RIGHTS CLAIMS THROUGH MUSIC a Study on Collective Identity and Social Movements

Home , A Soulful Christmas, Frank Iero, High for Hours, Joey Badass

RIGHTS CLAIMS THROUGH MUSIC A study on collective identity and social movements

Dzeneta Sadikovic

Department of Global and Political Studies Human Rights III (MR106S) Bachelor thesis, 15hp 15 ETC, Fall/2019 Supervisor: Dimosthenis Chatzoglakis

Abstract This study is an analysis of musical lyrics which express oppression and discrimination of the African American community and encourage potential action for individuals to make a claim on their rights. This analysis will be done methodologically as a content analysis. Song texts are examined in the context of oppression and discrimination and how they relate to social movements. This study will examine different social movements occurring during a timeline stretching from the era of slavery to present day, and how music gives frame to collective identities as well as potential action. The material consisting of song lyrics will be theoretically approached from different sociological and musicological perspectives. This study aims to examine what interpretative frame for social change is offered by music. Conclusively, this study will show that music functions as an informative tool which can spread awareness and encourage people to pressure authorities and make a claim on their Human Rights.

Keywords: music, politics, human rights, freedom of speech, oppression, discrimination, racism, culture, protest, social movements, sociology, musicology, slavery, civil rights, African Americans, collective identity

List of Contents

1. Introduction p.2 1.1 Topic p.2 1.2 Aim & Purpose p.2 1.3 Human Rights & Music p.3 1.4 Research Question(s) p.3 1.5 Research Area & Delimitations p.3 1.6 Chapter Outline p.5 2. Theory & Previous Research p.6 2.1 Music As A Tool p.6 2.2 Social Movements & Collective Behavior p.8 2.2.1 Civil Rights Movement p.10 3. Method p.13 3.1 Content Analysis p.13 3.2 Selection of Material p.15 4. Material – Songs of The African American Identity p.18 4.1 Slavery p.18 4.2 Civil Rights Movement p.21 4.3 Contemporary p.24 5. Analysis p.34 6. Discussion & Conclusion p.42 7. List Of References p.44 7.1 Bibliography p.44 7.2 Webpages p.46 7.3 Music p.47 7.3.1 Musicians & Songs p.47 7.3.2 Spirituals p.48

1. Introduction 1.1 Topic The focus of this study will be on how claims on rights can be conveyed through the way music articulates oppression and discrimination and how that frames societal change. The example used will be the role of songs in the African American community, covering the time from slavery to today. In this study I will talk about oppression, discrimination and rights violations occurring in the United States because of racism and its history of racial segregation. In order to discuss this, I will discuss how songs which express oppression, discrimination, rights violations, lack of freedom and visions of a better world, include claims of justice and rights. We will have to look at the way artists, musicians, use their ability to reach a large audience to articulate collective memory of an oppressive and discriminating history. How this articulation of collective memory mobilizes a society by creating collective identities and through social movements encourages people making claims based on identity, to make a claim on and fight for their rights by being vocal, pressuring authorities to live up to the law and grant everyone their human rights.

1.2 Aim & Purpose The aim of this study is to examine how music frames social change and gives room for right claims. The purpose is to gain understanding and awareness of how music can channel and articulate a society’s history, emotions, knowledge, information, ideas and rights violations such as discrimination and oppression. We will see how music used in this context of social movements, can contribute to pressuring institutions to respect all people’s human rights. With this study, I hope to contribute to already existing research uniting the field of human rights with sociology and musicology, in order to create an understanding of how music can come to play an important role in the contemporary fight for human rights. There is a tendency of categorizing music as pleasure and politics as business, placing those two topics far from each other, when in fact they can be very closely related. I hope to bring attention to the fact that music depicts our society and can shape how it may come to be, as well as further bring attention to the songs included in this study for future research within the sociological and musicological field.

1.3 Human Rights & Music One of many roles which music can serve, is as a voice for the oppressed. Voicing experiences of racism, discrimination, lack of freedom and other rights violations, with an aim of raising awareness and achieving said rights, it gives relevance to bring music into a human rights discussion. As music voices violations of rights, we can identify the rights being violated. By identifying people’s dissatisfaction through music, we can locate certain issues or occasions when peoples human rights are violated, e.g. in this case it is oppression and discrimination of the African American community, Music can also suggest and encourage potential action to take in order to make a claim on one’s human rights that should be granted to everyone according to various conventions e.g. ICCPR or ICESCR but aren’t due to oppression and discrimination. Music can encourage people to act in order to better our society and its relation to human rights.

1.4 Research Question(s) This study will be framed by relevant material and theoretical approaches in order to answer the following main questions: What perceptions of oppression and discrimination of the African American identity are conveyed through the songs? What kind of claims are expressed in music? The discussion brought forward in order to answer these two main questions, will result in rise of follow-up questions such as: How is music encouraging people to make a claim on their human rights? How are collective identities and music connected to one another? In what way could the relation between collective identity and music affect a society?

1.5 Research Area & Delimitations This study will gather research from the fields of sociology, and fields of human rights. First and foremost, musicology and sociology. Within these fields, I will further limit this study to research regarding collective behavior and collective identities, and research that has been done on music in the context of social behavior, as well as oppression and discrimination. Cultural sociology will be an essential part of this study, in order to establish a discussion on identities, collectives, movements, and rights claims.

To narrow down the broad spectrum of societies, rights and music, this study will be limited to the African American identity, and this community’s claim on human rights through music, on a timeline starting from slavery in the United States and ending with the current day. I limited and divided the timeline in to three eras: slavery, Civil Rights Movement, and contemporary, in order to chronologically and periodically discuss the song texts relevant to that specific time. These specific three periods are of relevance because they have characterized the African American collective’s fight for human rights, and there is already a vast field of research concerning the African American identity and discrimination. The material, song texts, will be limited to genres that are relevant for the timeline covering eras from slavery to current day. Most relevant for the timeline will be, starting from the era of slavery; spirituals, moving on to the era of Civil Rights Movement; jazz, funk, and ending with the contemporary era; hip-hop and rap. Music from these specific genres are included because these genres have been characterized by or are characterizing the era the music was produced during. The genres evolve into and/or give rise to one another over time, hence the relevance of following a timeline throughout this study. Genres such as metal will also be included, for a nuanced analysis and to show that these types of songs aren’t only occurring within the genres of hip-hop and rap. The music of the first two eras that will be discussed, is limited to the popularity of them within these fields and the occurrence of them in previous research, which is where they are selected from. However, I haven’t yet come across previous research on music of the third era (with the exception of Kendrick Lamar’s music), which I will discuss in this study. That music will be limited to songs that convey racism, and oppression and discrimination of the African American identity, and articulate a collective memory and/or identity. The selection of the contemporary music conveying discrimination has been chosen from artists whose music I am already familiar with. Most of the artist included in this study are a part of the African American community and have legitimacy when speaking of oppression and discrimination of the African American community since they are a not only part of it but recognized by it as members. Here lies the reason for the selection of the musicians Joey Badass, Body Count, J. Cole and Kendrick Lamar. These artists regularly hold big concerts where hundreds, if not thousands, of listeners attend, and they reach an even bigger audience worldwide through online streaming of their songs. One common criterion for selection song texts is whether there is a manifestation of collective identity or collective memory in the music.

1.6 Chapter Outline This study will contain brief research on the role of music during American slavery and the Civil Rights Movements that followed, in order to discuss the contemporary situation of collective movements and protests such as the Black Lives Matter (BLM) movement and where music places in these social and resistance movements. In chapter 2, I will present the relevant sociological and musicological theories regarding collective behavior. The theory will consist of previous research done by sociologists and theorists discussing different approaches on Civil Rights Movements, music, collective identities and culture. A discussion on what role culture has in collective identities and how music contributes to mobilization of society and creation of said identities as well as cultures, will be brought up. In chapter 3, the method used to approach my material will be presented. A content analysis together with hermeneutics, are the methods which will be used to present and methodologically analyze the material of this study, which consists of song lyrics/text. The selection process of the material will also be argued for here. This material will later be presented in chapter 4. The song texts presented cover a timeline divided into three eras starting from Slavery, continuing to Civil Rights Movements, and ends with Contemporary, the current period. Chapter 5 will consist of this study’s theoretical analysis, where the material will be discussed in relation to, and through, the theoretical approaches in order to answer this study’s main question(s). And finally, a brief conclusion of what was brought up in this study will be found in chapter 6. All sources for the information used in this study will be listed in chapter 7, in the list of references.

2. Theory & Previous Research

This chapter will deal with theoretical approaches to collective identities and social movements which are the theoretical framework of this study. The theoretical approaches, and the previous research are combined in one chapter together, because these theoretical approaches are gathered from, and consist of, previous research within the fields of sociology and musicology. This research regards how music can be used as a tool of mobilization in a society and creation of identity, by creating a specific culture where individuals can unite into a group, creating feelings of belonging and shared history. The previous research will serve as theoretical framework. This chapter will deal with different sociological, musicological and cultural theories and research done by various sociologists. Many of the theoretical approaches are selected and picked out from the previous research to be used as a base in this study. Previous research within the field of musicology constitutes the base for the theoretical approaches made in this study. The previous research within the field is vast, and a lot of research has been done both within the sociological field of collective identities and oppression and discrimination, and the musicological field e.g. the rise of a certain musical genre during a certain time of history. There is research on the relevance the musical genres had in the fight for the human rights, e.g. during the era of slavery and the Civil Rights movement. Research has also been done on contemporary social movements as well as music. However, when it comes to the combination of the two, the field is not as vast, especially concerning the African American musicians brought up in this study. This is where this study will pick up from the previous research presented in this chapter and build further on to it by exploring the relation of contemporary music and contemporary social movements in the analysis in ch.5.

