CALIFORNIA STATE UNIVERSITY, NORTHRIDGE
Sonic Jihadists:
Analyzing the Rhetorical Forms and Functions of the Hip Hop Underground
A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements
For the degree of Master of Arts in Communication Studies
By
Erik Holland
December, 2015
The thesis of Erik M. Holland is approved:
____________________________________
________________
Dr. Peter Marston
Date
____________________________________
________________
Dr. Bernardo Attias
Date
____________________________________
________________
Dr. John Kephart, Chair
Date
California State University, Northridge
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Acknowledgments
This work would not exist without the incredible support from friends and loved ones, the
assistance of CSUN faculty and administrative staff, and the indefatigable patience of Dr.
John Kephart III
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Table of Contents
Signature Page
ii
Acknowledgements
iii
Abstract
vi
Chapter 1: Introduction
1
Justification of Artifacts
5
Statement of the Problem
13
Chapter 2: Method and Literature
16
Method
16
Literature Review
22
Chapter 3: Publics and Counterpublics
39
Publics and Counterpublics of Hip Hop
Chapter 4: Analysis
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55
Group 1 – Role of the Author
58
Group 2 – Overt Criticisms
75
Group 3 – Elements of Counterpublics
93
Chapter 5: Conclusions/Implications
104
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Conclusions
104
Implications
107
References
113
Discography
123
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Abstract
Sonic Jihadists:
Analyzing the Rhetorical Forms and Functions of the Hip Hop Underground
By
Erik M. Holland
Master of Arts in Communication Studies
This thesis engages in a critical discourse analysis of three hip hop albums from the early
2000s to interrogate the rhetorical forms and functions of underground hip hop art and
artists. Examining the work of Immortal Technique, Mr. Lif, and Paris, this work argues
that the three constitute a representative sample of a counterpublic discursive space
within hip hop (as both a musical medium and cultural terrain). Combining theories on
publics and counterpublics with the work of contemporary rhetorical scholars, this thesis
argues that the rhetorical products of this counterpublic space function to circulate
critiques of social and political forces both inside and outside the scope of hip hop.
Further, they reveal that applying too generic interpretations of hip hop voices dilutes the
potential for embracing hip hop within academia as a site for productive political and
social praxis.
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Chapter 1: The Hook – Introductory Remarks
On September 11, 2001, hijacked aircraft crashed into the towers of the World Trade
Center buildings and the Pentagon, forever changing the course of both domestic and
global events. There seems little question that every American can vividly remember
what they were doing (and what they did) on that fateful day. An event of such
magnitude, like so many others before it (the attack on Pearl Harbor, the assassinations of
JFK or Dr. King, etc.), created what Bitzer (1968) referred to as a “rhetorical situation.”
There was an immediate context that necessitated the production of rhetorical discourse
(Bitzer, 1968, 1). Most remember the remarks of President George W. Bush in the
aftermath of these attacks as well as the steady stream of rhetorical moments that
followed. The events surrounding 9/11, including (but not limited to) the declaration of a
War on Terror also made possible a new and lively discussion/debate within and across
public spaces on the nature of these events and the American response.
I (and others) argue that we witnessed the production of one dominant, public
narrative that attempted to position the United States government as the unwitting victims
of a completely unprovoked attack. In speeches by government officials, public
government documents, and a steady stream of television and radio broadcasts from
major network channels and their affiliates, this carefully crafted narrative circulated in
public spaces with the intent of participating in a national mourning, reinvigorating a
sense of American patriotism, and drumming up support for a series of retaliatory
measure including (but not limited to) the PATRIOT Act, the War on Terror, and the
1
Invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan. A series of public spaces latched on to the basic form
of the narrative being disseminated through government channels and circulated them
more broadly (across television, radio, the internet). As with most dominant narratives,
this rhetorical situation saw a plethora of responses from a variety of outlets. There were
a series of active protests over, for example, the supposed crackdown on civil liberties, or
questioning the justifications for sending troops and military resources overseas.
It comes as no surprise, then, that popular culture saw its own variety of responses
and/or engagements with this “situation.” In this work I attempt to examine and address
the implications of one such production of rhetorical discourse: the critical, politicized
messages that emerged from the fringes of the hip hop community. As with any art
medium, music has long been a powerful tool for protest, and hip hop in particular has
been a space for critiquing the official narrative on social and political issues of the time.
From its early origins, hip hop was a vibrant venue for political thought and
enunciation of social and political critique. From the classic, 1983 Grandmaster Flash
and the Furious Five song, “The Message,” to the hard-hitting, militant musings of Public
Enemy and N.W.A., early hip hop established the genre as a site for engaging, critical
commentary.1 While that message-driven element of hip hop didn’t go away, it slowly
became supplanted by another form of hip hop: one more driven by the demands of
mainstream media and record company executives. Hip hop academic Tricia Rose
(1994; 2008) identifies the two divergent elements as “underground” and “mainstream,”
1
I identify “The Message” as, perhaps, the modern origin of socially conscious hip hop because previous
iterations are either not fully classifiable as hip hop or they seemed more of an extension of early dance
hall, improvisational, call-and-response style performances. This is not to say that this work represents
underground hip hop, rather it points to the evolution of the type of rap now circulating in underground
spaces.
