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WRITING ON THE STREETS: POPULAR LITERATURE AND THE BAD BLACK HERO A Dissertation by DENNIS LAMOUNT WINSTON Submitted to the Office of Graduate Studies of Texas A&M University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY Approved by: Chair of Committee, Kimberly Nichele Brown Committee Members, Shona Jackson Mikko Tuhkanen Wendy Leo Moore Head of Department, Nancy Warren December 2012 Major Subject: English Copyright 2012 Dennis Lamount Winston ABSTRACT This dissertation examines the various ways in which pop-cultural illustrations of the “bad nigger” figure beginning in the late 1960s helped to shape the kinds of defiant and oppositional practices that define the lives of black male youths today. I offer a brief history of the cultural and literary trope of the so-called “bad nigger.” I not only chart the cultural and political expressions of the “bad nigger” trope from the antebellum South to the industrial North, I also offer a critique of these accounts of defiant black male behavior that have dominated much of the intellectual discourse. Writing on the Streets: Urban Literature’s Black Male Hero does not pretend that the struggles of poor black inner-city life are somehow romantic or dramatic. What this dissertation does do, however, is offer popular black male cultural productions as a new critical site for engaging the cultural politics of economic power and racial oppression. Much of the scholarship on black male youth culture fails to engage popular texts that respond to black peoples’ negotiation of global issues. The works that do engage popular expressions and cultural productions often underestimate the importance violence, defiance, and opposition plays in the construction of a black male identity, not just for poor urban black male youths, but for men of color in general. Thus, this dissertation intends to magnify the need for more critical inquiry into popular cultural productions such as “street literature” and rap music, both of which contain poetic as well as practical elements of community uplift and self-empowerment and engage issues of cultural nihilism and self-destruction. ii This project’s focus on non-canonical texts follows bell hooks’ methodology and whose intellectual philosophy argues for “learning in relation to living regular life, of using everything we already know to know more. Merging critical thinking in everyday life with knowledge learned in books and through study has been the union of theory and practice that has informed my intellectual cultural work” (hooks 2). My hope, therefore, is that the readings I offer here will open the possibility for scholars and students of literature to consider more earnestly the importance of popular cultural productions in black communities. Furthermore, I write this dissertation in an effort to convince cultural and literary critics to concern themselves with the unique history and plight of poor urban black males confronting oppression and struggling in this criminal society. iii DEDICATION I dedicate this work to my family. A special feeling of gratitude goes to my wife Sameeya and our children who have been my support every step of the way. My daughter Leena Belle and my son Amari “Mars” were born in the midst of my writing this dissertation and they have been, and will continue to be my inspiration and the driving force in my life. I dedicate this work to my loving parents, David and Frances Winston who continue to show me the power and perseverance of their love. Thank you for your strength, wisdom and patience. I also dedicate this work to my big brother David Jr. and his family who have been my greatest cheerleaders. iv ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I would like to thank my committee chair, Dr. Kimberly Nichelle Brown, who has been a truly valuable advisor. Her seminar on Postmodern African American literature provided the foundations for this study and further inspired my passion for contemporary African American literature. Her uncompromising high standards have made me a much stronger critical thinker, a stronger writer, and a better person. She has also shown me what teaching and scholarship should aim to accomplish. I would also like to thank Dr. Mikko Tuhkanen, Dr. Shona Jackson and Dr. Wendy Moore for their caring advice throughout every stage of this dissertation process. I want to acknowledge all of the members of my dissertation committee for their guidance, patience, committed support, and encouragement. I must also take time to that the entire English Department at Texas A&M University and the many professors who made me a much stronger student, teacher, and individual, especially Dr. Charles Rowell, Dr. Janet McCann, Dr. Marco Portales, Dr. David McWhirter, and Dr. Jimmie Killingsworth. And last, but certainly not least, I would like to give special thanks to Dr. Michelle Levy, Dr. Pat Bonner, and Dr. Anjail Ahmad who have been the most significant mentors in my academic career. v TABLE OF CONTENTS Page ABSTRACT .............................................................................................................. ii DEDICATION .......................................................................................................... iv ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ...................................................................................... v TABLE OF CONTENTS .......................................................................................... vi CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION: THE “BAD NIGGER” BEGINNING ........... 1 CHAPTER II (RE)WRITING THE “STREET NIGGER” HERO ....................... 36 CHAPTER III “D-BOYS” TO MEN OF INDUSTRY .......................................... 107 CHAPTER IV “YARDIE,” OR THE POSTCOLONIAL “STREET NIGGER” IDENTITY ..................................................................................... 188 CHAPTER V CONCLUSIONS ............................................................................ 245 REFERENCES .......................................................................................................... 250 vi CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION: THE “BAD NIGGER” BEGINNING In many Negro communities … the emphasis upon heroic deviltry is so marked that the very word bad often loses its original significance and may be used as an epithet of honor. —H. C. Brearley, “The Ba-ad Nigger,” 1939 Oppressed peoples cannot avoid admiring their own nihilists of the quarters, who are the ones most dramatically saying “No!” and reminding others that there are worse things than death. —Eugene Genovese, Roll, Jordon, Roll, 1972 He’s a big bad wolf and you’re the three pigs He’s a big bad wolf in your neighborhood Not bad meaning bad but bad meaning good —Run-D.M.C., “Peter Piper,” 1986 This dissertation examines popular literary and musical depictions of the “bad nigger” hero, created by black male artists who are intent on illustrating their frustrations with social and economic marginalization. The “bad niggers” under investigation are poor urban black male youths who express their rage through acts of nihilism and self- destructive violence as well as through testimonies of violent revolt and radical protest. This dissertation challenges a dominant body of knowledge that has viewed the “bad 1 nigger” as unredeemable and incompatible with racial progress and social uplift. To make this argument, I map the history and multiple meanings of resistance and self- empowerment embedded in characterizations of the nihilistic “bad nigger” figure in popular literature and music written or performed between 1960 and the present. I focus my attention of popular writers and artists such as the novelist Robert Beck, rap artists Tupac Shakur, Christopher Wallace, and Shawn Carter, and pulp-fiction writer, Victor Headley. I view all of these pop-cultural illustrations of defiance as political statements that illuminate the various ways poor black communities as well as the larger mainstream society assess violent opposition to social injustice. My dissertation seeks to define the cultural and political identity of “bad niggers” as adaptable, evolving, creative, dynamic, and most importantly, socially redeemable. That is to say, my dissertation refutes both the homogeneous and ahistorical conceptualizations of “bad niggers” as perpetually linked to the image of what Cornel West calls a “nihilistic threat” to the black community. Writing on the Streets: Popular Culture and the Bad Black Hero thus rigorously contests the social, political, and cultural marginalization of poor urban black men, seeing them instead as inextricably linked to and as an integral cultural manifestation of mainstream culture and life. In “Nihilism in Black America,” Cornel West describes black criminals, drug dealers, substance abusers, and the like as nihilists in the black community because of the oppositional, defiant, and often self-destructive social behaviors they engender (West 221-26). West’s description of black cultural nihilism as well as his use of the term “nihilistic threat” to describe the behavioral practices of many poor and frustrated black 2 men living in American inner-cities explicitly recognizes the severe and oppressive history of racial, social, political, and economic terror in the U. S. According to West, [W]e must acknowledge that structure and behavior are inseparable, that institutions and values go hand in hand. How people act and live are shaped—though in no way dictated or determined—by the larger circumstances in which they find themselves …. Nihilism is to be understood here not as a philosophic

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