2.1 Music As A Tool

Music may serve several functions and some of these functions which are central for this study will be discussed in this section. Music gets shaped by cultural and political factors, and often reflects the political situation from that era (Rejai and Phillips, 2001 p.185). Being influenced by historical memories, politics, and culture, music can spread propaganda for ideologies or movements as well as encouraging the audience to act on the issue in question. Specifically, besides creating feelings of belonging and comfort, it can encourage hostile behavior towards the other, outside of that collective. Protest songs used during social movements fall under the category of propaganda. To gain understanding of the actions influenced by music, one needs to understand the way music 6 conveys and affects behavior and emotionally based actions. (Grant et. al, 2010 p.184ff) Music offers inclusion and a sense of belonging to a collective by creating a common culture that gives frame for the collective identity (Inthorn, Street & Scott, 2012, p.345). Reflection of historical, cultural and political events in music can influence and resolve conflicts arising in different situations, creating bonds between a collective past/memory and the current events. A collective can observe itself, as well as other collectives, through the interpretations of the social reality which the music is conveying. This way, ethnomusicology plays a big role in the creation and development of musical frames, by articulating music, which is an outcome of the society, back to it. Articulating knowledge and culture through music empower the community through self-definition and representation. The ability of preserving and mediating culture and knowledge that music possess is different than the abilities language possess. Music leaves room for interpretation, which the audience can fill with their own perceptions and feelings, creating emotional bonds between each other as well to the whole community. This can strengthen the groups’ relations and help resolve conflicts. (Grant et. al, 2010 p.191f) The emotions are essential for a collective identity and in turn a social movement, since emotions can encourage and lead to action and engagement in the political sphere. (Inthorn, Street & Scott, 2012, p.340f) Music as a popular culture offers individuals, youth especially, resources to engage in political activities, starting by talking about the music and exchanging political thoughts and ideas. (Inthorn, Street & Scott, 2012, p.348) Music can be used as a tool for opposing societal injustices such as racial discrimination and oppression. When speaking of oppositional culture, African American popular culture can be viewed as a way of expressing opposition to injustice, such as institutional racism and racial oppression. Rap music of the late 20th century functioned as expression of oppositional culture and resistance to issues occurring on the streets. Rap music came to bring light to these public issues and injustices, and art/music came to be used as a tool of resistance. Rap music became African American youth’s voice when opposing the dominant group in the society. Oppositional culture occurs, is fueled and encouraged, when a certain subordinate group in a society is worse off in terms of e.g. oppression or discrimination caused by the dominant group. This relationship between subordinate and dominant groups create tensions and leads to various forms of protest or resistance movements. (Martinez, 1997 p.268ff) When a collective’s ideas and ideologies are expressed by the state, and get representation, the collective doesn’t need to take actions, doesn’t need protest movements in order to get representation. (Eyerman, 2002 p.457)

2.2 Social Movements & Collective Behavior

Social movements became a central part of collective behavior studies around the time of WW2. Collective behavior was at best viewed as a reflection or warning of the social issues or tensions occurring that should be given attention, and at worst as threats towards government and institutions, as revolution. The understanding of social behavior shifted during the 60’s and 70’s because of the Civil Rights Movement, and social behavior came to be viewed from a new perspective. The previous understanding was that social behavior couldn’t affect and give rise to better democratic institutions, nor that it could help integrate a society. The previous perceptions of social movements were that they were indications of a lacking society and that something wasn’t right, e.g. in the case of the French or Russian revolution. (Eyerman, 2002 p.443f) It is more likely for alliances to form when people feel like their identities constitute a common ground. Ideologies can also come to play an important part in the creation of alliances for a social movement. Mobilization of a society and alliances are important in a social movement in order to increase the odds of achieving the movements goals, since people with similar ideas and strategies for action taking are likely to work well together for their common goal. The cultural dimension has become a feature in collective actions and play an important role in both mobilization as well as the movements collective identity. It indicates what the people in the movement stand for. (Beamish & Luebbers, 2009, p.650f) When music is produced it reflects the current societal movements and the historical influences of that surrounding society. Music takes social realities, mirrors them, and reflects them back to society, reproducing the realities. It can serve as an echo of the past carrying onto the present and offer a look into the close future of society and what social changes might be occurring, as well as create social changes by encouraging social movements and action taking. We can hear the social cries for changes and get an understanding of what the society looks like just by listening to music. (Wood, 1995 p.608) A certain bond is created between the recipients and the ideas that are distributed and supported through music, creating a connection and a sense of solidarity between individuals and collectives. During concerts’, ideologies can be spread as well as significant bodily motions such as a certain hand gesture or sign that are symbolic for the ideologies. These signs that have been used for the ideologies through time and history, create a link between the past and present movements, which generates a collective memory, and mobilizes the audience by establishing a collective identity and creates alliances. (Eyerman, 2002 p.450)

The oppressive and discriminating experiences from the past don’t remain in the past, they get articulated by collective memory to the present and affects the outcome of the future. The collective memory is a social phenomenon (re)produced by different contexts the collective is part of. Through articulation of memory, knowledge and information of the past is articulated in the present. Knowledge and information of identity shaping events occurring during individual people’s lives which are shared collectively, e.g. slavery, even though they are experienced individually. (Griffin, 2004 p.544f) Musicology allows us to examine music from the point of view of social shaping and social impact. A common critique towards this social science discipline is that it is lacking in the area of lyrical observation. That is, this discipline observes music from a broader social perspective, the context of when and how the music is created in relation to society. It doesn’t focus on the songs content and what the songs are saying, or how lyrics and organized sound have through history been tools of cultural and political change in a society during social movements. (DeNora, 2004, p.213) Music can be used as a tool to transfer memories from the past to the future. It can fill an important role for the collective memory; music remembers when individuals do not. This articulation of memories can be seen at work in the Civil Rights Movements. This articulation of memories creates a sense of belonging which people bond and unite over. A collective identity is created, where people that don’t know each other, nor have lived in the same centuries feel connected and can relate to one another. Social movements can through music objectify itself so that it takes a visible form, getting more attention brought to the issues that social movements bring up, and generating a continuity. Music can serve as support for certain groups that have created a collective identity, as well as recruit new members through inclusion or create alliances. (Eyerman, 2002 p.446f) Music has been an important tool for group formation and creating collective memory during social movements. However, music hasn’t frequently been researched as a factor of collective identity in social movements and in sociology. Music/lyrics haven’t only served the purpose of carrying and distributing political ideologies during social movements, it has also spread different fundamentals for sit-ins or different kind of resisting techniques. Learning a social movements discourse and how it can be changed legitimately, is of importance when participating in said movement effectively. (Collin, 2013p.450ff) The way actors in a movement produce and consume text, e.g. song lyrics and how and/or where they place themselves in relation to a collective identity and movement, can be analyzed

9 through discourse theory. The practice of music, in a social movement and/or a collective identity, becomes a way for individuals to learn about and join the movement’s discourse as well as taking an active part in expressing the collective identity and altering the collective discourse. (Collin, 2013 p.462f) Du Bois was a sociologist encouraging African American people’s civil rights in his works. He thought that art should give good/the best representation of the African American people, since they aren’t represented enough in the mainstream media, not represented in a good way at least. (Eyerman, 2002 p.445) It is important for people to define themselves, and see themselves represented whether it be in song, picture or media, rather than letting others spread misrepresentation and negative definitions. This improved the community’s collective self- esteem and helped defying the existing social norms. (Morant, 2011 p.73-78) Music and musical practices such as singing, clapping and dancing can collectively be used to create a link between different communities and to discuss the collective identity and what they commit to. Music can come to play an important role for members of collective communities who use music as a tool for spreading awareness about certain issues and what interest the community has in them, in order to properly approach and bring attention to them. Music plays an important role in the distribution of information when it comes to social movements and its collective action-taking. This was effectively shown by the Civil Rights Movement. (Paretskaya, 2015 p.639f) Music has repeatedly encouraged and provided the Civil Rights Movement with ideas or instructions for potential actions that would help the movements cause. (DeNora, 2004, p.218) The way music can mobilize a collective and recruit new members is by introducing individuals to new ideas they can connect to each other with and strengthen the collective identity. During the Civil Rights Movement, music was used as a tool for mobilization and serving the ones that are already committed to the cause/protests and create a common agreement. (Paretskaya, 2015 p.640)

2.2.1 Civil Rights Movement Songs about freedom, freedom from enslavement, which were sung during Civil Rights Movements, developed from gospel songs and spiritual hymns. Through song, people convey how they feel and singing in a collective creates a communication between the individuals, expressing the same feelings from deep within themselves, as one. This collective bonded by the same emotions, experience, and collective memory is hard to dissolve. These people put themselves, their lives even, at risk when participating in social movements and collective singing. Courage was essential for participating in the Civil Rights Movement. The instructions

10 for the Civil Rights Movement was to be peaceful, so that the police can’t stop them. No violence or conflicts, no singing even, but when the police arrived and tried to stop the peaceful protest and arrest the protesters, they were to sing with all their might and power that their lungs could carry. “Aint a-scared of your jail 'cause I want my freedom I want my freedom” (Hsiung, 2005 p.23f) A song that has a strong connection to Civil Rights Movements is “We Shall Overcome”. It was sung by slaves, carrying a message of hope, regardless if the context was religious or secular. During the 30’s and 40’s the songs context took a turn and it became to be viewed as openly political, when it got sung during movements and marches. This created a collective identity articulating the historical struggles to the present and became a worldwide protest for different struggles related to labor. (Eyerman, 2002 p.447)

“These songs bind us together, give us courage together, help us march together.” -MLK (Hsiung, 2005 p.23) The Civil Rights Movement came to be a movement dominated by youths in the 60’s when college and high school youth took it upon themselves to lead and participate in direct protest movements. (Eyerman, 2002 p.448) The youth brought their popular culture to the movements which came to have a role in the fight for the Civil Rights. Although, the influence didn’t only go one way, it was mutual. The fight for civil rights was conveyed through music, which was a component of popular culture, and music articulated the feelings and memories of civil rights violations and oppression of the collective identity, which emphasized the already existing collective feelings. Collective memory is distributed through music, hence, collective listening to such music, e.g. live concerts, is important for the creation of collective identity. (Eyerman, 2002 p.449) Nina Simone was a popular Jazz musician during the Civil Rights Movements era. Simone’s songs became the anthems of the Civil Rights Movement, they were the soundtrack, the background songs, of the different marches and rallies. (Feldstein, 2005 p.1379) Before the black power movements and the second way feminism, Simone introduced the vision of black cultural nationalism that is characterized by female power to the world. (Feldstein, 2005 p.1352) People all over the world considered her to have an intense political discourse of her own which she conveyed through her songs and used as tool of bringing up the shameful ways of race violence and segregation of African Americans. (Feldstein, 2005 p.1358) Simone could be found supporting different civil rights movements either by letting them use her name to gain more supporters or participating in them. She performed in Atlanta during the Selma-to-

Montgomery marches amongst other. She found politics to be important and affecting her life and surroundings, hence she found politics and music to be related, “two sides of the same coin”. (Feldstein, 2005 p.1361) She wrote “Mississippi Goddam”, one of the most influential songs that has become very important to civil rights movements, after hearing about the church bombings, where black people were the targets and little girls died. Her first instinct was to try to build a gun, but instead, realizing she didn’t know anything about guns and killing, she wrote a song. Music was her weapon. (Feldstein, 2005 p.1369) Thanks to Simone, amongst others, the American civil rights activism was spread to outside of the US as well as black nationalism. She created deep relations between her music and her politics during her performances and used her words and voice to link together Africa with African Americans when distributing thoughts of black freedom through her songs, that could be applied everywhere and weren’t only limited to the US. (Feldstein, 2005 p.1372f)

3. Method

In this chapter the method of content analysis will be presented. A textual analysis and a hermeneutical analysis, which are a subcategory of content analysis, will offer the most qualified approach in order to present and methodologically analyze the material in ch.4 which consists of musical lyrics. Because music leaves room for interpretation, when presenting the material in the next chapter, these methods will be combined and used in order to elaborate the lyrics and show my interpretation of its meanings. The lyrics’ meaning motivates why the material was chosen.