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providing a useful set of terminology to distinguish works emerging from this larger
public space. What she finds in 21st Century hip hop are a series of forces at play that
privilege the production of mainstream hip hop while pushing iterations from the
underground to the periphery. One might characterize the mainstream as the public face
of hip hop, while the underground operates as a counterpublic. Like many other elements
of popular culture, hip hop responds to rhetorical situations in its own way, and the
voices from underground hip hop represent a unique collection of carefully crafted social
and political critiques. But even within the counterpublic space of the underground,
different artists are driven by differing concerns and, thus, their works coalesce around
particular social and/or political agendas. 9/11 and the War on Terror certainly prompted
a specific set of concerns that animated the work of a particular group of artists but
perhaps more importantly, it presented a rhetorical situation that reinvigorated a
collection of voices from the underground. This thesis examines the works of a few
members of these voices. While the events surrounding the 9/11 attacks were the initial
driving force for this work, what emerged was a different rhetorical situation, one that
was, most likely, present within the hip hop community prior to 9/11/01. There was a
crisis of conscience within hip hop, itself, that became more visible (or, perhaps, audible)
upon the examination of texts supposedly aimed at demystifying the prevailing narratives
on/about 9/11. The economic forces that drive the privileging of certain artists, styles,
and content choices over others actively works to police the boundary between the
mainstream and underground spaces. It is this boundary that serves the major impetus for
the discourses emerging from the underground.
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Mixing approaches from both cultural and rhetorical studies, I investigate whether
we can understand a collection of voices emerging from the hip hop underground as a
select counterpublic discursive space, prompted by certain exclusionary measures put in
place by broader public spaces (including the mainstream hip hop community), and
responding directly to the context of 9/11. I argue that a select group of artists, and their
accompanying works (Mr. Lif’s Emergency Rations, Immortal Technique’s
Revolutionary Vol. 2, and Paris’ Sonic Jihad), represents a demonstrative sample pointing
to the continued existence of such a counterpublic space. Further, I contend that
analyzing and articulating how this space functions helps to broaden scholarship on hip
hop, theories of publics and counterpublics, and the rhetorics of politics and race. That
there are a series of power dynamics that regulate these spaces and that offer up
monolithic and/or normalized notions of how hip hop, and that a rhetorical analysis
provides a better understanding of how these spaces and relationships function. This
occurs, in part, by examining the ways in which counterpublic theory can challenge static
notions of identity formation within hip hop spaces. Because publics and counterpublics
activate discussions of power relations (between government and public, across different
publics, and the interplay of public and counterpublic) I choose to examine a series of
texts with particular attention to the ways in which language use exposes or implicates
these dynamics. Thus, methodologically, I employ critical discourse analysis, read in
conjunction with particular elements of rhetorical theory that help configure these three
albums, all produced in the context of 9/11 and the War on Terror.
Theories of publics and counterpublics represent a complex but intriguing
territory for research. While my work progresses in a series of steps aimed at answering
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a set of research questions, I may not explicitly respond to each question fully and finally
(though I certainly advance and defend a series of claims), in part because they represent
a series of issues that scholars continue to work through. However, my research is still
animated by thinking through these series of issues with the goal of making inroads
whenever possible. The process is one of bridging connections across previously
disconnected spaces, pointing toward new ways of thinking through identity formations,
resistance practices, and alternative uses of media. As such, I undertake an analytical
process geared toward thinking through the following: What rhetorical moves emerge
from an analysis of these texts (Lif’s Emergency Rations, Technique’s Revolutionary Vol.
1, and Paris’ Sonic Jihad)? What are the specific political and/or social critiques at play?
What is the value of articulating a unique counterpublic space as represented by these
three works? How does this articulation implicate the larger public space of hip hop writ
large? How can the theorization of the forms and functions of hip hop counterpublics
expand or improve research on race, politics, rhetoric, and popular culture?
What follows is a justification of the texts, statement of the problem, notes on
method, an examination of the literature that foregrounds my discussion, an in-depth
analysis of the themes emerging from these texts, and a discussion regarding the
conclusions and implications of said analysis.
Justification of artifacts
Engaging in a selection of appropriate texts representative of hip hop’s engagement with
the events surrounding 9/11 is no simple task. As with any major global event, the
commentary and criticism from within the hip hop community was widespread. Artists
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continue to make music engaging the pertinent issues and interrogating the relationship
between the United States government and Al-Qaeda, and the various policies and
social/cultural manifestations of security discourse. While the work ranges across genres,
the majority of music directly confronting these issues beyond a single lyric or individual
song remains at the margins of the music industry. Entire albums focused on these
contentious issues are extremely rare, and even individual songs don’t seem to advance
into radio play or onto the Billboard charts.
While hip hop artists, fans, journalists, and academics have all engaged in
discussions of “underground” versus “mainstream” or “commercial” works, it seems
uniquely pertinent to this discussion to clarify this distinction. Tricia Rose (2008) helps
to clarify the distinction between the two. She writes:
The distinctions made between the two tend to revolve loosely around whether
or not a given artist has politically progressive content…Those considered
“underground” are generally progressive minded artists, some of whom have not
been signed to a major record label and tend to operate in local DIY (do it
yourself) networks, online, or through local, marginally commercial distribution
networks. (p. 241-242)
If we may understand commercial hip hop as the public discursive space of the genre, my
research attempts to situate underground artists as representative of a counterpublic.
Rose (2008) discusses how artists working at the margins of contemporary hip hop (both
members of the underground and those select few who have managed to infiltrate the
mainstream) represent the most “vitally important” works deserving of attention (p. x).
She goes as far as to criticize the “public conversation” on hip hop (p. x) for being
“trapped in endless repetitions of silly, exaggerated claims by critics and supporters alike
– repetitions that enervated the conversation and dulled critical development” (p. xi). But
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it’s not simply the public conversation occurring between journalists, artists, and
academics that shape the public sphere of hip hop. Rather, it is the influence of major
media outlets and record companies who decide the commercial viability of works and,
thus, determine exactly who can participate in this public. Rose (2008) continues:
My pejorative use of the term “commercial” is meant to draw sharp attention to
the power of Viacom, Universal, Sony, and other massive media conglomerates
in elevating one thin slice of what constitutes hip hop over all other genres,
because doing so panders to and helps reinforce America’s veiled but powerful
interest in voyeuristic consumption of black stereotypes. (p. 242)
As a longtime hip hop head, my gut reaction was to include the works of both
Boston area MC Mr. Lif (born Jeffrey Haynes) as well as Peruvian-born rapper Immortal
Technique. Both of these artists engage in highly politicized work - what Ernest Allen Jr.
