have a specific group with which they rapped frequently and viewed as a mutual support system; as Mya states, “a support and foundation… all of us have you know weaknesses and strengths and we try to balance each other out.” Similarly, Kyle noted the role of his group: “we allocate like certain tasks; like certain people deal with the social media, the videos, the merch, all those type of things.” Crews are an essential part of rap music and local communities. They represent the collective identity of producers and rap artists who commonly engage in the creative process and provide one another with a mutual support system (Forman 2012:

255; Rose 1994: 34).

These groups of mutual support were referred to in the interviews as teams, cliques or collectives. Everyone claimed that the rap scene is small in Nova Scotia and,

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therefore, everyone knows everyone (not always personally), but they are still very divided. Angelique puts this into perspective:

It’s weird. People are like really cliqued up in Nova Scotia…. It’s all separated, it’s all separated. It’s weird because you can tell cause there’s certain people that go to certain people’s shows, go to their shows every time like they don’t switch up…. You would never see certain crowds comin’ to like my shows even though like you know or maybe not my shows per se but you would never see certain crowds mixing, which is weird. (Angelique, Interview)

Kyle reiterates this point and indicates that, in order for the Nova Scotia rap scene to gain attention, they need to work together:

As far as being close knit and stuff, we are, in the sense that it’s a small community, we run into each other all the time…. I think we embrace each others’ music and stuff like that, but when it comes to pushing ourselves further and making the genre expand and grow and stuff, we’re not good for that…. It’s like growing as a community in that sense that I feel like we lack. (Kyle, Interview)

Ty agrees that everyone should work together:

There’s a lot of groups out there that are I feel like they hate on other groups from their own city and community and I don’t find that cool at all. I feel like we should all be workin’ together because… you don’t want to have a bunch of talent in one city and no one make it because of all the hatred. (Ty, Interview)

Similarly, Colleen notes that there is a lack of opportunity for Nova Scotian rap artists and that lack has a lot to do with the separatism between different music groups;

I just feel like we need to come together in Nova Scotia…. Everybody has their little cliques and that’s cool but I think the cliques need to come together and everybody’s puttin’ on their separate shows and things…. Everybody has to want to come together more and actually make a real movement if something’s gonna happen. You know you have the South, you got New York, everybody is basically doin’ their thing together. It’s just like if Nova Scotia could do that then we’d make some noise. (Colleen, Interview)

Haines (1999) notes that there is a lack of musical opportunities for Canadian rap artists looking for professional careers (69). While Halifax and Dartmouth are hubs for Nova

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Scotian rap music, they are still relatively small compared to Montreal, Vancouver and

Toronto, the primary centres of rap music in Canada. The artists in this study understand that, in order to be noticed, they have to work together.

While everyone stressed that rappers need to work together as a movement, only one female artist showed initiative to bring this unity about through a project she is working on for the future. To help understand why there is a great divide, participants were asked to explain why they thought this separatism was happening. One participant described favouritism by promoters and the people who organized rap shows. He believed that the same artists continually were featured in the shows and others were rarely invited. He described this as being unfair for the fans because they did not have a say in seeing certain artists they liked, and unfair for many artists because as some talent was being hidden from the fans. The interview data suggests that shows are a large part of the scene in terms of visibility for the artists. Because of the high cost of videos and album/mixtape promotion, live shows are a way for artists to showcase their talent and gain a larger fan base without a large financial cost.

Fans play a large role in why artists feel there is a divide, because the fan base for

Nova Scotian rap music is small and there is noticeable competition for fan support.

Colleen talks about this in her interview: “Nobody wants to really support the other person because... this is what they’re thinkin’. “Why would I support this person when

I’m tryin’ do the same thing”…And if everybody’s rappin’, where are the fans? You feel me? Nova Scotia is not that big a place so where are all the fans if everybody’s rapping?”

Mya also noted that many communities support an artist who is from their area more so than other artists from other communities, so gaining respect and support from these

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communities can be challenging. Mya and Colleen’s interview responses stress the difficulties of being a female in the Nova Scotia rap scene and how competitiveness for support is tenfold for women compared to males. The complexity of being female in the

Nova Scotian rap scene, and being a female in rap in general, will be discussed in the following section on gender.

THE ROLE OF GENDER IN RAP

This section will examine the role of gender in both the Nova Scotia rap scene and in rap music generally. Both female and male participants shared their views on the various challenges of being a woman in rap music. Various questions about gender were asked throughout the interviews; for example, do you think gender is an important component of rap music? Interestingly when these questions were asked, respondents automatically discussed their responses in terms of female rap. This was interesting because gender pertains to both male and female. These responses could reflect the assumed privilege associated with being male in rap music and that this privilege may go unquestioned and without critical examination, similar to topics of race when Whiteness as a race is often overlooked.