3.1 Content Analysis

We as humans use language and text in order to covey our thoughts to other people and affect a broader audience. Language is what sets the limits of our thoughts and actions. In order to learn, educate ourselves, or simply just find out about something that sparks our curiosity, we turn to text, we read about it, and in the case of this study, we hear it through music. (Bergström, Boréus p.12) A textual analysis is one of the social sciences oldest methods used to interpret various texts, by looking at what point the text has, what words are chosen and used, as well as what the text means in its entirety, the bigger context. The discipline of social science examines human behavior in a society, how different people or different groups of a society relate and interact with each other, which in the case of this study is the African American community and social movements. This discipline is useful in the sociological fields for discussions of segregation, oppression and injustices, which are topics that this study treats. (Bergström, Boréus, 2000, p.12) Text acts as a tool in relation to humans, it mirrors, (re)produces and articulates human thought, such as thoughts on oppression and discrimination. It can be used to create relations between a group, a collective identity e.g. the African American identity, and other people outside of the group, mobilizing society and recruiting individuals to a collective, and/or creating alliances. (Bergström, Boréus, 2000, p.14) Language is used as a tool for constructing our knowledge. From an idealistic constructivist point of view, there is no distinction between language and reality. We can’t speak of a reality nor convey our thoughts and knowledge without the language. Language represents our realities, the human interaction and relations. (Bergström, Boréus, 2000, p.23f)

A content analysis of a text can be an examination of both quantitative and qualitative material and is useful when examining change over time, the occurrence of a certain word or phenomena mentioned at different times. (Bergström, Boréus, 2000, p.19ff) In the case of this study, such phenomena are oppression and discrimination of the African American community, which is occurring from the time of slavery to current day. A content analysis can be used to establish what effects the text can have on the recipients. This way of analyzing a text offers insight in social events or processes taking place in a society, and the social behavior during these occurrences, e.g. concerts or protest rallies. This method can be used to view the way social behavior changes over time, e.g. the behavior of discrimination and oppression, and the mobilization of protest movements. Although, using a content analysis as method when interpreting something might be a little vague when irrelevant material is chosen. It is important to analyze material that is of relevance to the research question, in order to reach a valid conclusion and answer. However, the chosen material can’t speak for the entire field of such material, only for itself, hence the results aren’t general only specific to the chosen material. Usually, in order to get a result and its cause-and-effect, the answer to “why”, e.g. a phenomenon in a society such as social movement or racism, a content analysis must be combined with another method suiting the research. This is yet another lacking thing about the method, since the outcome of the study may change based on the perspective one views it from. (Chadwick, Bahr, Albrecht, 1984, p.240ff) The Hermeneutic Circle is a process in which you analyze a text in order to understand it hermeneutically. It is a theory of analyzing the entirety of a text based on smaller parts of the text, and in turn analyzing the smaller parts in relation to the whole text, in order to establish an understanding of the text’s meaning and what it conveys. This sort of analysis will be done when analyzing the songs, which are the smaller parts, in relation to discrimination and oppression of the African American identity, which is the whole context. According to The Hermeneutic Circle neither the entirety of the text, nor the specific parts of the text can be understood individually without being considered in relation to each other. (Bergström, Boréus, 2000, p.26) The hermeneutic strategy of analyzing material offers understanding of the context for one or multiple texts. There are three different aspects to be analyzed in order to gain this understanding: The social-historical aspect which consists of considering the time the text was written and who it was meant to be received by, as we will see in the ch.4.1, or 4.2, and how the contemporary song texts from ch.4.3, build on to that historical aspect. (Bryman, 2001, p.370)

Interpretation is a founding pillar in the content analysis of a text. Interpretation can be complicated depending on the texts character and which category of a textual analysis is applied. A problematic thing with interpretation can be when analyzing a certain word, its meaning and occurrence. Every possible meaning of the word can’t be brought up every time that specific word is mentioned, hence the outcome of meaning may vary. When interpreting a text there are five main components to consider: the text, the context in which the text arises or is presented including its discourse, the producer of text, the recipient of the text, and the interpreter of the text. Based on these components, there are different strategies one can use when analyzing a tex. One strategic approach is relating the text to the interpreter, that is the person analyzing it. Another strategy is analyzing the text in relation to its producer, how the producer wrote it and what meaning and message they tried to convey. A third strategy is analyzing the text in relation to its recipient, that is, what messages and meaning does the targeted audience draw from the text. The last strategy of analyzing a text is its relation to the surrounding discourse, where the text is placed in the context without relating it to the five components/actors. (Bergström, Boréus, 2000, p.25) The texts content must be analyzed with consideration to the producers use of language. Knowing the context of the text is of importance in order to produce an accurate analysis, but it shouldn’t be the deciding factor of the text’s meaning, only a guiding tool. As previously stated, it is significant to consider what meaning the text has to the recipient. It is relevant to look at how different groups of society interpret the text depending on the collective living standard and difference like for instant economical-, gender based-, educational- and age differences. Different groups of society interpret the text differently based on what social characteristics and tools they possess. This part of the analysis is about getting an understanding of how other people understand the text. (Bergström, Boréus, 2000, p.28f)

3.2 Selection of Material

The selection of the songs was mainly based on the song’s topics, that is, whether the songs are reflecting a collective memory and/or identity, by e.g. talking about oppression and/or discrimination of the African American collective. Out of the wide selection of songs mentioning the issues in question, not every song will be included. The included songs have been selected based on my pre-understanding of the issues in question concerning the African American community. Songs have been selected from the contemporary artists who are mostly, as previously said, a part of the African American community, whose music is the genres of

15 hip-hop or rap. The selection of the older songs from the previous eras was based on their occurrence within the field of musicology. These songs were identified through the previous research included in this study and were selected for further examination. A way to limit the selection of songs will be sticking to certain relevant genres characteristic for the music of the era discussed, as explained in ch.1.5. The process of finding relevant songs was relatively easy, considering that they are popular songs by popular artists/musicians who are known worldwide for selling out concerts and having a high number of sold records and/or streams online. I am familiar with and have heard most of the songs previously. All it took was to gather all the songs I could think of into a playlist, as well as consult with people in my surroundings if they could think of any song which would fit the theme. Such songs were the songs from the contemporary era presented in ch.4.3, as well as the ones presented in ch.4.2. The correct lyrics to these songs were accessible thanks to the webpage “genius” dedicated to song-lyrics, which thoroughly works to have the correct lyrics, and often work close with the musicians or their labels. I wasn’t familiar with all the spirituals in ch.4.1 on the other hand. These older songs were selected based on their occurrence in academic articles and how popular they were within the field in the previous research. The lyrics for these songs were harder to find since they weren’t published on “genius”, which is the world’s biggest collection of lyrics and musical knowledge. There are different versions of the spirituals and the lyrics change every now and then, I picked the version which agreed with and were alike the lyrics used in previous research in ch.2. Entire songs won’t be presented, only certain parts of the chosen songs. Not every line or word from the songs are relevant or necessary to analyze for this study to be completed. Although, I am aware that this can be a problematic factor and affect the outcome of the results. Depending on what parts of the songs are analyzed, the results may take a different shape. The lyrics included in the following chapter are relevant to study in order to analyze the way music can convey and express the African American collectives’ experience of oppression, discrimination and human rights claims. These lyrics are also relevant to study in order to establish what kind of a role music can come to play and what significance it has had in the historical and current social movements, as the lyrics are brought up by musicians from the African American community. The songs presented from the earlier eras have been used through generations to articulate collective memories as well as identities. The contemporary songs, of the latest generations have taken inspiration from the past generations songs and are articulating collective memories from the past into the present and the future, which has created a sort of

16 evolution of the genres when a new one is created from the previous one. Songs presented belonging to the musicians of a non-African America identity are an example of protest music and are brought forth, as said, for nuance. The songs will be analyzed in relation to the context of rights violations such as discrimination and oppression. This study will analyze how the musicians articulate rights violations and lack of freedom through their lyrics and how experiences of discrimination and oppression are expressed. We will identify rights claim by studying the lyrics, the words used in the text.

4. Material - Songs of The African American Identity

This chapter will present the material in accordance with the chosen method. The material consists of songs stretching over time, covering the eras of slavery, the Civil Rights Movement and contemporary movements such as the Black Lives Matter movement. Because of this timeline, the material will be divided in subcategories of different eras, rather than the methodological processes, in order to follow the evolution of the musical genres of the songs. To avoid confusion, I won’t jump back and forth through the timeline, I want the text to be understandable and for the reader to easily follow the timeline chronologically.

4.1 Slavery

Starting from the first point of the timeline discussed in this study, era of slavery, a brief grasp of the historical context of the song texts is needed, as it is a founding brick of the following eras music to come. During the era of slavery in the US, the slaves didn’t have any rights, and weren’t allowed to do anything besides labor. The only form of leisure activities allowed were such as attending some form of Sunday church ceremony. The slaves found their refuge in Christianity and the bible. The hymns and gospel songs of Christianity mostly spoke of virtues such as patience, faith and hope, all essential to the enslaved African Americans. The hymns and gospel songs and passages from the bible mentioning the enslaved Hebrews and/or Jews found their way into the slaves’ work songs and became the spirituals that we call them today. Even though the biblical hymns spoke of the oppression which the Jewish people went through and not the African American slaves, the slaves related to their messages, since their realities of enslavement was similar. The living conditions and the hope of salvation and rescues depicted in the bible gave the slaves hope of a better future, if not in this life then the afterlife. (White, 1983 p.254f) The spirituals offered a safe space for expression of feelings, which the slaves weren’t otherwise permitted to express or convey to others. (White, 1983 p.260) Spirituals were used as a tool for making the painful work on the fields bearable. The caller (in the case of call and response songs) called out of pain through song and the other workers in the field responded, sharing his pain, expressing their feelings creating a collective spirit. (Wardi, 2012 p.511) The spirituals were produced during the oppressive and exploiting context by slaves, and targeted audience were other slaves being in the same situation. The contents of these songs mostly offered

18 comforting messages and hope for justice. The spirituals expressed the injustice, human trade and abuse which slaves lived through, and called out a hope of justice in the future. “Chained To The Land” otherwise known as “Hoe Emma Hoe” is an example of a call and respond work song. The caller would sing one of the following lines and the responders would sing back “Hoe Emma Hoe” between every call;

Master he be a hard hard man. Sell my people away from me. Lord send my people into Egypt Land. Lord strike down Pharaoh and set them free. Interpreting this text in the contexts of the slaves realities, this spiritual depicts the slave owner/master as the pharaoh of Egypt, which held slaves and treated people tyrannically. It is a cry, a prayer to god, to “strike” this evil man, to stop his evil doing and give the people freedom. Through the spiritual songs one reoccurring theme is hope and belief of a future where people won’t be judged by the color of their skin, but their actions and souls, whether it be in life or death. (Wardi, 2012 p.513) The memory of pain and brutal experiences through time is kept alive in the collective consciousness through blues. (Wardi, 2012 p.512) These songs served multiple purposes. Among other, they were prayers, giving comfort and hope to the recipients, workers in the field. They were work songs making the labor go by a little easier and keep everyone working in tact/on beat to avoid punishment. They were covert messages about how and where to escape. They were protests against the enslavement and the gruesome living conditions and horrifying treatment. Physical resisting led to punishment and death. The only way to get comfort and to resist was mental, which were actions suggested by song, even if they weren’t physical or explicit. (White, 1983 p.256) The song "I Am Bound For The Land Of Canaan" was indirectly about the hope of escaping and going north, where the enslaved could be free. (White, 1983 p.260);