(1996) might describe as “message rap”. Their larger bodies of work engage a variety of
political and social issues on both the domestic and international levels ranging from
commentary on race relations, the drug trade, and poverty to discussion of international
relations and the exportation of social injustice and exploitation abroad. Bay Area rapper
Paris holds a special place in my collection because he lives and works a mere 20 miles
from my hometown. Certainly my personal connection to the works of these three artists
influenced the decision to select an album from each as artifacts for evaluation.
However, each work is also uniquely representative of the voices emanating from the
counterpublic space of “underground” hip hop. Put generally, I choose these three
albums because each (1) have multiple songs that engage in oppositional/critical rhetoric
about 9/11 and/or the War on Terror, (2) the artists position themselves as operating
outside of the mainstream of hip hop, and (3) they all offer a particular call for those
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consuming their work – a call to question previously-held assumptions and empower
themselves with new information/perspectives. A brief discussion of the individual
albums selected from each artist should help shed light on the value of each as artifacts
deserving of greater examination and analysis.
Mr. Lif’s second EP, Emergency Rations, was released June 25, 2002 on the
Definitive Jux label. A concept album, its 8 tracks trace the potential disappearance of
Lif due to his outspoken criticism of American politics, particularly the military industrial
complex. This album is certainly the least talked about of the three albums I’ve chosen,
but is perhaps my personal favorite. While there exists some discussion in the popular
news media about either the content or release of both Paris and Techniques’ works,
discussion of Lif remains relegated to more academic texts (Rodriguez, 2006). Lif has a
way with wordplay and tempo that is truly poetic while also demonstrating his aptitude at
scathing political criticism. His use of metaphor and the dexterity with which he
approaches the turn of a phrase is truly remarkable. As with all three albums, not every
song as a direct engagement with the key issues surrounding 9/11 and the War on Terror,
but the album weaves a cohesive narrative about the roles of the government, the media,
and the average citizen and/or countercultural “miscreant” in and around the time shortly
after the events in question. The goal, and this will certainly be discussed in much
greater detail in the analysis section, seems to be shedding light on hidden truths,
uncovering the potentially insidious relationship between the military, politicians, and the
public discursive arena while also urging the listener to refuse complicity with this
disastrous state of affairs. As Lif’s colleague and musical collaborator El-P puts it in the
introductory remarks prior to the last track of the album, “Just trust us, something is
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going down. It’s personal, it’s political” (Mr. Lif, 2002). I will advance the position that
this work is cultural, rhetorical, and also representative of a voice from a particular
counterpublic space.
Immortal Technique released his second major studio album, Revolutionary Vol.
2, in November of 2003. Born in Peru, but raised in New York, Technique is known for
his aggressive lyrical wordplay and his striking political commentary, and Revolutionary
Vol. 2 demonstrates his growth as an artist and sharp political critic (Springer Jr., 2008).
Technique’s works are also often the subject of many an academic discussion (Aidi,
2002: 2003; Bloodworth-Lugo & Lugo-Lugo, 2008; Rose, 2008; Williams, 2008; 2009)
of politically-oriented hip hop. These discussions range from evaluations of Technque’s
presence in a community of “undergound hip hop” artists (Rose, 2008) to commentary on
race relations (Aidi, 2002: 2003) and, finally, more specifically focused on his discussion
of U.S. government policy, particularly in relation to the specter of terrorism
(Bloodworth-Lugo & Lugo-Lugo, 2008; Williams, 2008; 2009). What makes Immortal
Technique unique from the other chosen artists is his heightened level of public
popularity (as measured by a strong following among more discerning hip hop fans),
though, given the subject matter and language choices in most of his work, it remains to
be seen whether this places him in any greater position for commercial success.
Paris came back into the studio after a several year hiatus to release his fifth
album, Sonic Jihad, on October 7, 2003. Known for his outspoken criticism of the
American political system and, in particular, the presidencies of both George H.W. Bush
and his son George W. Bush, Paris epitomizes the rough, gritty, even militant politicallyoriented rapper (Guynn, 2006). As a native of the San Francisco Bay Area, Paris
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provides this analysis with a geographic departure from the East Coast roots of the other
two artists, thus affording a comparison of varying styles rooted in the differing evolution
of the genre across coasts - a topic not necessarily central to this work, but noteworthy
nonetheless (briefly engaged in the analysis section as an element of counterpublic space)
and discussed in greater detail in a variety of larger works examining the genre more
broadly (Chang, 2003; George, 1998; Rose, 1994; 2008). Sonic Jihad is a tour-de-force,
an aggressive criticism of our government’s relationship to (and, indeed, complicity in)
the events surrounding 9/11. Though this work shares the similar lyrical subject matter
of the other two artists, the album artwork itself caused quite a media stir for its depiction
of a plane headed for the White House (Chonin, 2003; Strauss, 2003). This affords an
examination of both the rhetorical nature of the music as well as the accompanying
iconography selected by the artist. After examination, the imagery on this album in
particular serves to solidify the positioning of Paris within this counterpublic space.
What do all three of these albums have in common? They were all released
within 16 months of each other and within relative temporal proximity to the War on
Terror. Though I initially chose these artifacts without knowing that others viewed them
as particularly representative of hip-hop’s response to the War on Terror, it was
reassuring to discover two articles by Paul Williams (2008; 2009) discussing “hip-hop’s
oppositional voices in the War on Terror” (Williams, 2009, p. 222). Williams (2009)
engages in a very brief analysis of hip-hop works addressing the issues of homeland
security, Katrina, and the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan by looking at the works of Lif,
Technique, and Paris (among a couple of others, thus suggesting that these three are not
the sole members of this counterpublic space). In a broader context, all three artists have
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been situated within the world of “underground hip hop.” His earlier piece (Williams,
2008) evaluates Mr. Lif and Immortal Technique as representing the Puritan figure of the
Jeremiad (often embodying the characteristics of a member of a counterpublic discursive
space) in their condemnation of the Bush administration as well as the willingness of the
American populace to allow atrocities to be committed in our names.