It was obvious from the responses of both males and females in the interviews that women are generally marginalized in rap music. This adequately reflects the literature because the male gender is viewed as a form of subcultural capital in rap

(Harkness 2012: 288-292; Gaunt 1995:302). From the interview responses, women’s marginalization was apparent in terms of their opportunities and acceptance, their invisibility, pressure to conform, emphasis on appearance, and unhealthy competition that

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exists among female artists. The challenges for women in rap will be discussed in terms of appearance and competition.

Appearance and Pressures to Conform

As in the discussion of mainstream music, Mya and Colleen noted a pressure to conform to a certain style in order to be successful. The literature discusses the hypersexualization of female rappers in the media and how this presentation is problematic as a reinforcement of stereotypical and pornographic images of Black women, and that also shows the apparent lack of agency of female rappers (Perry 2012a:

508). The other side of this argument is that women in rap, even if they exhibit overt sexuality, reconstruct essentialzed Black womanhood by challenging stereotypes and norms, illustrate female power and agency, critique sexism and patriarchy, and celebrate their sexuality (Baldwin 2012: 241; Gaunt 1995: 294; Keyes 2006: 97, 105; Oware 2009:

787; Pough 2004: 74; Rose 1994: 147). The pressures of conforming to the image and appearance of famous Black female rappers were apparent on the local level of female rap in Nova Scotia and the participants navigated this pressure in different ways. It is important to consider, that although Mya and Colleen articulated this pressure, Angelique did not. She stated that she felt accepted in the scene. This sense of belonging could mean that her style already reflected the desired style and there wasn’t a need to change her presentation.

Colleen and Mya had different views on how they handled the pressures of appearance and conformity in the local rap scene. Colleen refused to compromise herself and her morals by changing her appearance and style. She states:

they would want your attire to basically want me to conform to other females. In like the whole Lil’Kim, Foxy and Nicki Minaj, that whole

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thing…. That’s how they’re gonna make their money.… They might not have my talent but if they got that look and somebody else thinks that they’re gonna make money off of them… they’re gonna try and run with it…. You can’t change my style, you can’t change my morals or my mind set. It’s not going down like that. (Colleen, Interview)

All of the celebrity female rap artists mentioned in the above quote are known for their hypersexuality. Not only does Colleen’s quote reflect the emphasis on appearance, it downplayed the role of talent and skill in female artists. Mya similarly noted the emphasis of appearance over skill in her own experience: “I was talking to a guy and he gave me some insight and he said my style of rap is dead. And it was really, really, really hard on the heart because it was like, you’re cute rely on that more.” Despite the obvious hurt Mya felt from this experience, she has learned to navigate the pressures of appearance differently than Colleen. She views conformity as a strategy and playing her cards effectively:

We play with it. I play with it personally, like when I was younger I didn’t like cameras, I didn’t like make-up.… Then people started saying like you know “you’re a human doll”... and it’s like “oh I’m a human doll, okay I’ll play with it.” Now I’m something you already thought I was anyways and now you have Nicki Minaj and all these other people to compare me to.… It’s so easy to just sit back and laugh at it all.… Females have that stigma around us like you know we have to have sex to get to the top or you know we have to sell ourselves. Every artist is technically a prostitute, we’re all selling ourselves we’re just not having physical contact with anybody. (Mya, Interview)

Mya conforms to pressures on appearance but views it as a strategy to gain success. She is exerting what she sees as agency because it is her choice to use her looks to advance herself as an artist. When critically examining this choice, it actually represents a limited form of agency because the choice only exists within the boundaries of patriarchy. Mya’s experience and attitude is a significant example of why a postfeminist discourse is problematic. As Gill has stated, “girls and women are invited to become a particular kind

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of self, and are endowed with agency on condition that it is used to construct oneself as a subject closely resembling the heterosexual male fantasy found in pornography” (152).

Mya’s agency is permissible in this situation because it reproduces oppression through exploitation of women. Mya and Colleen both noted that, as a woman, in order to be successful they have to rely on their appearances, which reflects a partiarchical society.

Naming this view a postfeminist discourse is irrelevant because it is obvious the goals of feminism still have not been achieved.

Throughout her interview, Mya stresses how exerting sexual agency has given her an advantage over men. She states that because it is more socially acceptable for women to modify and enhance their appearances through the use of makeup, hair extensions or injections, they can gain attention solely through their look. Men can also use attractiveness, but men who are unattractive can rely solely on their skill. This opportunity is not present for women who are conventionally defined as unattractive.

Mya mentions this point in her interview: “as I got older people gave me a chance, they listened to me more because I was more appealing to the eye.” She also notes that her appearance allows her to make professional connections that may not have been possible otherwise:

People in the industry you know, celebrities, well-established people, they don’t wanna hang with dudes, they wanna hang with girls. They don’t need to know we rap, we already know they’re fond of us. There’s our in right there. So we can play our cards right and take advantage of every situation possible and I feel like that’s why a lot of guys hate on us. (Mya, Interview)

Mya’s quote indicates the complexity of strategy that females have to think about. The male participants also offered some insight on female rap artists and their appearances.