I have started for a city on that bright eternal shore Where the saints of God shall gather and live on forevermore Tis a land of love and purity where my possessions lie And I am bound for the land of Canaan when I die This spiritual conveys hope, it speaks of a better place where the enslaved would have better opportunities and be seen as free people with rights where they can own their own lives and belongings, have their own “possessions”, get paid for their labor. “Follow The Drinking Gourd” was a spiritual which had cryptic directions in the lyrics, metaphors informing the slaves of where to go and find the right escape route;

Follow the drinking gourd, For the old man is a-waiting for to carry you to freedom,

Follow the drinking gourd. When the sun comes back and the first quail calls, Now the river bank makes a mighty good road, The dead trees will show you the way. Left foot, peg foot, traveling on, Follow the drinking gourd. Now the river ends between two hills, Follow the drinking gourd. There's another river on the other side, Follow the drinking gourd. These lyrics are an encrypted message of the underground railroad, which was a network of people dedicated to help slaves escape to freedom (History). These lyrics are geographical directions, e.g. “the river ends between two hills”, of which rout the escaping slaves could take in order to travel safe and/or receive help from allies. There were songs of frustration and helplessness such as “Nobody Knows the Troubles I've Seen”. Other songs are about hope of freedom and strength like “We Shall Overcome” and “Let My People Go” As previously mentioned, “We Shall Overcome” was a source of comfort and hope as the enslaved sang;

We shall overcome Oh, deep in my heart I do believe We shall overcome someday Used in the context of slavery it was conveying the resilience of the collective, how they will overcome this oppression and someday live, maybe not individually but collectively, to see better times. All these spirituals inspired by biblical stories conveyed the slave/master relationship, where the masters were represented in the spiritual’s texts as the tyrants. For instance, in the spiritual “Let My People Go” or also known as “Go Down Moses” the pharaoh of Egypt is a metaphor for the slave-owners/masters. This song was a call for freedom and justice to be served;

When Israel was in Egypt's land. Let my people go Oppress'd so hard they could not stand. Let my people go Go down, Moses Way down in Egypt's land Tell old Pharaoh Let my people go The Lord, by Moses, to Pharaoh said: Oh! let my people go If not, I'll smite your first-born dead—Oh! let my people go Oh! go down, Moses Away down to Egypt's land And tell King Pharaoh To let my people go The song lyrics always changed depending on the context of where the song was produced and received. The slaves improvised while singing and altered the lyrics to fit in personal experience and convey it to the recipients’ collective mind and memory. The singing was simultaneously both an individual and a collective experience. (White, 1983 p.261)

The spirituals sung in the field as work songs, evolved into blues, which fit better those slaves who didn’t believe that praying to God was a solution in order to improve the slaves actual living conditions and end their suffering (White, 1983 p.262). African American slaves produced and reproduced the spirituals to capture and convey their individual and collective experiences. The spirituals were sung in order to express the emotions and thoughts of the enslaved people, exposed to bondage and oppression for over 200 years during the time slavery was legal in the US, between 1650 and 1863. (Small, 2009 p.46) Even though the spirituals evolved from biblical songs and gospel, spirituals convey and make a strong claim on human rights and better life standards, unlike the gospel songs which rather focused on salvation and God (Small, 2009 p.48).

4.2 Civil Rights Movement

Through time, as the era of slavery passed and the era of Civil Rights Movement started to take shape, blues music and the popularized version; jazz, came to be significant for the era, the way spirituals were significant to the African American that lived during the era of slavery. Even though slavery was abolished in 1863 in the US, people were still enslaved by the system, which can be seen in cases like the threat of violence and underpaid jobs. The times may have changed, but so has slavery. It hasn’t gone away, just taken a different shape, like debt, labor and human trafficking. (Small, 2009 p.48f) The rights that once might have been separated as ICCPR and ICESCR came to be very intertwined as one was needed to achieve the other. What started as a fight for Civil and Political Rights came to be a fight for the Economic, Social and Cultural Rights as well. In order to vote for instance, you had to be a citizen, but this reached beyond the civil rights when you couldn’t be a citizen if you didn’t have a home, a house or land, which you couldn’t afford when you were underpaid or not paid at all for your labor. Even though slavery got abolished, there were still laws allowing segregations and oppression of African Americans in the Jim Crow era, and the African Americans didn’t have any civil rights. A way to fight and resist the segregating laws of Jim Crow was for musicians to refuse performing at segregated venues which didn’t allow attendance to every group of the society or if they were discriminating towards a group, e.g. African Americans. (Ward, 2010 p.23) Billie Holiday’s song, “Strange Fruit” paints a hair-raising picture of the extreme punishments African Americans got simply for the color of their skin;

Southern trees bear strange fruit Blood on the leaves and blood at the root

Black bodies swinging in the southern breeze Strange fruit hanging from the poplar trees Pastoral scene of the gallant south The bulging eyes and the twisted mouth Scent of magnolias, sweet and fresh Then the sudden smell of burning flesh Here is fruit for the crows to pluck For the rain to gather, for the wind to suck For the sun to rot, for the trees to drop Here is a strange and bitter crop The “southern trees” and “southern breeze” conveys that this is happening in the southern US, the states that declared themselves as the Confederate States of America. These states were the last states to abolish slavery, and they did not do it until the civil war took place. Even after slavery got abolished, it wasn’t safe for African Americans to be by themselves out and about amongst white Americans, even less so in the southern states of the US. The battlefield of the fight for human freedom during the 50’s and 60’s took place in the south of the US (Griffin, 2004 p.546). Considering the context and time when this song was produced, it can be interpreted that “black bodies swinging” in the trees is common enough that it, in some twisted way, might have been a fruit. African Americans were killed, lynched, and burned, and then left to decompose by the white Americans, like they weren’t people, or human bodies. This song conveys to the audience that African Americans weren’t treated humanely or as people. Even though the spirituals and the blues sometime express similar feelings and have the same themes and produce similar content, there is a distinction between them. The spirituals were produced during a time before the civil war, when slavery was still intact. They were slave songs describing the historical injustices, sung collectively. The blues did evolve from the spirituals on one hand and reproduced the messages conveying oppression and discrimination, but on the other hand they are songs of the post-civil war era. The blues depicted social issues of that era, such as segregation laws during the Jim Crow era. (Gussow, 2017 p.84) Nina Simone’s song “Mississippi Goddam” emerged as a gunshot during the era of the Civil Rights Movements in the US. Simone tackles the issues straight on in her lyrics:

All I want is equality For my sister my brother my people and me Yes you lied to me all these years You told me to wash and clean my ears And talk real fine just like a lady And you'd stop calling me Sister Sadie Oh but this whole country is full of lies You're all gonna die and die like flies I don't trust you any more You keep on saying 'Go slow!' 'Go slow!' But that's just the trouble 'Do it slow' Desegregation 'Do it slow' Mass participation 'Do it slow'

Reunification 'Do it slow' Do things gradually 'Do it slow' But bring more tragedy 'Do it slow' Why don't you see it Why don't you feel it I don't know I don't know You don't have to live next to me Just give me my equality Her frustration and anger over the bad treatment and injustices that African Americans are living with are apparent. Blues music emerged with a cry as an undertone, produced in the context of horrifying and painful experiences which black people lived through, and for this reason there is a claim on blues; it is black music. This theory which Gussow called bluesism says that white people couldn’t possibly understand and feel the pain of historic experience that is still to this day in circulation, which black people face. Hence, white people can’t play the blues in its true way of meaning, they are just trying to replicate and appropriate them. (Gussow, 2017 p.84) The blues were/are an important part of the African American community since it has the power to numb the pain and despair, replacing it with a good feeling, even if so momentarily for the short time it takes to listen to a song. (Gussow, 2017 p.97) During the post-Civil Rights Movement era in the 70’s “color blind” music dominated the clubs, or discos, where people of different races could meet and integrate, as if the society was “color blind” as well. Still, society faced racial issues and injustices. Out of this popular disco music, funk emerged as a counter to the false image of a “color blind” society, producing songs which contained the topics of racial and economic issues, connecting them to the surrounding society and discourse. James Brown was considered the king of funk, and his song “Say It Loud” was of big significance when expressing the black people’s dissatisfaction and frustration over the racist white society after the Civil Rights Movement. (Morant, 2011 p.73-78) In the following lines of the song, a certain dissatisfaction with the Civil and Political as well as the Economic, Social and Cultural Rights can be noted, e.g. underpaid and/or not paid work. The underlining message of the song, directed at the African American audience, is to make a claim on one’s own individual life, which nobody owns;

I've worked on jobs with my feet and my hands But all the work I did was for the other man And now we demands a chance To do things for ourselves We tired of beating our heads against the wall And working for someone else Say it loud, I'm black and I'm proud […] We rather die on our feet, Than keep living on our knees

The line “all the work I did was for the other man” refers back to slavery as well as unpaid/badly paid labor. Spending one’s life working and struggling for nothing in return. This song is claim on rights such as life, education, and in turn getting a job with a salary, in order to lead a decent life as any other citizen of the US, be able to have a home and vote. The music started focusing on empowerment of the collective identity as well as individual identity, rather than only oppression and rough lifestyle. Through music the musicians tried to convey to the audience that black culture is beautiful and deserving of equality and tried to get the audience to realize their power through self-definition.

4.3 Contemporary

Even after the era of Civil Rights Movements, self-definition continued to be important, and it was continued by musicians to try to offer better representation. Moving on with the time, from the Civil Rights era we find ourselves in, what in this essay is referred to as, contemporary era, and with it, the contemporary movements. It is of utter importance for a social movement to change the audiences’ mind and their perception of the past, present and future. After the Civil Rights Movement some African Americans improved their economic statuses and many became members of the middle class, hence they didn’t consider the history of slavery to be very relevant to the context of their own life, their current issues and injustices that were occurring in the lower classes. Social movements are there to raise collective awareness, make the audience realize that the racial problems and injustices are still occurring, only they have taken another form, and/or switched in which area they get expressed. (Morant, 2011 p.77) Racism shapeshifts, as does music. Funk protest music evolved beyond just funk and reinvented itself into rap and hip-hop music, which came to be the new generations tool for making their voices heard. (Morant, 2011 p.80) Joey Badass is one of those musicians who use hip-hop as a tool in order to convey what he is feeling and point out issues in society. In his rap song “Land Of The Free”, Americas history of slavery is portraited as well as the current racial issues in the US;

The first step in the change is to take notice Realize the real games that they tried to show us 300 plus years of them cold shoulders Yet 300 million of us still got no focus Sorry America, but I will not be your soldier Obama just wasn't enough, I just need some more closure And Donald Trump is not equipped to take this country over Let’s face facts 'cause we know what’s the real motives In the land of the free, is for the free loaders Leave us dead in the street then be your organ donors