Rose (2008) compiles a list of “progressive artists” towards the end of her most
recent book (p. 247) that includes Immortal Technique, Mr. Lif, and Paris (among many
others including Mos Def, Dead Prez, and Jean Grae, sometimes-collaborators with my
chosen three artists). Situating these three within the underground both lends to
examination of this brand of hip hop as counterpuiblic as well as aids in the
understanding of the potential rhetorical potency of such works. I contend that these
three works serve to construct a multi-faceted counterpublic space. I chose them as a
representative sample of the underground because, while they vary stylistically and
geographically, they all converge around similar content. Their subject-matter positions
them firmly within this counterpublic space. One that operates distinct from the voices
emanating from more mainstream hip hop circles and which, in the instance of the three
albums analyzed, situates its oppositional discourse in response to the government
portrayal of 9/11 and the War on Terror. This focus makes this particular group distinct
from, but complementary to, other voices from the underground in its use of 9/11 as a
vehicle for larger discussions of social justice, capitalist greed, and media manipulation.
It should be noted that my use of “underground” to denote a particular sphere of
artists and musical products is not purely defined by a use of oppositional discourse in
any context or a lack of commercial viability. Obviously a number of artists mention
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political and/or social issues. Similarly, one finds aspiring rappers hawking their albums
on street corners across the world that don’t necessarily qualify as members of this
“underground.” Rather, it is both an attention to message-rap (a body of work oriented
toward active and sustained political and/or social criticism), a level of detail/specificity
associated with their messages, and a relative lack of commercial success. The term
“relative” is important here. Any rap aficionado will be quick to point out that artists
such as Immortal Technique aren’t exactly virtual unknowns in the hip hop world.
Rather, it is a combination of significantly less radio play, reduced record sales, and
general publicity in mainstream media outlets. It is, perhaps, also easier to think of this
discursive space as one in opposition to a distinct subsection of the mainstream. While
there are internationally acclaimed artists such as Eminem, Nas, Kanye West, or Jay-Z
that certainly get their fair share of radio play, record sales, and publicity, they have
enough message-oriented content such that their work is not the true target of, say,
Technique’s criticisms of the mainstream. Rather, it is a large percentage of the works
circulated through mainstream channels that one might dub “party music.” This is hip
hop unconcerned with the political. It is what seems to dominate major radio stations,
featuring the glorification of lavish lifestyles (partying, consuming, spending money) in
the same way that the gangsta rap of the 1990s glorified violence, drug use, and the
denigration of women.
I wanted to create some sort of metric to help identify these three albums as
definitively underground, and I thought that album sales might be a simple way to situate
them so reaching a particular level of distribution beyond, say, the aspiring artist selling
his demo on the corner (although, many big name rappers - Too $hort, for example -
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started from such humble beginnings). This proved a more difficult task than anticipated,
because sales numbers beyond the top selling albums aren’t readily available. I was
unable to acquire information regarding the album sales of Sonic Jihad or Emergency
Rations. The Viper Records website credits Technique for selling 29,000 copies of
Revolutionary Vol. 2, though it does not appear to be updated in the last 10 years. Other
reports have him claiming, in interview, that he had sold upwards of 85000 copies. Even
in an age of declining album sales (due to both illegal downloading of music and the
increasing number of streaming music sites) these numbers pale in comparison to those
that I characterize as mainstream hip hop figures.
Consider, by comparison, that Eminem’s album “The Eminem Show” – which
also debuted in 2002 – sold over 7 million copies just that year, and has reached global
sales of over 30 million copies to date. 50 Cent’s 2003 release “Get Rich or Die Tryin’”
sold nearly 900,000 copies in the first week and over 6 million in the first year of its
release. 50’s album, featuring such tracks as “In da club” and “P.I.M.P.” serves as a
quintessential example of the mainstream hip hop that stands in contrast to the works of
Technique, Lif, and Paris.
Because I articulate their particular brand of rhetoric as a response to a specific
historical moment (Bitzer, 1968), their grouping is afforded by the time period in which
they disseminated these selected works.2 While the above discussion of each album reads
somewhat like highly positive album reviews, my goal was to demonstrate that these
works are connected not just by content, but they also represent genuine feats of artistry.
2
Bitzer’s rhetorical situation seems the fitting descriptor here. There is a particular exigence that makes
possible a moment for the production of responsive, rhetorical symbol use.
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There is, admittedly, a bit of cherry-picking taking place in the selection of these three
albums, but it is with the goal of identifying some of the more rhetorically potent voices
(of the time) emerging from this underground counterpublic to illustrate the peak
potential of this space. My claim is that these works are a representative sample of a
larger group of artists and texts that construct a rhetorically significant discursive space.
Statement of the Problem
While there are, of course, broad issues of race and class relations that continue to serve
as the dominant problems undergirding the production of hip hop as well as the pursuit of
communication studies (and acts of communication more generally), I do not claim that
this thesis is a direct response to those broad issues. Rather, I claim that there exists a
current lack within academic spaces to better engage the world of hip hop as a productive
source for the theorization of social change. There is an underutilized discursive space in
the hip hop community that might serve as a strong resource for communication scholars
to better theorize (and, thus, develop praxis) on both the voices and movement of
marginalized groups. My contention is that examining the form and functionality of
counterpublic hip hop spaces can create a bridge to untap this potential. Part of the
problem lies in the current treatment of hip hop spaces, both within the academy writ
large and in the formulation of counterpublic theories, as monolithic in nature – or at least
lacking the complexity and nuance that seems evident upon more diligent examination. It
is this level of multiplicity that serves as one of the most productive elements of the
genre/culture. Continuing to ignore this (for lack of a better term) resource for social
change is to participate in the marginalization by omission of these voices. Both studies
of publics and counterpublics as well as examinations of hip hop need to better account
14
for the nuances afforded by more precise combinations of the two to create new avenues
for research as well as platforms for critical discourse and social change. This thesis
represents such a combination.