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All the male participants agreed that women do use appearance and sexuality in their music and image. Mikhail views it as selfish for a listener to expect more from a female than her creativity and her music. He states, “just wanting to see somethin’ out of a person is selfish. You have to see what they’re giving us and if you appreciate it then cool but don’t try to look for nothing else outta this person.” He blames others for expecting a certain image from females, but he also notes the woman’s fault in another quote: “we’re gonna take what you give us. As me bein’ a listener of music, we’re gonna take what you give us and what you put out there. If the world wants that after remember at that first time you put that out there for us to get your attention and now you’re wonderin’ why that’s all it is because that’s what you put us onto at first.” Mikhail’s quote suggests that if a woman makes the conscious decision to base her image on sexuality and appearance, she cannot be upset if that’s how others come to view her.

Unfortunately for the female artist, this may not be something that she wants in the first place but may be the only opportunity she believes will bring her success and visibility as an artist. Kyle also talks about the over sexualization of women in rap;

I don’t know, I’ve always felt weird and I don’t know if it’s because of like the popular female rappers that have made it when you think of like Foxy Browns and stuff…. It’s super like oversexualized… and I often wonder to myself, do the females feel like they have to do it? … I almost feel like when it comes to the female part of rap that maybe it’s still let’s say ten years back in the mainstream mindset where you need to conform.… There’s so many people here that are open and stuff to every different type of music but all those people I see are male…. I wonder if they feel like they can’t you know, quote on quote,“spit bars”. (Kyle, Interview)

The above quotes by male participants demonstrate that they hold women accountable for sexually exploiting themselves. This is another indication that a postfeminist framework is problematic because postfeminism celebrates female agency and females become

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accountable for their choices, which ignores the institutional oppression that frames these decisions. Interestingly, Angeliqe did not note these pressures in her interview. However, all female participants noted that there is unhealthy competition among female artists.

Competition Among Female Artists

Female artists in this study acknowledged that there is unhealthy competition between females in the scene. This is partly due to a lack of fan base and support for female artists. There was also the notion of an unspoken rule that there can only be one female artist who has success at any one time. They noted that this phenomenon exists in popular culture as well.

Mya stated that the biggest challenge about being a female was her safety. When asked to elaborate on this point, she said:

The fact that you know there could be ten guys sitting in a room all rapping and nobody compared anybody but there could be you know two females in a room and it’s like do or die. Who’s better? I don’t feel like females do that to themselves, I feel like we allow the people or the men around us to do that to each other and they could kind of convince us like we always have to be in competition with each other. There’s nothing wrong with healthy competition ever but I feel I’ve been victim to that too and I’ve disliked other female rappers because like you’re trying to take my fans or you’re trying to cop my style. It’s like I would never have thought that if somebody didn’t put that bug in my ear. (Mya, Interview)

It is clear that Mya believes males have a lot to do with why there is animosity between female artists. Angelique refers to the competition as a “secret beef,” which means that it is something that goes on behind the scenes. She stresses the importance of females coming together in the future:

We need to be workin’ together more because that was before now it’s gettin’ to the point where everyone’s so hungry for the fame and everyone’s so close for it that everyone feels like they have to surpass people, but I’m tryin’ to get everyone to stay in the old ways and stay workin’ together you know. Everyone’s getting’ jealous and upset and

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“Oh you’re workin’ with this person and that person” but you can’t…. I don’t want it to be like that, it shouldn’t be like that. We should all be workin’ together. (Angelique, Interview)

Colleen reiterates this in her interview,

I feel lonely cause you know even the women that are out there rappin’, nobody really clicks. I haven’t gotten in touch with anybody, nobody’s got in touch with me and that’s bad on both sides… everybody’s tryin’ to basically be heard and there’s not many female artists.… I mean, try to do somethin’ together. (Colleen, Interview)

The division of the women in the scene reflects the division of the Nova Scotian scene in general. As Nova Scotia is a marginalized centre of rap music because of its geographical isolation, women are even more marginalized in the scene. Both Mya and Mikhail speak on the invisibility of women. Mya believes it has something to do with the fact that people do not profit from female rappers. Mikhail thinks it has to do with the limited fan base for female rap music. This lack of opportunities could help explain why there is a fight for support and fans among the females.

Despite the challenges of being a woman in rap music, participants believed it was important to have women representing these roles. All participants did not think that gender should determine access to the genre; instead it offers a new perspective to the story, one that is female. Yet the general challenges that were highlighted throughout this section reflect the literature in the sense that women’s voices in general have been systematically silenced (Pough 2004: 68) and their fight for representation has been ongoing throughout history (Pough 2004: 217).

THE ROLE OF RACE IN RAP

One of the largest debates in Hip-Hop centres on race and cultural ownership.

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This debate exists because Hip-Hop and rap music transcend racial barriers, and there is a history of cultural exploitation of Black vernacular and musical traditions through White appropriation (Higgins 2000: 51; Wright 2012a: 523). Rap is considered to be a Black art form because it originated from the Black population, granting Black participants in the genre racial authenticity (Baldwin 2012: 230; McLeod 2012: 170; Rose 1994: 5). In order to navigate the debates on this topic, the participants were asked about race in rap music.