They disorganized my people, made us all loners Still got the last names of our slave owners This song was produced during the shift of presidency in the US, when a white racist replaced the former first black president of the US. The song conveys dissatisfaction with this change, which was for the worse and not better. In order to make sure our changes are for the better, the better future we are fighting for becomes real, we need to become aware of the obstacles that are preventing it from happening, we need to “take notice”. The line “Obama just wasn’t enough” expresses the disappointment and frustration over how the first black president of the United States didn’t actually do what was expected from him, to deal with the oppression of African Americans, or at least approach the subject more explicitly. Obama becoming the president was an important milestone and meant a lot for the representation of the African American people. But his actions were falling short when it comes to the improvement of living standards and the treatment of African Americans, as can be concluded from this song and the song “High for Hours” which will soon be presented in this essay. The next president of the United States following up after Obama, Donald Trump, is known for expressing racist (as well as sexist and homophobic) views, especially on the social medium called Twitter, which is the place where the contemporary youth spend their time and connect to each other. It is a common critique that he isn’t “equipped to take this country over” considering his ignorance and neglection of the many issues the country is facing, gun violence among other. “They disorganized my people made us all loners” can be interpreted in many ways. One way is to interpret it in the context of slavery, meaning that it refers to people being stolen from their homes and sold as slaves all over the world, and when these slaves got families of their own they were sold separately to different slave owners/masters. Another way to interpret this is in context of racial segregation, the division of people and breaking up a collective identity, making people feel like they don’t belong anywhere. Institutional racism segregates people and creates division even internally in the black community. These internal conflicts are created and become a distraction for the bigger picture of structural racism which characterizes the state. Black on black crime becomes the go-to excuse and diversion of attention when people try to bring up racism, oppression and the crimes white Americans carry out or let happen. (The Root, 2017) Criticism of Trump being unfit to be a president is also presented by the metal band called “Stray From The Path” through their song “Good Night Alt-Right”;

It’s 2017 but in a 40’s trend With a racist president that’s “making everything great again” But tell me when this was fucking okay All the streets and the screens popping triple K’s

You want the peace? uh-uh, nah that will not fly here ‘Cause if you blink they’re pushing you back 300 years Trump being the president and expressing racist ideologies, socially legitimizes racism. People see him allowing it and are encouraged to carry on with their oppressive behavior, like carrying around KKK signs, rather than be shamed for it. The message being sent here is that we have stepped back into the 40’s, the era of Jim Crow, where there were segregation-laws, and the oppression of African Americans was legal, by having Trump as the new president. Racism, police brutality and gun violence go often hand in hand and many musicians are trying to shine light on it. African Americans all over the US get falsely charged and stopped on the streets for simply walking. They look suspicious. Why? Because of the color of their skin. People are being shot and killed, even children like the 12-year-old Tamir Rice (The Nation, 2014) because some white policeman felt threatened by their skin color which he associated with violence and criminality. The fury over these reoccurring killings is also expressed in the previous song discussed “Land Of The Free” in the line “leave us dead in the street then be your organ donors”, which conveys, interpreted in the context of police brutality, that African Americans aren’t seen as people by the authorities, until they die and become “organ donors”. Until other people exploit their human biology. As if their lives didn’t matter. A movement started emerging, protesting the violence and oppression directed at the African Americans, called “Black Lives Matter”, which have consisted of peaceful demonstrations. Marching in peaceful protests and chanting “we can’t breathe” meaning that the racism, oppression and discrimination is suffocating them both as a people and as individuals. The phrase “we can’t breathe” is based on Eric Garner’s last words “I can’t breathe” which he repeated over and over, as he was held down on the ground, unarmed, in a chokehold by policemen until he died. (CNN 2014) (The Nation, 2014) These cases of police brutality, murder of innocent and/or unarmed African Americans, and racism are also conveyed by the metal band “Body Count”, in their song “Black Hoodie”;

Got on a black hoodie, its hood up on my head I didn't have a gun so why am I dead You didn't have to shoot me and that's a known fact And now I'm laying face down with bullets in my back […] Maybe some justice, someone got it on video They say do something, he used to gang bang They made my homie look like fucking shit on everything Had on a black hoodie, that's all it took The DA portrayed him as a dirty fucking street crook They let the cops off, nobody fucking marched Nobody had a clue, it's never made the news

The production if this song followed the large number of shootings of African Americans during the last couple of years (The Conversation, 2017). African American people are criminalized in the mainstream media, portraited as bad people with bad attributes doing bad things. Bad people being shot doesn’t have the same ring as innocent people getting murdered. Very rarely do these cases get attention in the news media, their murders never “made the news”, being considered insignificant. No justice is upheld, and people’s lives were taken. The mainstream media is racist in such extent that we can only rely on getting a just and fair reportage of police brutality if “someone got it on video” when it took place. A musician that is vocal about oppression, racism and things that are wrong in our society is J. Cole. The majority of J. Coles songs seem to be of relevance for this subject. He is one of the contemporary musicians that is aware of the impact he can make on his audience on the receiving end, he uses his words to convey messages and to affect people’s emotions. We can see this by looking at the lyrics of his songs, which will be discussed in short, and what words he uses. His songs say something about oppression and discrimination, which according to the theories discussed in ch.2, can have a powerful influence on collective mobilization and rising collective awareness. Being a popular musician in this era, his words are received by both the youthful and the older generations. When he sings about oppression, discrimination and violation of one’s rights, people in the audience can connect their own experiences to the song. One thing the entire audience has in common and can connect through is his words, all these people relating to the same thing, their struggles are recognized and conveyed, a collective identity is created. His song “High For Hours” deals with racism and its consequences, such as police brutality, and murder of innocent black people;

I thought this was thou shalt not kill But police still letting off on n****s in the Ville Claiming that he reached for a gun They really think we dumb and got a death wish Now somebody's son is laying breathless When I was a little boy my father lived in Texas Pulled up in Toyota, drove that bitch like it was Lexus Put my bag in his trunk and headed off for Dallas Out there for the summer feeling just like I was Alice Lost in the wonder land where n****s still suffering Just like they was back home and that's wrong So now its fuck the government, they see my n****s struggling And they don't give a fuck at all and that's wrong, Police brutality and the killings of innocent African Americans is a major theme through this song. We can also see the reference to the south of the US, “Texas” and “Dallas”. As discussed previously, the southern states of the US were the last ones to abolish slavery, and even after the abolition, the white Americans were violently racist and narrowminded. Still to this day this

27 ignorance and racism can be experienced. The line “I was Alice lost in the wonder land where n****s still suffering” portraits how surreal it feels that this oppression and discrimination is still going on in reality. How people don’t seem to care even though they have a long clear history of what happened, which they are so quick to claim repulsion of, but still are turning a blind eye to the current racism. This song was produced during Obamas presidency and the discourse surrounding the disappointment the African American community felt. J. Cole discussed Obama, further on in the same song;

I had a convo with the president, I paid to go and see him Thinking ‘bout the things I said I'd say when I would see him Feeling nervous, sitting in a room full of white folks Thinking about the black man plight, think I might choke, nope Raised my hand and asked a man a question 'Does he see the struggles of his brothers in oppression? And if so, if you got all the power in the clout as the president What's keeping you from helping n****s out?' Well I didn't say n****, but you catch my drift He look me in my eyes and spoke and he was rather swift He broke the issues down and showed me he was well aware I got the vibe he was sincere and that the brother cared But dawg you in the chair, what's the hold up? He said there's things that I wanna fix But you know this shit n****, politics Don't stop fighting and don't stop believing You can make the world better for your kids before you leave it Like Joey Badass, J. Cole also discusses of Obama being the first black president of the United States but still not living up to the African American community’s expectations of doing what it takes for “his brothers in oppression”, Although, J. Cole has a less of an accusing tone than what is expressed in Joey Badass’ song, as he gives room for the presidents answer in his song. When singing about the conversation between him and the president the lyrics go “he said there's things that I wanna fix, but you know this shit n****, politics” meaning that all of the decisions are made through different political processes and not one man, even if Obama has “got all the power in the clout as president”. The power is divided between the House and the Senate, which together have a lot of different people and representatives of the US. The president’s power to affect the decisions is limited. (The White House) Instead, the message that the musician is trying to convey through the song is rather that the ordinary people, the civilians, are the key to change, and that they are the ones that change the way society works. The people on the receiving end of the song are encouraged to take action against the oppressive system. Protest music is an important tool of recruitment and solidarity in a movement. It helps bring a movements discourse to the outside and raises attention as well as makes the people outside of the movement support and sympathize with the movements discourse. (Morant, 2011 p.80)

Protest music used during social movements fall under the category of freedom of expression and information in the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) (1996), and the movement itself falls under the freedom of assembly as well as freedom of association. (Grant et. al. 2010 p.188) Although, there is a limit on this freedom of expression. “Leathermouth” is a post-hardcore band which has had conflicts with the law concerning their song “I Am Going To Kill The President Of The United States Of American”. The bands front man, Frank Iero, was approached by the Secret Service and threatened that if his band wouldn’t cease to perform that song, they would face grave consequences. (Kerrang, 2018)

How can I believe what you say? Your propaganda bullshit makes me sick Murdered fascists make no noise I'd shed your blood to fucking save the world […] You put words in my mouth I'd like to put a bullet in yours I'll send you to hell, I'll send you to hell I'll send you to hell motherfucker The Secret Service’s actions could perhaps be seen as a violation of freedom of expression, but as stated, freedom of expression is limited, threatening messages aren’t included by this right. With every right follows a duty as well, it is a duty not to violate another person’s rights, which is what this song is considered to do, since it is threatening a person’s life. Mobilizing a society with hate and the message of such potential action, could easily result in serious violence. Even though this song is first and foremost conveying rage over a corrupt and deceiving state and trying to question the authorities, “your propaganda bullshit makes me sick”, it is threatening when he sings “I’d like to put a bullet in yours”. Another song inspiring people to question the authorities is “Brackets” by J. Cole which raises collective awareness among the audience. This song focuses on the economic issues and how the authorities are tricking us by lying about how our taxes are spent;

Yeah, I pay taxes, so much taxes, shit don't make sense Where do my dollars go? You see lately, I ain't been convinced I guess they say my dollars supposed to build roads and schools But my n****s barely graduate, they ain't got the tools Maybe 'cause the tax dollars that I make sure I send Get spent hirin' some teachers that don't look like them And the curriculum be tricking them, them dollars I spend Got us learning about the heroes with the whitest of skin One thing about the men that's controlling the pen That write history, they always seem to white-out they sins Maybe we'll never see a black man in the White House again I'll write a check to the IRS, my pockets get slim Damn, do I even have a say 'bout where it's goin'? Some older n**** told me to start votin' I said "Democracy is too fuckin' slow" If I'm givin' y'all this hard-earned bread, I wanna know

Better yet, let me decide, bitch, it's 2018 Let me pick the things I'm funding from an app on my screen Better that than letting wack congressman I've never seen Dictate where my money go, Straight into the palms of some Money-hungry company That make guns that circulate the country And then wind up in my hood, making bloody clothes This song contains descriptions of racism which takes place in school. According to the song text, the African American children aren’t represented, and aren’t offered the right sort of education, even though, supposedly, the tax money is paying for it. The musician wants to convey that African American children’s history, which their current lives’ situation is affected by, isn’t being portraited when they are “learning about the heroes with the whitest of skin”. Interpreting this in the historical context of slavery, we can draw the conclusion that they aren’t taught about the collective identity they are a part of, and they are taught only of stuff which white people, people that don’t look like them, do which tends to be presented in a good and white-only way. It can be drawn, from the musician use of the phrase “white-out they sins”, that he tries to convey how white people tend to be the central part of history, which teaches of “heroes with the whitest of skin”, meaning that white people are the heroes of history, and the black people are reduced to less. Today it is universally known that we use the word “black” e.g. the black market, as a synonym for illegal, and “white” meaning the contrary, which in itself is very problematic. Whiting out sins refers to the oppression and discrimination during slavery, being the sins, are being whited out, made into something good, or at least portrayed as not entirely bad or criminal, rewriting history incorrectly. This song is encouraging action the way that it places doubt and mistrust of the government within the recipients with the line “if I'm givin' y'all this hard-earned bread, I wanna know?”, making them question the authority: where is the money going? With this song, the musician questions why the people can’t decide what they are funding, meaning if they got to choose, much less money would be invested in the arms industry that would lead to less lives being taken, they wouldn’t “wind up in my hood, making bloody clothes”. J. Cole may be one of the few musicians today whose lyrics actually say something and convey content of the civil rights violations the African American community was/is experiencing, but he isn’t the only one. Kendrick Lamar is also a big spokesperson when it comes to oppression of African Americans and calling out the corruption in the institutions. His entire album “To Pimp A Butterfly” has become important for the contemporary protest movements within the African American community. It consists of songs calling out social issues such as segregation