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Chapter 2: The First Verse - Notes on Method and Reviewing the Literature
Method
The work of a rhetorical and/or cultural critic is an ever-evolving process. My own
methodological approach attempts to embrace the evolution of rhetorical criticism to
incorporate both approaches from language studies as well as cultural studies.
Ultimately, the goal is to combine elements of rhetorical and linguistic methodologies to
analyze the ways in which this particular counterpublic space operates, is contested,
determined, challenges public spaces (of mainstream hip hop, popular American media
etc.) and serves various rhetorical and ideological functions. Given the shared element of
discourse, a rhetorical and linguistic approach seems the most appropriate method for
engaging the concept of counterpublics. The discursive elements of social groups that
construct counterpublics also lends an approach that recognizes the ways in which
language within particular spaces shapes cultural and counter-cultural movements.
Understanding hip hop as a cultural product is a vital element in any evaluation of the
genre as operating within both public and counterpublic spaces. This cultural perspective
cannot help but influence the process of rhetorical criticism. Lindlof and Taylor (2011)
explain:
The rise of cultural (and particularly media audience) studies has affected this
venerable “cousin” of the communication discipline, which traces its roots to
ancient Greek philosophy and which has traditionally conducted humanistic
theorizing and critique of strategic discourse developed for the purpose of
persuading public audience. Within the past two decades, the theoretical
commitments of rhetorical and cultural studies have increasingly converged
around the critique of media, institutions, and discourses that constitute and
govern public culture. (p. 27)
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My work also finds itself situated in this particular point of convergence. The process of
ideological rhetorical criticism will be used to help reveal the nature (the particular
embedded ideological perspectives) of the individual songs, the albums as a whole, and
the collective works of all three artists. In her text on rhetorical criticism as
practice/method, Sonja Foss (2004) explains that:
The primary goal of the ideological critic is to discover and make visible the
dominant ideology or ideologies embedded in an artifact and the ideologies that
are being muted in it...The ultimate aim of an ideological critic is the
emancipation of human potential that is being thwarted by an existing ideology or
ideologies or a celebration of artifacts that facilitate this emancipation. (p.243)
I am looking for the ways in which these works (as a representative sample of a
counterpublic) generate - as well as criticize - particular ideological perspectives on the
state of hip hop as a medium, the media coverage of political events (as well as the
relationship between the media and the State), the actions and discursive framing of these
actions by politicians and, finally, the events themselves (9/11, the War on Terror, and
the preceding and ensuing events). Evaluating the rhetorical dimension of these texts, as
well as the way(s) that the specific language choices operationalize certain ideologies
helps, in part, to formulate an understanding of how one may understand them as
operating within counterpublic discursive spaces.
This ideological rhetorical approach will involve my own analysis of the chosen
texts as well as drawing connections (or theoretical grounding) between the works of
Technique, Lif, and Paris and the works of rhetorical scholar Kenneth Burke (1945;
1969; 1973; 1984a; 1984b). My goal will be to demonstrate how these artists utilize
rhetorical strategies/techniques such as synecdoche, framing, identification, and piety to
17
craft a body of oppositional discourse that invites a questioning of the framing of the
events in question presented by the popular media and the government. Burke allows us
to situate the chosen texts as particularly rhetorical in nature by demonstrating the varied
reliance on pivotal terms employed by the selected artists.3 My main purpose is less to
prove that these groups are demonstrative of a counterpublic space (as this work has
larger already taken place), and more to examine the discourse circulating within said
space. In addition to examining/analyzing rhetorical tactics and strategies, it is important
to position the ways in which these works function as counterpublic by examining the
specific language choices of these texts as productive of, or revealing, certain power
relationships.
A relatively new (in the larger context of rhetorical studies) but increasingly
common method for interrogating the way(s) in which language produces or reveals
power structures is Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA). CDA as method is generally
attributed to the work of Norman Fairclough (1992; 1995) though, as with most methods,
it finds its origin in early works in the fields of socio-linguistics, philosophy, and
communication studies. In addition to Fairclough, many others (Blommaert & Bulcaen,
2000; Rogers, 2011; van Dijk, 1993; 1997; Wodack, 1996) have expanded on and
articulated differing ways to adopt and/or apply this method to research endeavors. This
ranges from examination of specific language choices and their ideological implications
within educational settings (Rogers, 2011) to research endeavors engaging potential
3
Of course, for Burke, language (or symbol use) is inherently rhetorical. My goal, here, is to assess the
particular rhetorical forms and functions within my selected works. Analyzing particular forms and
functions, for Burke, helps to reveal, for example, processes of identification and/or motive.
18
power structures implicated within song lyrics (Bell & Avant-Mier, 2009) similar to the
undertaking herein.
For Wodak and Meyer (2009), CDA is characterized as engaging a common
ground of discourse, critique, power, and ideology. In this sense, the work certainly
engages (or overlaps) elements of ideological criticism while paying special attention to
forms of ideology that constitute (and are constituted by) power relations. In this way,
CDA may be the blanket term used to describe my method, but I employ a particular
variation, engaging specific theorists and practices from within the domain of rhetorical
studies. While elements of rhetorical criticism are present throughout, CDA seems fitting
here because of its approach to discourse. As Fairclough and Wodak explain:
CDA sees discourse – language use in speech and writing – as a form of ‘social
practice’. Describing discourse as a social practice implies a dialectical
relationship between a particular discursive event and the situation(s),
institution(s) and social structure(s), which frame it; The discursive event is
shaped by them, but it also shapes them. That is, discourse is socially
constructive as well as socially conditioned – it constitutes situations, objects of
knowledge, and the social identities and relationships between people and groups
of people. It is constitutive both in the sense that it helps to sustain and reproduce
the social status quo, and in the sense that it contributes to transforming it. Since
discourse is socially consequential, it gives rise to important issues of power.
