April 17, 2006
People Who Understand Hip-Hop, Volume 2
"Much of this [social science] literature not only conflates behavior with culture, but when social scientists explore 'expressive' cultural forms or what has been called 'popular culture' (such as language, music and style), most reduce it to expressions of pathology, compensatory behavior, or creative "coping mechanisms" to deal with racism and poverty. While some aspects of black expressive cultures certainly help inner city residents deal with and even resist ghetto conditions, most of the literature ignores what the cultural forms mean for the practitioners. Few scholars acknowledge that what might also be at stake here are aesthetics, style and pleasure."
- Robin D.G. Kelley
Posted by jsmooth995 at April 17, 2006 12:36 AM
robin's on-point with that. half of hip hop doesn't really explain anything, and doesn't really try to, but a lot of the time it doesn't really matter as long as the shit Bumps...
Posted by: sanju at April 17, 2006 1:31 AM
Amen.
labels and divisions are such b.s.
"Social Science" can go &*%^ itself.
And I hope Google caches that.
Posted by: CitiZEN EMily at April 17, 2006 3:54 AM
Dude, I quoted this exact paragraph in the intro to my book! He is so right...
Posted by: Joe Twist at April 17, 2006 11:30 AM
robin kelley is the man. anyone who cites das efx in his dissertation gets infinite kudos from me =)
Posted by: konijn at April 17, 2006 6:11 PM
I did my thesis on hip hop and used some of his articles at the time. Robin D.G. Kelley is the man.
I wonder if people are aware that he's a communist and that that is a big part of the reason why his perspectives are so on point.
He really understands what it means to be black and a communist/marxist.
Posted by: K at April 20, 2006 11:56 AM
You can't be 38417 serious?!?
Posted by: Mary Box at June 17, 2006 10:12 AM