30 of society, street violence, corrupt institutions and oppression (Blum, 2016). In his song “Hood Politics” he points out the irony of the American political system being just like street gangs;

The streets don’t fail me now, they tell me it's a new gang in town From Compton to Congress, it’s set trippin’ all around Ain’t nothin' new but a flow of new DemoCrips and ReBloodlicans Red state versus a blue state, which one you governin’? They give us guns and drugs, call us thugs Make it they promise to fuck with you No condom they fuck with you, Obama say, "What it do?" There is violence occurring on all planes, from the violence in “Compton to Congress”. He places street gangs the Crips and Blood, in relation to democrats and republicans the two political parties/sides ruling the US. Both the street gangs and the political parties identify themselves by the same colors, red or blue. The distribution of arms in local communities is large and weapons are accessible to locals. The musician conveys through the line “they give us guns and drugs, call us thugs”, “they” being the politicians, democrats & republicans, of the state funding the arms industry, and suggests the thought to the recipients of the song, that the distribution of guns and drugs is to be blamed for the occurring violence, and in turn loss of life. The gun control discourse is large, and is occurring in many artistic medias, such as music. In March 2018, a festival called “Stay Amped” was held, featuring many different musicians of different musical genres, as a way of collecting money in order to fund a protest movement taking place by the end of the same month. (The Anthem) This protest movement was called “March of Our Lives” which was a march where the collective was demanding proper gun control and improved gun laws in order to end gun violence. This specific protest was organized following the events of the last school mass shooting in Parkland, Florida, which was already the 8th school mass shooting of the year. (CNN 2018) “Their” politics fund and allow mass production of arms, which eventually find their way to the local people, already segregated and divided with internal conflicts, killing each other, as can’t only be drawn from this song but also the previously discussed “Land Of The Free”. They try to convey to people that the bigger institutions are responsible for the break-up of the African American community, segregating the society, taking away opportunities from the oppressed by not investing nor improving their neighborhoods, the way they do with “rich white neighborhoods”, leaving people to struggle and take the matters in their own hands, criminalizing them and creating a “self-fulfilling prophecy”. They are trying to create awareness amongst their audiences about systematic oppression and discrimination and

31 encourage them to make better choices in life instead of giving into these self-fulfilling prophecies. In the following song “The Blacker The Berry”;

Came from the bottom of mankind My hair is nappy, my dick is big, my nose is round and wide You hate me don't you? You hate my people, your plan is to terminate my culture You're fuckin' evil I want you to recognize that I'm a proud monkey You vandalize my perception but can't take style from me And this is more than confession I mean I might press the button just so you know my discretion I'm guardin' my feelins, I know that you feel it You sabotage my community, makin' a killin' You made me a killer, emancipation of a real n**** Kendrick Lamar continues to raise the issues of internalized hate and violence, and the issues which followed the emancipation during the civil war era. When interpreting this text in relation to its producer we can assume that he takes prejudices of physical attributes that are used against African Americans and applies those characteristics to himself proudly in order to uplift the collective identity, using these as a tool of self-definition, taking pride in the things people usually have used as insults and hate (we can understand that from him asking “you hate me don’t you?” after describing himself the way prejudiced people might view him). When interpreting this text in relation the context surrounding it we can draw from it that prejudice isn’t always only prejudice, when it comes from a position of power it becomes racism. Racism can as he sings “terminate my culture” and “sabotage my community”. Culture is big component of a collective identity or community, people create connections and sense of belonging through culture, hence disruption or termination of a culture can break up a community. Further on in the same song resumes the talk of racism and slavery;

I said they treat me like a slave, cah' me black Woi, we feel a whole heap of pain, cah' we black And man a say they put me in a chain, cah' we black Imagine now, big gold chain full of rocks How you no see the whip, left scars pon' me back But now we have a big whip, parked pon' the block All them say we doomed from the start, cah' we black Remember this, every race start from the block, just remember that The lyrics convey how black people still to this day are treated like “slaves” because they “are black”, whipped and in pain, as in the time where they didn’t have any Civil and Political Rights. This text articulates a collective memory of a history which consists of pain and injustice. Mistreated, and oppressed just because they are black. They are “doomed from the start” because you can rarely manage to get out of the effects of oppression, when the entire system is built for you to fail and for it to benefit of your failure. Here again, comes the self- fulfilling prophecy. But it also uplifts that the opposite can happen, that they can succeed. The song is still trying to lift the collective self-consciousness and self-esteem. It sends the message

32 that these prophecies aren’t decided and set in stone, that they can only be self-fulfilling when you let them happen. Analyzing this text in relation to how the producer of this text intended to affect the recipients, we can see how he urges the recipients to not accept other people’s disbelief and let it get in the way of their success. The song continues speaking of the rigged system;

I mean it's evident I'm irrelevant to society That's what you're telling me, penitentiary would only hire me Curse me till I'm dead Church me with your fake prophesizing that I'mma be another slave in my head Institutionalize manipulation and lies Reciprocation of freedom only live in your eyes African American people are being told by the world that they are “irrelevant to society” and that they can’t lead well paid jobs since nobody would hire them. These aren’t prophecies, but rather discouraging words for diminishing hope and discourage people from even trying to succeed. This instead creates a self-fulfilling prophecy, which didn’t have to happen, but did because of the manipulating circumstances of oppression.

5. Analysis

This chapter will analyze and discuss the material from theoretical perspectives discussed in ch.2. Here I will try to analyze how the collective identity is upheld by music articulating the memory of oppression and discrimination through the ages, and how human rights claims can be expressed in music, which should answer the main question of this study. I will once again, although briefly, bring in some songs and lyrics, but this time they are discussed in relation to the theoretical approaches in order to prove a point or to show the rights claims being made. Throughout this study we have seen that music can come to play an important role in the creation of alliances and mobilization of a society when it conveys experiences of rights violations. Music has acted, and still does, as a voice, an amplifier, of the surrounding in which it is produced, in this case a surrounding containing injustices and rights violations. Individuals living in oppression and discrimination can be united by their common experience which can be found expressed in song. These songs can also convey potential actions which the collective cane take e.g. through movements, in order to make a claim on their rights that are being violated. As supported by Beamish & Luebber in ch.2. not only the common experiences of oppression and discrimination but also a common goal to achieve, creates solidarity between individuals and unites people in a community since people can achieve a bigger change together rather than alone. The exchange of thoughts and feelings concerning oppression and discrimination between individuals becomes a political as well as social and cultural topic and creates space for potential political action. Drawing from Eyerman’s and Giffort’s theories discussed in ch.2, it can be established that people connect through their history and become a part of a community, with its own culture, which is characterized by common experiences and feelings. People part of the African American community have experienced oppression, discrimination and violation of rights because of the color of their skin. This oppression and discrimination can be traced back through history, as other people of African American identity have been met discriminated and oppressed because of the color of their skin. The community articulates historical events and emotions through its collective memory that are passed down from one individual to another within the community. Even if the current young generations, participating in the Black Lives Matter movement never themselves experienced slavery nor participated in the Civil Rights Movements, based on the social behavior theories from ch.2 it can be claimed that they know and feel their people’s

34 historical struggles, since the collective identity has come to be framed by it. A collective uses past experiences to create the collective memory, and (re)articulates it adding the present experiences which individuals relate to and have shaped their individual identities by. Based on the theories previously discussed in ch.2, one could conclude that the collective identity lives in a symbiotic relationship with the individual identities, they build onto and develop each other. This collective identity and the bonds shared between the individuals are kept alive by their culture. A culture is (re)produced within the community which the individuals feel part of and claim it as their own. The culture is preserved and evolved by the collective through collective memory, even when the individuals that experienced the memories are gone. An important cultural medium is art, which is expressed in many forms, music being one of them. From a musicological perspective as presented in ch.2. music can be seen as a tool of communication, informing and spreading thoughts, feelings and knowledge. Music can articulate collective memories and by communicating them to an audience, strengthening the collective identity and self-esteem. We have seen musicians use self-definition in order to strengthen the collective self-esteem, e.g. in the songs “Say it Loud – I’m Black and I’m Proud” and “The Blacker The Berry”. The current social issues are building on the foundation of slavery and the Civil Rights Movement. The old social movements tried to change the way society as a whole was, they were more revolutionary than what the contemporary resistance movements are, which don’t want to change society as a whole, only certain problematic parts, such as the oppression and discrimination of African American people. Unfortunately, change is only happening gradually, and drawing a conclusion of Eyerman’s theorization on the relation between political ideologies and the civilians’ political satisfaction, new social movements building on the same issues such as oppression and discrimination occur since many issues were left unresolved by the previous movements. From the perspective of Eyerman’s theory we can see how slavery got abolished, but segregation was left intact. When the Civil Rights Movements protested the segregation and discrimination and demanded that African Americans got their Civil Rights just like any other citizen, they got the right to vote eventually. But as conveyed by the music produced by the African American community, such as the songs presented in ch.4.2, institutional racism, and racism in general, is still a big issue. These songs bring attention to the issues which still remain and remind us that people still have to fight for their Civil and Political- and Social and Economic rights.