Discursive practices may have ideological effects – that is, they can help produce
and reproduce unequal power relations between (for instance) social classes,
women and men, and ethnic/cultural majorities and minorities through the ways in
which they represent things and position people. (Fairclough and Wodak, 1997,
258)
Fundamentally, CDA is a process of analyzing the way(s) in which language and
society operate as co-productive forces in the creation and/or shaping of power
relationships, hierarchy, ideologies, and hegemonic practices (Blommaert & Bulcaen,
2000). Fairclough (1992; 1995) frames his discussion of CDA in terms of discourse-as19
text, discourse-as-discursive-practice, and discourse-as-social-practice (Blommaert &
Bulcaen, 2000). This speaks to the nature of language as constitutive of reality (the ways
in which our language choices both construct how we come to understand the world and
situations within as well as how to act upon said situations) but with particular attention
to the ways in which language serves a socially hegemonic function (language as a tool
for creating hierarchy and/or constructing power relationships amongst social actors).
Put simply, CDA involves the examination of text(s) and the discussion of how particular
elements of the chosen text(s) serve a critical function in the articulation of power
relationships and/or particular ideologies. The world of hip hop and, in particular, the
underground, represents a fertile terrain for the discursive interrogation of these exact
type of ideological relationships with a particular attention to the power of language.
CDA engages in intense analysis of text, ranging from written works to images, to news
broadcasts, which utilizes both whole-text analysis (attempts to arrive at general meaning
and the evaluation of structure) as well as individual attention to linguistic elements
(particular word choices, sentence structure) (Bell & Avant-Mier, 2009). Hip hop seems
an excellent forum for the application of CDA because of the ways in which artists play
with language and structure to disrupt dominant ideologies.
One final element of note is the prescriptive nature of this methodology. For
some practitioners of CDA, simply analyzing discourse to reveal the social forces, power
structures, and/or ideologies at play is insufficient. This process must also result in the
application of potential solutions to the problematic ideologies that shape or are shaped
by the discourse in question. Toolan (1997) is credited with the suggestion that “CDA
should make proposals for change and suggest corrections to particular discourses”
20
(Blommaert & Bulcaen, 2000, p. 449). This component of the method affords us the
possibility to move beyond pure theorization of text and into a praxis-oriented approach
to scholarship. As part of my methodological approach, the evaluation of these texts will
be accompanied by suggestions for how understanding hip hop as operating within both
public and counterpublic space can facilitate progressive growth within the genre as well
as motivating its audience to embrace the politically suggestive messages of the artists.
This is not to say that my approach will offer particular suggestions for how the selected
artists might alter their approaches to the craft. Rather, the understanding of the power
structures involved in the language gives credence to this stylistic approach and may
suggest the positive potential for others to adopt similar approaches to engaging political
issues through hip hop. What a critical discourse analysis may help reveal is the way(s)
in which the particular counterpublic discursive space constructed within the hip hop
community in response to the political events surrounding 9/11 operate as a form of
rhetorical ideological criticism which serves to illustrate the potential for these spaces to
invite alternative understandings of the formation of political discourse and the power
relations inherently embedded within those formations. At the same time, the artists
analyzed in this thesis suggest, through their own discursive production, that the
problematic ideologies (that serve as the objects of their critiques) are embedded within
the discursive products of the various public spaces to which they stand in opposition.
Thus, the prescriptive element that I identify is one aimed at changing our relationship to
those spaces.
21
Literature Review
For the purpose of clarity, I group the literature contextualizing this research endeavor in
a series of thematic sections that engage both the subject-matter of the chosen artifacts as
well as the medium of these texts. I conclude by identifying the gap in the current
academic works on hip hop and argue that this thesis represents a partial filling of said
gap. In the ensuing chapter, I examine the literature base of the grounding theoretical
terrain of publics and counterpublics.
9/11 and the War on Terror
Any evaluation of the way(s) in which some aspects/elements of hip-hop as a genre
(community, culture) engages in political rhetoric requires some investigation into the
nature of the rhetorical situation prompting said rhetoric. Though the literature
surrounding the horrific events of 9/11/01 (and the ensuing governmental responses) is an
abundant and ever-expanding body of work, my purpose here will be to focus exclusively
on the texts that establish the official government discourse on these events and those that
situate these events within popular culture (specific pop cultural texts that engage 9/11
and/or the War on Terror). Because the focus of my work is on the responses to this
official discourse within the hip-hop community, the discussion of this public (official)
story about 9/11 and the War on Terror will be less varied than that of the way(s) in
which hip-hop can be understood more abstractly as a medium for political, oppositional
discourse (in part because “official story” that hip hop responds to is not particularly
nuanced). Regardless of this lack of nuance, it is important to identify both the places
where this official language was formulated, presented, and circulated to the public, as
22
well as the reactions within the various media of popular culture. My claim is that the
“official story” is one advanced by government institutions, mainstream media, and the
public discursive space of hip hop (both in a reification of certain themes advanced by the
original narrators and through a noticeable absence of criticism/questioning of said story).
