Gangsta Rap and the Politics Of
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WOMEN RAPPERS AND THE NEOLIBERAL POLITICS OF INDIFFERENCE: REEVALUATING THE RACIAL AND SEXUAL POLITICS OF LOS ANGELES GANGSTA RAP IN THE EARLY 1990s by SAMUEL V. GOLTER A THESIS Presented to the School of Music and Dance and the Graduate School of the University of Oregon in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts September 2017 THESIS APPROVAL PAGE Student: Samuel V. Golter Title: Women Rappers and Neoliberal Indifference: Reevaluating the Racial and Sexual Politics of Los Angeles Gangsta Rap in the Early 1990s This thesis has been accepted and approved in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Master of Arts degree in the School of Music and Dance by: Loren Kajikawa Chairperson Eduardo Wolf Member Stephen Rodgers Member and Sara D. Hodges Interim Vice Provost and Dean of the Graduate School Original approval signatures are on file with the University of Oregon Graduate School. Degree awarded September 2017 ii © 2017 Samuel V. Golter iii THESIS ABSTRACT Samuel V. Golter Master of Arts School of Music and Dance September 2017 Title: Women Rappers and Neoliberal Indifference: Reevaluating the Racial and Sexual Politics of Gangsta Rap in the Early 1988-1994 This thesis asks why women gangsta rappers have been excluded from virtually all academic and popular discourses about the genre. While ‘positive’ and ‘empowering’ New York-based female rappers in the late 80s and 90s are often referenced by those concerned with gangsta rap’s misogynistic tendencies, women rappers in Los Angeles who performed alongside male gangsta rappers, were represented on labels managed by gangsta rappers, and were otherwise self- consciously engaging in the gangsta rap style are almost never acknowledged by either the genre’s defenders or detractors. By interrogating this discursive absence, I reevaluate the neoliberal sexual and racial politics of gangsta rap’s censorship discourse and interrogate the rhetorical and representational strategies deployed by female gangsta rappers such as Lady of Rage, Bo$$, NiNi X, Menajahtwa, H.W.A., and Yo-Yo to both contest misogyny and express coalitional affinity with their male counterparts from within the genre itself. iv CURRICULUM VITAE NAME OF AUTHOR: Samuel V. Golter GRADUATE AND UNDERGRADUATE SCHOOLS ATTENDED: University of Oregon, Eugene Lawrence University, Appleton, Wisconsin DEGREES AWARDED: Master of Arts, Musicology, 2017, University of Oregon Master of Music, Performance, 2017, University of Oregon Bachelor of Arts, Gender Studies, 2013, Lawrence University Bachelor of Music, Performance, 2013, Lawrence University AREAS OF SPECIAL INTEREST: Popular Music and Hip Hop Critical Race Theory Gender and Sexuality Music and Politics PROFESSIONAL EXPERIENCE: Teaching Assistant, Department of Ethnic Studies, Eugene, Oregon, 2015- 2017 Teaching Assistant, School of Music and Dance, Eugene, Oregon, 2013- 2015 GRANTS, AWARDS, AND HONORS: Phi Beta Kappa, 2013 Magna cum Laude, Lawrence University, 2013 v ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I wish to express sincere appreciation to Professor Loren Kajikawa for his assistance in the preparation of this manuscript. In addition, special thanks are due to my committee members, Professors Steve Rogers and Eduardo Wolf, for providing invaluable insight I worked to transform my draft into a final manuscript. I also would like to thank my graduate cohort, Ashley Merriner and Kevin Whitman, for allowing me to workshop my ideas and for inspiring me with their own projects. vi TABLE OF CONTENTS Chapter Page I. INTRODUCTION………………………………………………….………… 1 Structural Overview……………………………………………………. 12 II. THE SEXUAL POLITICS OF GANGSTA RAP DISCOURSE ………..... 19 Defining and Disciplining Gangsta Rap…............................................. 33 Gangsta Rap and the Problem of Influence: The Case of Bo$$............. 52 “Violence is an Epidemic in the Country”: The Congressional Hearings on Gangsta Rap............……………………………………… 73 Heteropatriarchy and the Black Family: The Neoliberal Sexual Politics of Gangsta Rap Discourse………………...………..…………. 88 Too Misogynistic, Not Heteropatriarchal: The Sexual Politics of Gangsta Rap…………………………………………………………… 99 III. WOMEN RAPPERS AND THE SEXUAL POLITICS OF GANGSTA RAP ....………………………………………..…………………....…..… 103 Spit Her Name: The Purpose of Gangsta Rap Feminism………….… 103 Building a Gangsta Rap Feminist Framework: Bo$$, Menajahtwa, and NiNi X…………………………...……………....... 134 Setting the Stage: The 2 Live Crew Obscenity Hearings ………...…. 139 The Politics of “Livin’ In a Hoe House”: The Case of H.W.A…........ 162 IV. CONCLUSION…………………………………………………………... 174 vii Chapter Page Gangsta Rap’s ‘Erotics’……………………………………………… 180 From Battle of the Sexes to Bonnie and Clyde: Yo-Yo’s Collaborations with Ice Cube…………………………………...