Now currently the Black Lives Matter movement is bringing attention to institutional racism and focusing on police brutality, fighting for their human rights, the most basic one; right to life. As pointed out by Joey Badass in the song “Land Of The Free”, African Americans have been shot and killed dead in the streets simply for the color of their skin, and even though this kind discrimination and violence has been occurring through history as well, it wasn’t until the last few years that it got proper attention thanks to the development of technology and the internet. The exchange of knowledge and culture, as said by Inthorn, Street and Scott which has been discussed in ch.2. has created a space for potential political action and social activism. The internet is an important tool of communication for (but not limited to) the youthful generation. The recent generations use social media as a way of communication, reaching millions instantly, and the spreading of information and knowledge is far more efficient and easier spread by the use of #hashtags. The killings of innocent African Americans due to police brutality and gun violence has rarely been televised or reported by news channels, but with the help of internet the information of these social issues have been broadcasted worldwide. We can see this being brought to attention by the song “Black Hoodie”. In this day and age, marches and different kind of protest movements, such as the Black Lives Matter and March of Our Lives have been organized on a global scale in matter of hours, to protest oppression and discrimination, police brutality and gun violence. Music is an important tool used during these marches and rallies when protesting. Movements like Black Lives Matter or March of Our Lives have used music for the spreading of the collective identity and group formation, and popular musicians have participated in the movements, bringing wide media attention to them and what the movements stand for. These movements have amongst other things protested the use and distribution of arms, which we can see in the song “Hood Politics”, as the “they”, meaning the people in charge of the state or arms industry, are the root of these guns reaching locals in one way or another and taking lives. Which can further be argued for, for the sake of this study, being a violation of the most basic human right, the right to life. Social movements indicate that something is lacking in society and/or politics. Lack of representation is often the cause, and I don’t only mean representation in the sense of a person being the “face” of the people representing them, I mean representation of the ideologies and political discourse as well. When a group is already represented and is benefitting from the way society works in its favor, there is no need nor urge for this group to protest, as was theorized by Eyerman. Social movements emerge as an action towards an issue in question, pressuring

36 authorities and institutions to eventually make a change, and live up to the Human Rights that the state is supposed to grant its citizens. We can conclude, from the songs discussed in this study e.g. “Mississippi Goddam” and “Brackets”, as well as this theory of Eyerman’s, that music can encourage individuals to pressure the authorities and various institutions to be more respectful of the African American collectives human rights and live up to the law which states that everyone should have their rights respected regardless of skin color. The point of a social movement, according to Morant, is to change the people on the other side’s minds, about the issues in question. The point is to spread awareness to outside of the one community that is suffering, since the dominant groups of society might be either oblivious of or ignorant towards the social issues occurring around them. Spreading collective awareness as well as the collective memories of the past is important for there to be any changes in the future. In order to spread awareness and bring attention to injustices according to Joey Badass one has to be aware of their surroundings, because, as he claims, “the first step in the change is to take notice”, concluding that we have to learn from history in order not to repeat it, in this case the US history of slavery. As said in “Good Night Alt-Right” to not be pushed back 300 years. When a community faces oppression, discrimination, and has their rights violated they collectively protest in order to make their voices heard, considering that there are given democratic opportunities where mobilization and freedom of association is a right. However, as previously demonstrated in ch.4 by the song “I Am Going To Kill The President Of The United States Of America”, the freedom of what one can express is limited, e.g. hate speech and threats, and there may still be consequences of doing so. During slavery, the spirituals were the main tools of communication during labor. If the slaves tried to hold regular conversations during labor they would be punished for inefficiency, but while singing in rhythm to their work they could get away with covertly expressing their feelings and thoughts, uniting through song. From Griffin’s, Collin’s and Eyerman’s theoretical perspectives on the role of music, discussed in ch.2, the spirituals created the link between the individuals and the community. The slaves shaped the spirituals after their own experiences, shaped by individual identities, which made up the frame of the collective identity and memory, which in turn lead to mobilization of the people and aided them to revolt against the system of slavery and claim what later came to be their Human Rights. The spirituals, such as “Chained To The Land” and “Let My People Go” and “I Am Bound For The Land of Canaan” offered the individuals comfort and hope through the collective identity, as well as a place of remote safety and relief. These songs were used as a tool of collective

37 resistance, both when the slaves used them as a loophole when the slave owners forbade communication and when they encouraged as well as planned escapes from the plantations and enslavement. White’s discussion concerning the role of spirituals during slavery, points to that the slaves leaned on the bible when forming their claims on rights. Through spirituals they expressed that since God had made man equal it was a sin not to treat them as humans. They expressed their suffering because of the unjust ways they were treated and hope that God will punish the sinners, as the ones living in enslavement would be set free, believing in justice in an afterlife. The spirituals supplied the slaves with ideas and suggestions of direct actions of rebellion towards the system, such as escaping. Unlike the comforting spirituals which convey hope of a future, in the lyrics of “Follow the Drinking Gourd” potential actions are conveyed for this future to be established. This spiritual’s main message for the slaves was escape. It offered directions of the escape route, and it did so cryptically so the slaveowners wouldn’t discover their plans of rebellion. Music had a role to play in the mobilization of the enslaved and their struggles for escape, freedom and survival. Once slavery got abolished in the US, other protests were sat in movement, since new issues arose. The Jim Crow era followed the emancipation and with it followed new fights for humane treatment and Civil Rights. The music of the Civil Rights Movement was more specific with its claim on rights than what the spirituals of slavery were. These made explicit claims on the Civil and Political Rights, as they conveyed anti-oppression and anti-discrimination messages, which can be seen in songs such as “Mississippi Goddam” and “Say It Loud”. Such messages were explicitly conveyed by Nina Simone in many of her songs, “Mississippi Goddam” among other, as she sang “just give me my equality”. In the song she expresses that the African American community has been tricked by the system, tricked to believe that they were free people now, when in fact they were still slaves of the system which didn’t grant them their freedom and human rights. The promises of a better life, as she says, were lies. Her people still suffered, her people’s rights were violated, her people were still treated unjustly and unequally, her people were still getting abused and killed, discriminated solely because of the color of their skin. Simone conveys that she is sick of doing things slowly, one thing at the time, wait for the change to happened. Because ultimately for an African American person to be quiet and go slow, gives the white Americans a pass to keep exploiting and harming them. She is loud, and with her song sung loudly in unity, the voice of the oppressed who have had their

38 rights violated is heard. Here we see how Simone’s music encourages people to take action, to take the matter into their own hands and claim their rights instead of waiting and going slow. Even if a person may speak, the chances of their individual voice being heard is small, especially if this person is oppressed and discriminated against and silenced from every direction. Oppression doesn’t exist in the eyes of the oppressor, the majority of society or the other communities, since they can’t/won’t see nor hear it. When a popular person with a wide and large audience speaks the words of their oppressed and discriminated community, the way musicians do through song, the world listens. For a society to be aware of its problems, it needs to be informed of it first, and then encouraged to protest it, to take action against the oppression and discrimination, the violation of basic human rights. And the united community and its alliances have a better chance of being heard than just one individual. Although, the music articulated the struggles of slavery and the collective memory, as can be seen in James Brown’s lyrics “I've worked on jobs with my feet and my hands but all the work I did was for the other man” still remained and fueled the new movements which in turn fueled the songs with new experiences and collective memories, and so it went on. The popular music of this era consisted mostly of blues, jazz and, later on, funk. These genres of music were considered the African American music, since they developed from the same point of community’s history: slavery. The popular African American musicians in these genres used and rearticulated the collective memory of their community through song, in order to both express themselves and express the collective’s emotions, reproducing their culture and the definition of their identity. The songs evolved from only conveying misery and struggles, to conveying confidence and pride, empowering the collective self-esteem in order to realize that they are worth more and deserving of humane treatment, so that they get the confidence to take action, to oppose oppression and discrimination carried out by the dominant group of society, and demand their Human Rights. “Say it Loud” was an empowering song, and encouraged people not to settle for less, but demand what they deserve and be proud of who they are. To demand more, to “demand a chance”, and improve the living standards, by pressuring the oppressive institutions and society to change. Self-definition came to be an important reoccurring theme with the African American musicians. Rather than letting the dominant group of society define them as less than human and/or in a way suggesting they are worth less, they wanted to represent the community in the best way possible. They wanted for the community to define itself as- and identify with beauty and deserving of equality. Such songs point to Grant’s and Du Bois’ discussions about

39 the importance of self-definition. Self-definition was a step towards breaking social prejudice and judgmental norms as much as it was empowering the members of the community to act and make a claim on their rights. The big difference between contemporary music and the music produced during slavery or the Civil Rights Movement era doesn’t lie in the content produced, but in the width of the audience that it reaches. With today’s technology music is distributed worldwide instantly and is easily accessible for almost anyone. This means that the intended messages of a song are received on a larger scale, which in turn means that more people get affected in one way or another by its words and emotions. It is today easier to spread awareness and collective memories, as is the recruitment of members and alliances to the community, which facilitates the mobilization of a society and community building. We have come to see, throughout this study, that mobilization is of essence when multiple individuals want to achieve something such as rights claims, and that an effective way to mobilize a society is rhetorically through music. The contemporary musicians like Joey Badass, J. Cole and Kendrick Lamar are trying to spread awareness and information about the oppression and discrimination of the African American community. To patch up and seal the cracks which the white American community has created within the African American community, which is expressed in their songs previously analyzed in ch.4, e.g. the lyrics “they disorganized my people made us all loners”. They were made loners by racism. Racists that destroyed their homes and kidnapped people from their homes, families and communities, disrupting their culture, transporting and selling African Americans like stock. By continuously creating divisions within the African American community with institutional racism and segregation, splitting the community up in order to prevent the individuals from mobilizing. These songs are voicing the collective’s struggles with oppression and discrimination and are helping people to make a claim on not only the Civil and Political Rights but also the Economic, Social and Cultural Rights. During the Civil Rights Movements the civil rights were more distinguishable from the Economic, Social and Cultural Rights. Today, they interfere with each other on different levels. These songs articulate collective memories of discrimination and oppression to the present through simple lines that have roots of significance in the collective history. The bible and biblical references in the spirituals characterized the songs. J. Coles song “High For Hours” includes a biblical reference: “Thou shalt not kill” which connects to the character of the spirituals, the origin of hip-hop. A simple line which holds centuries of history. Christianity has also been used by the Western society, as an excuse to

40 invade and colonize states and commit genocides. If we are bending religious rules for our own benefit, and insisting on following the word of God, why have we forgotten the most important one? The song “The blacker the berry” by Kendrick Lamar makes apparent connections to the African American history of slavery. It talks about the progress and the economic development of the African Americans, how they went from being chained up to having gold chains around their necks, showing the people that positive change and progress is possible and that they shouldn’t let society limit them and their opportunities, but fight for themselves in order to achieve their goals and make a claim on their rights instead.