This “official discourse” is certainly not contained within a single speech-act or
document. Rather, it was an ongoing collection of speeches and statements from the
Bush administration as well as a set of various discussions in popular media outlets
(primarily, politically conservative news organizations such as Fox News). It is not the
exclusive story, but it is one that circulated across a variety of public spaces and, thus,
inspired a number of competing, counter-narratives. The official findings of the 9/11
Commission Report (National Commission on Terrorist Attacks, 2004), for example, tells
a tale quite different to that of the Bush Administration, but it lacks the accessibility and
reach of the simpler narratives circulated by, for example, President Bush, Vice President
Cheney, Rush Limbaugh, or Bill O’Reilly. This story, understood generally, portrays a
rise of anti-American sentiment in various areas within the Middle East, inspired by
predominantly Muslim religious fanaticism, resulting in the creation of terrorist
organizations that are violently opposed to core American values. America is positioned
as a champion of freedom and equality because of our embrace of a politically
democratic system of governance. America was the victim of an entirely unanticipated
and unprovoked series of attacks on September 11, 2001. Our diligent intelligence
gathering identified the terrorist organization Al Qaeda as the entity primarily
responsible, as well as sympathetic individuals in both Afghanistan and Iraq. This
prompted a justified military response as retribution for these attacks. There are, of
23
course, subtle variations on this story (ones directly implicating Saddam Hussein as a coconspirator, for example) depending on the reporting media outlet or government official,
but the general story seems to embody these core plot elements. I develop the narrative
in lesser detail here because the three artists I analyze in later sections do significant work
to lay out the names and narratives that represent this “official” story and its plot.
There is no shortage of pop culture references to 9/11 and/or the War on Terror,
and while some academics discuss the treatment of these events across a variety of media
- film, literature, comics (Bragard, Dony, & Rosenberg, 2011), advertising, theater, and
music (Foster, 2005; Heller, 2005) - the focus here will be on the way(s) in which music
engages the critical themes that emerged from the attack and the ensuing governmental
response. Given the variety of responses to the events surrounding 9/11, it should come
as no surprise that music across a variety of genres engage this subject matter and, as
such, academics have had fertile ground to discuss the interaction between the events and
their musical responses.
What is intriguing about the particular space of the hip hop underground is that its
members do careful work to identify the publics to which they stand in opposition.
Specific actors and institutions are called out with they same regularity that they bemoan
the social and political ideologies they oppose. While I do not elaborate on specific
names or events that constitute the “official narrative” on 9/11 or the War on Terror, the
artists themselves are not shy about setting up their opponent’s argument prior to
knocking it down.4 Indeed, all three discuss, in detail, the various sources that contribute
4
I am not, here, accusing Mr. Lif, Immortal Technique, and Paris of constructing any straw men (or
women) here. Rather, as the analysis section will reveal, I argue that their criticisms are organized and
precise such that laying everything out in advance would spoil all of the excitement.
24
to constructing this narrative, the process of collusion taking place between politicians,
media elites, and business executives, and the various plot elements that comprise this
story. While the above paragraph points to a general outline, examination in further
chapters delves into the specific nature of this “official story.” Strangely, this story
seems to circulate most heavily in this underground space.
What is revealed through the work of academics on hip hop, as well as the artists I
identify as shaping this particular counterpublic space, is that much of what prompted a
challenge to this official narrative was a perceived absence of discussion or dissent in
mainstream circles. As a result, I can detail the ways in which the mainstream media
propagated a narrative that reinforced patriotism and opted to circulate a simple “us
versus them” mentality, but the evidence of this story within hip hop is, in some sense,
reflected in absence. Still, works outside of research on hip hop, specifically, do engage
the problematics of this official account.
Many scholarly writings on 9/11 and the War on Terror focus on the way(s) that
the discourse of the war constructed the figure of the “terrorist.” These works generally
focus on the ways in which the September 11th attack and the ensuing response
repositioned the construction of Muslim or Arab identity in conjunction with this figure
of the terrorist. For example, Morey and Yaqin (2011) provide recent insight into the
stereotyping inherent in representations of Islamic peoples in the post-9/11 era. Their
work contextualizes the sweeping generalizations made about Muslim people across a
variety of cultural modes of expression (e.g. news media, film & television, political
discourse, marketing campaigns). William Spanos (2008) further articulates how
particular metaphors of good and evil implicit in the American exceptionalist attitude in
25
the wake of 9/11 further partake in problematic assumptions about the nature of terrorism
and the assumed humane mission of America. The ultimate goal of works such as these
is to expose the inaccuracies of such generalizations.
Of noteworthy observation is the connection established (both in the literature and
popular culture at large) between the framing of Muslims as “other” and the historic (and
ongoing) representations of African Americans and, (often) in particular, consumers and
producers of hip-hop. A variety of works engage the connections historically between
African Americans and Arabs as well as the phenomenon in the post-9/11 era
characterized by the positioning of the Muslim/Arab “other” as the new primary object of
national fear (Aidi, 2002; 2003; Bloodworth-Lugo & Lugo-Lugo, 2008; Clark, 2003;
Hill, 2006). These writings engage the way(s) in which “brown bodies” supplanted (or at
least joined) “black bodies” as the new ideograph of evil. Perhaps for the first time in our
country’s history, individuals perceived as of Middle Eastern descent faced (albeit
momentarily) greater persecution (even at the hands of those previously otherized) and
profiling. Popular culture writ large tackles these types of representations head on.
Morey and Yaqin (2011) offer strategies for breaking free of these damaging
representations of Muslims by embracing the construction of authentic forms of Muslim
femininity that stand in contrast to the more uniform western model for the feminine.
They also evaluate the work of comedians engaged in the deliberate hyperperformativity
of Muslimness as a strategy designed to “challenge simple stereotyping by appropriating
and unsettling its assumptions” (17). They also seem to give credence to strategies
employed by artists such as Immortal Technique. They write in the conclusion to their
book “We move forward by inches when we move forward at all. A greater diversity of
26
voices must be brought to the table, allowed to speak and be seriously listened to, before
any progress can be made to unpick stereotypes and allow Muslims as they are to walk
out of the frame and into the political life of the twenty-first century” (Morey & Yaqin,
2011, 216).