Because of their status as African Nova Scotians, and their place in the Black diaspora, the participants would generally be considered racially authentic, but because the Black population in Nova Scotia is considered a minority, it was essential to this study to question the participants on how they viewed race in the rap scene.

When asked if they thought race was an important component of rap, four out of the six participants said it was not. Two participants did not directly answer the question but it was apparent from their responses that they shared concerns about White control of the genre and cultural ownership. Ty, one of the four participants who did not think race mattered in rap music emphasized skill and “swag”, which means appearance/style, as a determining factor of authenticity. He says; “as long as you have the skill and look for it, it doesn’t matter what race you are to be honest. If you have the skill people will just wanna hear what you got, that’s just me anyway, I don’t look at people for their race.”

Kyle argued that it was the overall demographic of Nova Scotia and the fact that communities are racially diverse that race isn’t viewed as a critical component of the

Nova Scotia rap scene. He elucidates on this argument as follows:

I think number one here is that you don’t have like… lets say a Black kid went to school, there’s not gonna be all Black kids, it’s gonna be like White and other aspects of people just in the Maritimes in general like you’re gonna have Mik’Maq and other people from different backgrounds,

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whereas let’s say if you’re in inner city in Chicago and might actually be 99% all Black students…. In the life aspect coming from the Maritimes is that I don’t think any of us in this day and age where like we didn’t grow up in just like a segregated, you know a segregated community or anything like that so I feel like… it’s for the simple fact that like I grew up in a community where there’s White, there’s Black. (Kyle, Interview)

Kyle’s response suggests that the way race is viewed is relative to geographical location and the generation in which you grew up. His response may partly explain why

McGuire’s thesis on the history of Hip-Hop in Nova Scotia found the scene to be racially divided in 1997. The people who would have grown up in the 1970s’-80s’ would have lived in a different social landscape than those who grew up in the 90s’. For example, the last segregated school in Nova Scotia closed in 1983 (Black History Canada 2015); therefore the racial relations would have been much different at this time. Clearly, racial identity politics were important in the 1970s and 1980s. The argument that the rap scene is less racialized now reflects a post-race discourse.

Colleen considers different races and ethnicities in rap to be a positive thing. Like the female perspective, different races offer a new perspective to the music. Colleen suggests that,

I think it’s actually good to have a lot of different people.… That’s just me.… I feel like people are understanding the culture a lot more like if you see another ethnicity rapping then you could probably understand what’s goin’ on better through them if you’re the same ethnicity as them (Colleen, Interview).

Mya similarly notes that people from different races have important stories to tell and issues to discuss. Additionally, she believes it is challenging for White artists to justify their presence in the genre. She says,

All true artists have a bunch of bullshit in their life to go through. It doesn’t matter if you’re White, Black, Puerto Rican or Haitian… I feel like you know White people have a lot harder time becoming believable. Because just like Black people, White people get stereotyped a lot.… It’s

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like times have changed…. As a Black person we’re supposed to pride ourselves on Hip-Hop. Hip-Hop was something that was created by the Blacks and it’s something that you know should be able to be shared…. Hip-Hop has always been about having a common interest and showing love for it…. I feel like White people have a lot harder time getting accepted here…. There’s an MC that I strongly support and he is White and he doesn’t get the recognition he deserves.… You know, a lot of the Hip-Hop guys and stuff like that, the coloured ones are or the more experienced ones, they weren’t really trying to listen to him. So you know how people have that persona of females…. I feel like he’s getting outted because of the colour of his skin. (Mya, Interview)

Mya’s experiences as a female in the scene allowed her to recognize the challenges for some White rappers to gain respect. She emphasizes perspective on why some people are included and some people are not. She believes that peoples’ experiences influence their perspectives.

Mikhail and Angelique’s responses on race touched on cultural ownership and

White privilege in the rap scene. They did not directly say whether or not they believed that race was a major factor in rap, but their responses indicated it was something they critically contemplated. Mikhail states in his interview that he feels that Hip-Hop is moving further away from Black culture, and therefore Black people are losing cultural ownership:

Well if you wanna be completely honest it came from Black people. It came from Black people and for Black people to not be allowed.… It’s for everybody though, it’s for everybody but for us to feel completely shunned out of something that we started, it will bother you…. Maybe the rules are bein’ changed by the people in power and switching lanes and stuff, you know it’s somethin’ you just gotta deal with. I’m not gonna just change it. (Mikhail, Interview)

Mikhail’s concern reflects the larger issue of cultural appropriation. He refers to people in power, which could mean large record labels/corporations who are changing the music to fit a larger audience. He also recognizes that he is powerless as one person to change this

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situation. Angelique questions race in the Nova Scotian rap scene by noting that the three most famous Hip-Hop artists to come from Nova Scotia are White. She states:

It’s actually really weird because… the only three main like… a couple main White people that are from Nova Scotia…. It’s weird because it’s almost like white people can get more of a crowd… but I don’t wanna say that right… but yeah it’s weird cause then you got them and they’re like the three mains comin’ from Nova Scotia right now but there’s… so many talented African Nova Scotians as well. (Angelique, Interview)

When asked why she thinks this situation prevails and she said she thinks it has to do with identity. There is a larger White population in the Maritimes, and White listeners may prefer to hear White artists over Black artists because they identify with them. She also mentioned class as a factor determining why White artists from Nova Scotia have more success. Class differences will be discussed in the following section.