6. Discussion & Conclusion

We have now discussed topics such as collective identity, music and culture, discrimination and oppression, and social movements such as the Civil Rights Movement and the Black Lives Matter movement. We have looked at the role music has had to the African American community during the periods of slavery, civil war, and contemporary time, as well as the development of the different genres building onto each other, e.g. contemporary rap and hip- hop music has its roots in jazz and blues of the Civil Rights Movements era, which in turn has evolved from spirituals from the time of slavery. After analyzing the different social phenomena in relation to musical expression, we can conclude that music as a cultural tool has come to play an important role for the distribution of encouragement and ideas for making claim on Human Rights. Doing so by framing identities by, as well as creating emotions when, conveying collective memories of oppression and discrimination the collective identity has experienced. Mobilizing people as well as building communities with the same collective memory and the same goals to achieve. We have also briefly discussed claims on specific rights as an example, such as freedom of expression and the right of association, a civilian’s right to vote, economic rights and any persons right to life, that are expressed through music. We have seen that musicians discusses important issues and rights in their songs even though they might not explicitly mention them by their names such as “Civil and Political Rights” or “Economic, Social and Cultural Rights”. Protest music has had, and keeps having, multiple effects on society. We have discussed how music can mobilize a society by articulation of knowledge and (re)production of culture, upholding a collective identity. Direct effects of protest music can be seen e.g. in social movements aiming to either change the way certain parts of a society function e.g. laws concerning the issue in question during the Civil Rights Movement, as well as Black Lives Matter and March for Our Lives, which the latter two have one of their aims in common; implementation of stricter gun laws in the US. These movements’ active protests and goals are spread, fueled and encouraged by music and the suggested potential actions of resistance to be performed or executed. Collectives mobilize with the help of music as a cultural tool, in order to pressure society in large of changing, by pressuring authorities and giving rise to better institutions. We have seen a continuity of oppression and discrimination of the African American collective identity conveyed in the different songs from all three of the eras in the timeline. During the

42 eras of slavery and the Civil Rights Movement, we have seen that individuals with an African American identity have been making a claim on rights through music conveying that they are not yet seen as equals to the white Americans because the state didn’t grant them the rights which were granted to the white Americans. We can also see the social changes that have happened throughout the timeline reflected in the contemporary music being produced after the Civil Rights Movement, as the songs urge people to pressure the authorities to live up to and respect the granted human rights. We have now seen that, where there are people there is culture uniting them as communities, and music has proven itself to be a unifying tool as well as a medium able to communicate, (re)articulate and maintain knowledge and information to the masses. In this case, knowledge and information concerning e.g. oppression, discrimination, racism and rights violations of different eras that have affected the African American identity, both collectively and individually, and given rise to potential change. We have seen that change has happened throughout history, such as the abolishment of slavery in the US, and then later on the Civil Rights Movements which resulted in African Americans getting their Civil and Political Rights. We have also seen that change is gradual, meaning that even though these movements led to one thing changing for the better, there remain a lot of things needing to be fought for, e.g. police brutality in the current day and age, and stricter gun laws, which the contemporary movements such as BLM and March of Our Lives are fighting with the help of famous musicians voicing and spreading awareness of their issues to a large and broad audience. Music in the context of social movements aiming for social change, helps frame the issues of a collective identity and gives room to people to voice their dissatisfaction over unjust treatment, such as racial discrimination and oppression. Showing the issues within a society first, in order to be able to change them. “The first step in the change is to take notice” (Land of The Free, 2017).

7. List Of References 7.1 Bibliography • Beamish, Thomas D. & Luebber, Amy J. (2009) Alliance Building across Social Movements: Bridging Difference in a Peace and Justice Coalition, Social Problems, Vol. 56, Issue 4, p. 647–676, Society for the Study of Social Problems, Inc. University of California. DOI: 10.1525/sp.2009.56.4.647. • Bergström, Göran. Boréus, Kristina (2000) “Textens Mening och Makt: Metodbok i Samhällsvetenskaplig Textanalys” Studentlitteratur, Sweden, Lund. • Blum, Adam (2016) Rhythm Nation, Studies in Gender and Sexuality, 17:3, 141-149, DOI: 10.1080/15240657.2016.1199923 • Bryman Alan (2001) ”Samhällsvetenskapliga Metoder”, Liber AB, Liber Ekonomi, Berlings skogs, Trelleborg (2002). • Chadwick A. Bruce, Bahr M. Howard, Albrecht L. Stan (1984) “Social Science Research Methods” Prentice Hall, Inc. Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey 07632. • Collin, Ross (2013) “Songwriting and Activism: A Young Singer's Efforts to Write Himself into the Traditions of an Activist Group”, Social Movement Studies, 12:4, pp.448-465, DOI: 10.1080/14742837.2013.779455 • DeNora, Tia (2004) “Historical Perspectives In Music Sociology” Department of Sociology, SHiPSS, University of Exeter Elsevier B.V. pp.211-221. doi:10.1016/j.poetic.2004.05.003 • Eyerman, Ron. (2002) “Music in Movement: Cultural Politics and Old and New Social Movements”, Qualitative Sociology, Vol.25, No.3, pp.443-458 • Feischmidt, Margit. and Pulay, Gergő. (2005), “Rocking The Nation; The Popular Culture of Neonationalism”, Nations and Nationalism 23 (2), 2017, pp.309–326 • Feldstein, Ruth. (2005) “I Don’t Trust You Anymore”: Nina Simone, Culture, and Black Activism in the 1960s, The Journal of American History, pp.1349-1379 • Grant, M. J. Möllemann, Rebecca. Morlandstö, Ingvill. Münz, Simone Christine. Nuxoll, Cornelia (2010) “Music and Conflict: Interdisciplinary Perspectives”, Interdisciplinary Science Reviews, 35:2, pp.183-198, DOI: 10.1179/030801810X12723585301237

• Griffin, J. Larry. (2004) “"Generations and Collective Memory" Revisited: Race, Region, and Memory of Civil Right” American Sociological Association, American Sociological Review, Vol. 69, No. 4 (Aug. 2004), pp. 544-557 • Gussow, Adam (2017) “I Will be Free, I Will be Me: Rethinking Blues Origins, “Bluesmen,” and Blues Feelings in the Age of #blacklivesmatter”, Arkansas Review 48.2, pp.83-98. • Hsiung, C. David (2005) “Freedom Songs and the Modern Civil Rights Movement”, OAH Magazine Of History, pp.23-26. • Inthorn, Sanna. Street, John. Scott, Martin (2012) “Popular Culture as a Resource for Political Engagement” SAGE, Cultural Sociology 7(3) pp.336 –351 DOI: 10.1177/1749975512457141 • Kerrang! Magazine – “Fight The Power”. K!1709, 17.02.18. • Martinez, A. Theresa (1997) “Popular Culture As Oppositional Culture: Rap as Resistance”, Sociological Perspectives Vol.40, No.2, pp.265-286 • Morant, M. Kesha (2011) “Language in Action: Funk Music as the Critical Voice of a Post—Civil Rights Movement Counterculture”, Sage Publications, Inc. Journal of Black Studies, Vol.42, No.1, (January 2011) pp.71-82. DOI: 10.1177/0021934709357026 • Paretskaya, Anna (2015) “This Is What Democracy Sounds Like: Protest Performances of the Citizenship Movement in Wisconsin and Beyond”, Social Movement Studies, 14:6, (January 2015) pp.635-650, DOI: 10.1080/14742837.2014.995077 • Rejai, Mostafa. Phillips, Kay. (2001) “Classical Music and Political Sociology: A Research Note” Journal of Political and Military Sociology; Summer 2001; 29, 1; Social Science Premium Collection pp.177-186 • Small, Kathryn (2009) “Saving the Spiritual for Your Students”, Sage Publications, Inc. Music Educators Journal, Vol.96, No.2. (December 2009) pp. 46-49. DOI: 10.1177/0027432109351686 • Ward, Brian (2010) “Civil Rights and Rock and Roll: Revisiting the Nat King Cole Attack of 1956”, OAH Magazine of History, (April 2010) pp.21-24. • Wardi, J. Anissa (2012) ““The Colored Man Can’t Fix Nothing with the Law”: Carceral Spaces in August Wilson’s The Piano Lesson”, Springer Science + Business Media New York, J. Afr. Am. St. (November 2012) 17:506–517, DOI 10.1007/s12111- 012-9236-z

• White, John (1983) “Veiled Testimony: Negro Spirituals and the Slave Experience”, Cambridge University Press, Journal of American Studies, Vol.17, No.2, (August 1983) pp.251-263 • Wood, Elizabeth (1995) “Performing Rights: A Sonography of Women's Suffrage”, Oxford University Press, The Musical Quarterly, Vol.79, No.4, (Winter, 1995) pp. 606- 643. 7.2 Webpages

• Black Lives Matter webpage Accessed: 16/05/2018 URL = • CNN: New York man dies after chokehold by police - By Deborah Bloom and Jareen Imam, CNN Updated 2231 GMT (0631 HKT) December 8, 2014. Accessed:16/05/2018 URL = • CNN: What You Should Know About The March For Our Lives – by Dakin Andone, Updated 1357 GMT (2157 HKT) March 23, 2018 Accessed: 28/04-2018 URL = • The Conversation: Gun Violence in The US Kills More Black People and Urban Dwellers – by Molly Pahn, Anita Knopov, Michael Siegel, November 8, 2017 Accessed: 07/08/2018 URL= < http://theconversation.com/gun-violence-in-the-us- kills-more-black-people-and-urban-dwellers-86825 > • The Anthem: Stay Amped – A Concert To End Gun Violence Accessed: 28/04/2018 URL = • History – Underground Railroad, October 29, 2019 Updated February 8, 2019 Accessed: 13/08/2019 URL = • The Nation: We Cant Breathe: The Movement Against Police Brutality Is Just Beginning – By Katarina vanden Heuvel, December 9, 2014 Accessed: 18/05/2018 URL =

• The Root: Why We Never Talk About Black-On-Black Crime: An Answer To White Americas Most Pressing Question – By Michael Harriot, 10/03/2017. Accessed: 21/09/2018 URL = < https://www.theroot.com/why-we-never-talk-about- black-on-black-crime-an-answer-1819092337 > • The White House Accessed 21/09/2018 URL < https://www.whitehouse.gov/about-the-white-house/the- legislative-branch/ >

7.3 Music 7.3.1 Musicians & Songs • Billie Holiday (Solo Artist) - “Strange Fruit” (1939) Jazz, Pop. URL = < https://genius.com/Billie-holiday-strange-fruit-lyrics > • Body Count (Band) - “Black Hoodie” (2017) Metal. Album: “Bloodlust”. URL = < https://genius.com/Body-count-black-hoodie-lyrics> • James Brown (Solo Artist) - “Say It Loud – I’m Black And I’m Proud” (1968) R&B, Soul. Album: “A Soulful Christmas” URL= < https://genius.com/James-brown-say-it-loud-im-black-and-im-proud- lyrics > • J. Cole (Solo Artist) - “High For Hours” (2017) Hip-Hop, Rap. URL = < https://genius.com/J-cole-high-for-hours-lyrics > - “Brackets” (2018) Hip-Hop, Rap. Album: KOD URL = < https://genius.com/J-cole-brackets-lyrics > • Joey Badass (Solo Artist) - “Land Of The Free” (2017) Hip-Hop, Rap. Album: “All Amerikkkan Badass” URL = < https://genius.com/Joey-bada-land-of-the-free-lyrics > • Kendrick Lamar (Solo Artist)

- “Hood Politics” (2015) Hip-Hop, Rap. Album: “To Pimp A Butterfly” URL = < https://genius.com/Kendrick-lamar-hood-politics-lyrics > - “The Blacker The Berry” (2015) Hip-Hop, Rap. Album: “To Pimp A Butterfly” URL < https://genius.com/Kendrick-lamar-the-blacker-the-berry-lyrics > • Leathermouth (Band) - “I Am Going To Kill The President Of The United States Of America” (2009) post- hardcore Album: XO URL= < https://genius.com/Leathermouth-i-am-going-to-kill-the-president-of-the- united-states-of-america-lyrics > • Nina Simone (Solo Artist) - “Mississippi Goddam” (1964) Jazz. Album: Nina Simone In Concert URL = < https://genius.com/Nina-simone-mississippi-goddam-lyrics > • Stray From The Path (Band) - “Good Night Alt-Right” (2017) Metal. Album: Only Death Is Real URL = 7.3.2 Spirituals • Chained To The Land / Hoe Emma Hoe URL= • Follow The Drinking Gourd URL = • I Am Bound For The Land Of Canaan URL= • Let My People Go/Go Down Moses URL = • We Shall Overcome URL =