……. 184 Won’t Stop (Beyoncé ft. Kendrick Lamar): The BET Awards and the Future of the Gangsta Style………………………….............. 197 REFERENCES CITED………………………………………………………. 209 viii LIST OF FIGURES Figure Page 1. Two panels from the comic accompanying Snoop Doggy Dogg’s debut album Doggy Style………………………………………...………… 4 2.1. Front cover of Time Magazine on August 3rd, 1993…………………….. 55 2.2. Album cover of Born Gangstaz by Bo$$.................................................... 66 3. Album cover of H.W.A.’s Livin’ In a Hoe House...................................... 164 4.1. Throwing a raider out of the desert rover from the music video for “California Love”……………….................………………….. 183 4.2. A party on the streets of L.A. consisting of men and women wearing the colors of both the Bloods and the Crips from the music video for “Piru Love”……………….......................................................…………. 184 4.3. First four paragraphs of the call-to-action posted on the front page of beyonce.com on July 7, 2016………………..………….........………….. 203 4.4. Beyoncé and Kendrick Lamar on stage during the final chorus of “Freedom” at the 2016 BET Awards…….....…............................……… 206 ix CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION This thesis contributes to the current scholarship on Los Angeles gangsta rap of the late 1980s and early 1990s by asking why women gangsta rappers have been excluded from virtually all academic and popular discourses about the genre. While ‘positive’ and ‘empowering’ women rappers of the late 80s and 90s such as Queen Latifah, MC Lyte, and others are often referenced by those concerned with gangsta rap’s misogynistic tendencies, women rappers in Los Angeles who performed alongside male gangsta rappers, were represented on labels managed by gangsta rappers, and were otherwise self-consciously engaging in the gangsta rap style are almost never acknowledged by either the genre’s defenders or detractors. Considering that so much of the discourse on the genre is centered on identifying and politicizing its problematic sexual politics, it seems strange that the contributions of women gangsta rappers have been ignored. In fact, the silence about women gangsta rappers contrasts sharply with the relative loudness of their voices in prominent and controversial gangsta rap albums by men and on virtually every early independent gangsta rap label, suggesting that the assumption that gangsta rap is a fundamentally male field is based on a critical misreading of the genre. For example, Snoop Doggy Dogg’s 1993 album Doggy Style, was criticized by the president of the National Political Congress of Black Women, C. Delores Tucker, during both of the two congressional hearings about gangsta rap 1994. To the Senate Subcommittee on 1 Juvenile Justice, Tucker testified that the graphic art of a comic sold with the album was pornographic to the extent that “if the filth that is depicted in these cartoons is not obscene, then I submit that nothing is obscene.”1 To the House Subcommittee on Commerce, Consumer Protection, and Competitiveness, Tucker took her argument further, referring to Snoop’s music to argue that it represents an existential threat to black community and identity: Even if it comes out of our own mouths, the gangsta rap and misogynist lyrics that glorify violence and denigrate women is nothing more than pornographic smut. And with the release of Snoop Doggy Dogg’s debut album, “Doggystyle”, that includes the graphic artwork that is in the room here today that is sold with it. Because this pornographic smut is in the hands of our children, it coerces, influences, encourages and motivated our youth to commit violent behavior, to use drugs and abuse women through demeaning sex acts. The reality of the 1990s is that the greatest fear in the African American community does not come from earthquake, floods or fires, but from violence, the kind of violence that has already transformed our communities and schools into war zones where children are dodging bullets instead of balls, and planning their own funerals.2 Yet, for all the carnivalesque sexual depravity celebrated in Snoop Doggy Dogg’s music, the first rapper heard on his album is actually not Snoop Dogg but Lady of Rage, who opens “G-Funk Intro” with a deft verse identifying herself as Snoop’s collaborator while describing herself “sippin’ on Tanqueray with my mind on my money and my mouth fulla gan-jay.” Rage’s verse is structurally significant and outlines the major themes explored by Snoop Dogg in the rest of his album. These 1 Subcommittee on Juvenile Justice, Committee on the Judiciary of the United States Senate, Shaping Our Responses to Violent and Demeaning Imagery in Popular Music, 103rd cong., 2nd sess., February 23rd, 1994, 12. 2 Subcommittee on Commerce, Consumer Protection,