THE ROLE OF CLASS IN RAP

The role class or socio-economic status plays in rap was an emerging theme from the interview data. Only one participant viewed class as a determining factor for whether or not a rapper could gain authenticity. Three participants acknowledged that being from a wealthier background provided advantages otherwise unavailable to rappers from lower-income backgrounds. Finally, four participants stated that rap could be authentic from any class as long as the rapper is telling true stories about his or her life.

In the previous section on race and rap music, Angelique stated that she questioned why all three of the most successful rappers from Nova Scotia are White. She attributed this partly to class because she explained White people tend to be better off financially. She clarifies this point in her interview:

Black people you know are less fortunate maybe.… I know a lot like a lot of artists and stuff have their own studios and they have the equipment, you know what I mean. They have… they have that little maybe extra

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advantage maybe because, I know when I was tryin’ like even now it’s hard sometimes, well it’s not really hard cause I always got people asking to like find a good studio that fits you, or to find good beats or to find good producers, but if you have the money to pay for your equipment or the money to pay for those beats, or the money to pay for this good videos, then you’re gonna have so much more than the person that doesn’t even if that person’s better. You know. (Angelique, Interview)

Angelique’s quote argues that even if someone has more skill or talent, the person with more money has a clear advantage and is more likely to gain success. Similarly Mya and

Ty reiterated this in their interviews, Ty said, “I think if you’re wealthy I mean it’s really really easy to do more things, like to do shows away cause you have the money to do that like apply for nominations and all that stuff, those things count…. Money’s a big part of it.” Mya noted that money did play a role in Nova Scotian rap music, but that there are other opportunities available for artists from lower socio-economic backgrounds:

I mean in Nova Scotia you definitely need money to invest in yourself. I mean if you’re broke and you really spend a lot of time investing in your craft, there’s grants and stuff.… Money is important, and money isn’t. Money isn’t the only thing that matters… but money has to talk for you sometimes. (Mya, Interview)

The acknowledgement that money is a large component for the success of Nova Scotian rappers challenges the literature where class is viewed as subcultural capital, similar to race and gender (Harkness 2012: 294). Class is used to maintain boundaries of authentic participation; being ‘real’ was associated with lower and working-class rappers whereas being ‘fake’ was associated with being from a middle to upper class (Harkness 2012:

294). In the Nova Scotia rap scene class does not seem to be a major barrier of participation in the music, however, the participants emphasized that rappers from wealthier class backgrounds are only accepted in the scene if they tell true stories about where they’re from and how they live.

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Ty, Colleen, Mya, and Mikhail all noted that honesty is important when it comes to rapping about your socio-economic background. As Mikhail states, “you can be a good rapper coming from money but you have to rap about coming from money. You’re not in the hood, you’re not from the hood, don’t say the police chasin’ me and stuff. The police aren’t even in your neighbourhood.” Similar to the different perspectives offered through narratives of race and gender, Mya believes that there is a different perspective that is offered from various class backgrounds and wealthier people are not exempt from major issues in their lives. She elucidates:

When I was in elementary school you know the majority of my friends… lived in (wealthy community). They had these big old homes and like all this shit…. I didn’t even have my own room for like the majority of my childhood.… Then at the time I did think they were better off. As I got older you know I realized their shit was more fucked up than mine was. And that’s the thing like music is about telling your story but we’re so familiar with the story of the streets it’s like we’re not accepting of anything different…. People that come from money, they probably have the most stress and depressed and mental illnesses and a bunch of different things that follow with that because they never wanna embrace the problem itself, they’re always trying to fix it with money or materialistic things, and I feel like that’s just as bad as being broke (Mya, Interview)

The concept of the streets in rap music is significant because social location is a substantial part of rap music. Narratives of authenticity are often located from the African

American “streets” in contrast to the inauthentic narratives of White suburbia (McLeod

2012: 171), which is essentially what Mya is alluding to in this quote. Keyes explains that

“the streets” are identified as, “a subculture of the urban milieu that operates by its own rules, economics, lifestyle and aesthetics” (2002: 6). Mya’s quote also speaks to survival.

She explains wealthy people do not know how to accept their own personal issues or how to embrace them, in contrast to someone who comes from a lower-class where survival is important and you learn to understand and embrace your problems.

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Finally, Kyle was the only participant who viewed class as determining whether or not a person’s participation in rap is authentic, even over race and gender. He says:

I find this locally and I guess you could say North America wide or what mainstream people want, I find what people want to hear in general is usually someone from the lower class because the person that has money to go to a show, buy a CD and stuff doesn’t come from that community or that background…. I would say the class thing definitely effects it because I find like I would say the music that I connect with and I think a lot of people connect with would be people that come from a lower class or a lower standard of life and I think that’s what the grassroots of Hip Hop has always been, those people just voicing their opinions…. I think that will always be, no matter how pop Hip Hop becomes, that will always be one thing that people will always connect with. (Kyle, Interview)

For Kyle, Hip Hop originated from the margins of society and nothing will be as significant as the narratives of marginalization, no matter how commercial rap becomes.

Kyle’s quote also suggests the power that White middle-class consumers have over determining the narratives that are popular in rap.

The interview elicited a variety of responses from the six different participants.

The multiplicity of the responses reflects the diversity of the scene, and the absence of solidarity in the Nova Scotia rap scene. As a result of the multiple views present in the interview data, there can not be an assumed homogeneity of the Nova Scotian rap scene and African-Nova Scotian rap experience.

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CHAPTER 6: Conclusion

This study has contributed to the field of sociology because African-Nova Scotian rap music is an area of social research that is noticeably absent from academic literature.

Rap evolved from an urban African-American art form to be appropriated by marginalized Black populations throughout the African diaspora, African- Nova Scotians being one of them. Rap music in Nova Scotia is a hybridized culture of the original Hip-

Hop movement, popular culture today, and the social conditions facing Black Nova

Scotians. The participants in this study emphasized personal experience and life narratives in rap music. They also emphasized geographical location whether in terms of their own local communities or Nova Scotia in general as an important aspect of their music. Gender, race, and class dimensions are present in the rap scene of Nova Scotia but are viewed and negotiated in various ways; however, there is consensus among participants that women face additional challenges as artists than their male counterparts.

Views of the participants were diverse and did not reveal a uniform experience in the Nova Scotia rap scene. Because the perspectives in the interview data demonstrated unique and individual experiences it would be problematic to imagine an essentialist

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African-Nova Scotian rap artist experience. The data concludes that the tensions apparent in the literature on rap music are also noticeable in the Nova Scotian rap scene and the

African-Nova Scotian rap experience. These tensions are emphasized in this study rather than resolved.

There are boundaries of authenticity guarding the Nova Scotian rap scene and, participants navigate these boundaries in different ways. Boundaries of authenticity are created as a way to regulate who does and who does not have cultural ownership and access to the art form (Higgins 2000: 51; Harkness 2012: 297; McLeod 2012; 166; Potter

1995: 131; Pough 2004: 194; Rodman 2012: 186). These boundaries reflect the social norms of Hip-Hop culture and are negotiated by producers and audiences of the music

(Harkness 2012: 288). Harkness’s description of the “archetypal” authentic rapper as

Black, male, urban, working-class, underground, skilled, true to himself and resistive to commercialization (2012: 288) is consistently challenged by the data from this study.

The important role of community experiences is apparent in all of the interviews.

Identity in Hip-Hop is rooted in local experience, and recontextualizing Hip-Hop culture at a local level creates social meaning and value (Forman 2012: 250; Perry 2012: 296;

Potter 1995: 53; Rose 1994: 34). The importance of locality, community and hybridity is also apparent in the subcultural theoretical framework. The state of a local community during the emergence of a subculture explains why that subculture and meaning system can transcend geographical barriers. Similar social, economic and ideological institutions must be in place for the subculture to gain coherence for another population in another region (Stratton 1997: 189).

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Obviously, rap music as a form of self-expression is relevant to those living in local Nova Scotian communities and that is why it is appropriated. The historical and institutional racism felt by African-Nova Scotians became a catalyst for the emergence of a Hip-Hop subculture (McGuire 2011: 24). Similar to the African American populations of New York City during the 1970’s, the lives of Halifax blacks were affected by urban renewal (McGuire 2011: 28). Prior to the emergence of rap subcultures, Africville was closed during the 1960’s causing more than 2500 low-income and predominately black families to be relocated into housing projects in areas such as Gottigen Street and

Uniacke Square (McGuire 2011: 34-35; Nelson 2008: 57). It is apparent that local experience and community play a large role in the African-Nova Scotian rap artist experience.

The commitment and responsibility artists feel towards their communities’ reveals one the greatest tensions in the data; gaining success while staying true to who you are and where you’re from. There is pressure on marginalized populations to use creative expression as a means of social commentary and this is apparent in the literature. As

Rodman (2012) notes, people of colour are often denied artistic rights and the ability to separate their everyday lives from their music (184-186). Participants indicated the complexity of gaining success while staying “real”, and acknowledged that in order to gain substantial accomplishments, their narratives had to change to fit audience desires.

As a result of the emphasis on authenticity in rap music, rappers must carefully tread the line between being financially and musically successful while avoiding “selling out”. This is reflected in McLeod’s analysis of three of the six dimensions of authenticity,

Social-Psychological Dimension (staying true to yourself vs. following mass trends),

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Political-Economic Dimension (underground vs. mainstream), and Cultural Dimension

(the old school vs. the mainstream) (2012: 169-172). Four of the six participants viewed gaining success as a compromise between their own artistry and meeting the demands of a larger fan base. They saw this compromise as a form of artistic evolution rather than

“selling out”. Two participants viewed conforming to the demands of a record label or mainstream audience as negative and stated that it was morally wrong because it was distancing themselves as artists from their own music and creative self-expression.

The two principal themes to emerge from the data were, the description of the

Nova Scotian rap scene, and the views on race and gender in rap music. The experiences and perspectives in the rap scene are very heterogeneous. This is apparent in participants’ discussion of race. Four out of the six participants did not believe that race was an important component of rap music, and they provided a number of reasons for this. The other two participants did not directly answer the question, but had critically contemplated the role of race in the scene in terms of cultural ownership and White privilege. There was a consensus that the rap scene in Nova Scotia is very fragmented as a result of the existence of many different cliques and groups, and the absence of a collective movement. There is the desire for collectivity as a means to gain recognition of the scene outside of Nova Scotia, yet none of the participants take individual responsibility to initiate this movement. The individualistic and competitive nature of the scene because of the lack of both a fan base and market for the music is apparent in the data.

Competition was especially apparent between females because they are marginalized within an already marginalized population. The literature suggests that

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while rap is subject to oppression and critique by society, it equally acts as an oppressor to the women present in the genre (Higgins 2000: 92-93; Pough 2004: 19-20; Rose 1994:

104). Marginalization of women occurs because of the widely held belief that rap is exclusively male, instead of being shaped by both female and male participation (Gaunt

1995: 277; Potter 1995: 92). Women in the Nova Scotian rap scene face challenges and barriers as artists that their male counterparts do not.

The unhealthy competition between female rappers in Nova Scotia, coupled with an emphasis on appearance rather than artistry, replicate the marginalization of women, especially Black women. Marginalization of Black women is apparent in popular culture

(Banet-Wesier 2007), subcultures (Thorton 1997a; McRobbie and Garber 1997), expressive cultures (Kelley 2012: 139; Pough 2004: 8; Rose 1994: 58), Black culture

(Gilroy 2012; Collins 2006) and society in general. This marginalization exists at the local level of Black female rappers’ experiences in Nova Scotia and is apparent in both the theoretical frameworks and academic literature. The marginalization of women constitutes perhaps the most significant finding of this study. A postfeminist discourse is problematic for examining women’s marginalization in the Nova Scotia rap scene. The characteristics of postfeminism conveniently hide and remain structured by the social inequality and exclusion of women (Gill 2007: 152; Tasker & Yvonne 2007: 2).

Postfeminism portrayed in the media and popular culture normalizes feminism in such a way that it becomes apolitical, eradicating critical consideration of structural inequalities

(Banet-Weiser 2007: 211). Women’s choices as artists in the Nova Scotia rap scene assume an individualized agency, yet these choices only exist within the boundaries of patriarchy.

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Future Research

This research has provided a foundation for an area of study that has been neglected in academia; African-Nova Scotian rap music and the Nova Scotian rap scene in general. However, this study utilizes a small sample size because of limited time and financial resources. To improve upon this research a larger sample is recommended. A larger sample would allow the existing themes to be either strengthened or disputed, it would provide new themes, and allow for a more accurate representation of the contemporary Nova Scotian rap scene.

Participant observation of the Nova Scotia rap scene is suggested as a further method of research to expand upon this study. Participant observation would allow the researcher to observe and document social norms, behaviours and relationships that may not be apparent through an interview process. Additionally, it would allow the researcher to establish contacts and build rapports with members of the rap scene to facilitate the interview process. Participant observations could take place at album release parties, live shows, ciphers and recording studios.

Encapsulating the fans’ experiences in the rap scene is another potential direction for further study. As audiences, fans occupy an important role in popular culture by dictating mainstream music through consumption patterns, and negotiating boundaries of authenticity. Although the fan base of Nova Scotia rap music is relatively small it is worth investigating to reveal a holistic view of the scene. Subsequently, conducting a study including all aspects of the Hip-Hop movement (graffiti, rap, DJing and breakdancing) would also provide a holistic view of the scene and its relations. While all

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of these aspects represent different forms of creative self-expression they fall under one specific culture, and are associated with disenfranchised and marginalized populations.

This study examines dimensions of race, class, and gender in the contemporary rap scene, as well as Black participants’ experiences living in Nova Scotia. Because of an equal representation of male and female participants, two different perspectives based on gender were apparent in this study. Conducting a study with an equal representation of

White and Black rappers from Nova Scotia would provide new insight into the racial relationships of the scene. Contrasting White and Black experiences would also provide insight into the racial landscape of contemporary Nova Scotia.

Using the findings from this study, larger societal structures can begin to be questioned, especially those of popular culture and the media, and the structures that serve as barriers to Black populations and Black women around the world. It is apparent from this study that rap music provides a voice and an outlet of creative self-expression for African-Nova Scotian rappers. By listening to these voices we can begin to understand the experiences and culture of African Nova Scotians in terms of the past, the present and the future.

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Appendix A: Interview Guide

General Demographic Questions What community did you grow up in? What community do you live in now? Do you make a living from rap? (If not, where do you work? What is you marital status? How old are you?

Community Can you tell me a little bit about your life growing up? Can you describe your community? How did you feel about your community when you were growing up? How did you feel about schooling when you were growing up?

Rap Fandom Tell me about your first experience listening to rap? Who are your favorite rap artists and why? Do you like other genres of music? If so, which ones? What do you think is the most important element of rap music? What are your views on mainstream rap? Underground rap? Did any particular rap artists or style have an effect on your own music? Who? What? Have any female artists particularly inspired you?

Rap Production When did you begin producing rap music? Why did you want to start rapping? What are some important themes/messages in the content of your rap? Do you rap about your community? If so, what kind of things do you discuss? Do you work closely with other rappers from your community? From Nova Scotia? Do you feel support from other members of your community in regards to your rap music? If so, how? How would you describe the rap subculture from where you are from? Who is included, who isn’t? How would you describe being a female in the rap scene? Are there challenges, and if so what are they? Do you rap with a group? Who is in this group? Where are they from Do you feel like race is an important component of rap? Gender? Class?

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Appendix B: Research Summary and Participant Consent Form

REB Approval Date: January 21st, 2014 Date:

Dear Participant,

You are invited to participate in a research study being carried out by Alyssa Gerhardt, a graduate student from Acadia University’s Department of Sociology. Research is being conducted under the supervision of Dr. Tony Thomson. Please feel free to contact Dr. Thomson by phone at 585-1479 should you have any questions or concerns regarding the research project.

What is this project about? This project seeks to understand the experiences of rap artists living in and/or growing up in communities located in Nova Scotia. The project will compare participants’ experiences based on social constructs such as, gender, race and class, and asks if or how they are present in the content of their music.

What will my involvement be? Your involvement in the study is completely voluntary. You may choose to withdraw from the study up until one month after your interview. Your participation in this study will include at thirty minute to an hour in-depth interview. Your interview will be audio-recorded and transcribed. During the interview you will be asked questions about your experiences as a producer of rap music and as a fan. You will also be asked questions about your experiences growing up in a local community and how these experiences have, if at all, influenced the content of your music.

The research may also involve a brief follow-up telephone interview for purposes of clarifying or elaborating on responses given during the interview and/or to answer any questions that may have arisen after our meeting. The follow up call is also completely voluntary and would take place no more than two weeks following the face-to-face interview. You may withdraw consent for my use of follow-up information up until one month after the follow-up interview.

Who will have access to my recorded interview and interview transcript? Only myself, as the primary researcher and my project supervisor will have access to the original audio-recorded interview and interview transcript. Transcription will be carried out by, myself. The audio recording and transcription will be kept in a locked office, on a password-protected computer, until the project is complete, at which time both recordings and transcriptions will be destroyed.

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How will my confidentiality be protected? Every effort will be made to protect your privacy and keep your participation in the study confidential unless required by a court of law. Your name and any potentially identifying information will be removed from the final presentation of the research.

Are there any harms associated with this research? There are no known harms or personal benefits associated with participation in the study. However, your involvement in the study may contribute to an improved understanding of both Nova Scotian rap and African-Nova Scotian subcultures and communities. In signing the consent form you do NOT waive any rights to legal recourse in the event of research-related harm.

How will findings from this study be shared? Findings from this study will be presented in the form of a graduate thesis and defense for Acadia University. Additionally, the research may be submitted for presentation at an academic conference, or submitted for publication to an academic journal.

Who can I contact if I have a question? Should you have any questions or concerns please feel free to contact:

Primary Researcher Alyssa Gerhardt, MA Candidate Email: [email protected] Phone: 1-902-298-1019

Project Supervisor Tony Thomson, PhD Professor, Department of Sociology, Acadia University Email: [email protected] Office Phone: 585-1479

Acadia University Research Ethics Board Stephen Maitzen, PhD Research Ethics Board, Chair Email: [email protected]

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I have read and understood the above information regarding this research project (please check the boxes to indicate ‘yes’):

¨ I understand that participation is voluntary and that I may withdraw from the study up until one month after the interview

¨ I agree to participate in the research project and to have my interview tape- recorded

¨ I understand that in signing my consent I do NOT waive any rights to legal recourse in the event of research-related harm

¨ I agree to be contacted for a brief follow-up interview

¨ Please do not contact me for a brief follow-up interview

______

Signature of Participant Date

______

Signature of Researcher Date

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