Hip-hop as cultural and/or rhetorical product
Before jumping specifically back into the works on hip hop that help inform my research,
there is value in briefly discussing the variety of approaches to music, generally, that help
situate it broadly as a significant rhetorical wellspring, particularly as it pertains to the
construction and circulation of political ideology. Engaging in rhetorical evaluation of
music is no new endeavor. These range from discussions of folk rock (Beebee, 1991), to
country (Sellnow, 1999) to hip hop (Calhoun, 2005; Walser, 1995). Even work that more
broadly engages music as rhetorical practice and/or argument helps couch the more
specific discussion herein. While some work thinks generally about how changes in the
tempo or musical style may be perceived rhetorically, perhaps in the same way that pace
and timbre alter the rhetorical sway of a speech (Sellnow and Sellnow, 2001), other work
more specifically engages music as a source for persuasive argument, even as a way to
activate space (think public and counterpublic here) for discursive production (Lipsitz,
1994).
Works specifically targeting the musical responses to 9/11 often involve
understanding the use of music as a method for collective mourning and/or healing
(Gengaro, 2009; Grusin, 2010; Newman, 2006). Particular concerts in New York City,
for example, offered a space and vehicle as a cathartic experience for those most closely
27
affected by the attacks on the World Trade Center. Others simply engage in genrespecific discussions of pop culture capitalizing on and/or criticizing the events
surrounding 9/11. We noticed, for example, a series of artists that embraced the patriotic
fervor in the immediate aftermath of 9/11 and produced a series of songs that sustained
the narrative offered by the government and major media outlets.5 This includes mainly
discussion of country music (Foster, 2005; Hart, 2005; Heller, 2005) but in some
instances (again, enumerated in the following section) within hip hop.
With the larger and varied approaches to music in mind, I want to take a moment
to work through some of the broader academic approaches to hip hop to explain how my
own work fits within (or alongside) conversations regarding both the cultural and
rhetorical nature of this specific genre. But first, it bears discussing the origins of hip hop
to understand how the seeds of politically and socially conscious rhymes were sown.
Obviously there are entire volumes (George, 1998; Chang, 2005) devoted to articulating
the history of the genre, but for the purposes of this text I will provide an extremely
abridged version.
Of course the history of hip hop did not originate with the combination of MCs
and DJs and the mixing of records in New York City dancehalls. It was an evolution that
moved from slave music, to the vocal scat accompanying bebop jazz and blues, and
finally to spoken word poets emerging in the 1960s (responding, obviously, to a time
period of particular strong social unrest). The works of such artists as Gil Scott Heron,
The Last Poets, and The Watts Prophets (to name a few) mark both the early origins of
hip hop, generally, and demonstrate more specifically that hip hop actually finds its
5
A narrative that I discuss in greater detail in the ensuing section.
28
origins in political, message-centric lyrical content. This led to the later developments of
message-oriented activity within the genre by artists such as Grandmaster Flash, then
Public Enemy, KRS-1, and Mr. Lif. But the split happened when the genre gained
commercial viability. We saw a competition of sorts between the emerging works in the
late 1970s. On one side came the catchy but more frivolous works of, say, The Sugarhill
Gang and their single “Rapper’s Delight.” On the other, more conscious works such as
Grandmaster Flash’s “The Message.” Academic works appreciate the richness of the
genre by attending to all of its various representative samplings, though generally not in
singular pieces of research.
Tricia Rose’s (1994) seminal work Black Noise: Rap Music and Black Culture in
Contemporary America seems the most appropriate text to ground any discussion of hip
hop as either cultural product or, indeed, a culture in and of itself. Rose analyzes the
narrative elements of rap music and culture as well as the social conditions that lend
themselves to the development of the genre. She explores the factors contributing to the
creation of rap culture, specifically the racial, gendered, political, social, technological,
and historical contexts that frame the production of rap music and the creation of rap
cultural identity in general. From a cultural studies standpoint, this work begins to
identify or situate hip hop/rap music as a unique culture in and of itself and is invaluable
as a grounding work in the study of hip hop from such a perspective.
While less a true rhetorical analysis of the genre, Rose’s work provides the
foundation upon which almost all other scholars in the field base their more targeted
rhetorical inquiries of hip hop/rap as rhetorical/narrative practice and cultural formation.
Rose provides the basis for the academic study of rap music and hip hop culture as
29
performative resistance practice. Rose articulates her conviction that rap music has
seemingly apparent, though still highly contested, political potency:
Rap’s poetic voice is deeply political in content and spirit, but rap’s hidden
struggle, the struggle over access to public space, community resources, and the
interpretation of black expression constitutes rap’s hidden politics; hegemonic
discourses have rendered these institutional aspects of black cultural politics
invisible. Political interpretations of rap’s explosive and resistive lyrics are
critical to understanding contemporary black cultural politics, but they reflect
only part of the battle. Rap’s hidden politics must also be revealed and contested;
otherwise, whether we believe the hype or not won’t make a difference. (145)
It is, perhaps, this characterization of “rap’s hidden politics” that most precisely
provides the foundation for my own inquiry herein. A consideration of the counterpublic
nature of highly politicized rap music must move beyond the simple lyrical content of the
music to understand the complex politics of hip hop culture itself. Indeed, the work of
artists engaged in more politically-oriented musical content are often speaking as much to
a more traditional understanding of politics (the particular decisions and actions of
political leaders) as they are to these hidden politics of the rap industry. My work, then,
builds off of Rose’s desire to contest the portrayal of hip hop as pure noise instead of a
discursive space ripe for enacting both internal and external political criticism.
The notion of rap/hip hop as “noise” provides an interesting perspective from
which to examine both the history of rap and the potential of this genre for positive,
message-oriented musical expression.6 As with many developments within the musical
world, the institutions of the day seem resistant to new styles or experimental practices
and, as such, label them as mere noise rather than adopting a more open-minded
6
Though “noise” can certainly refer to sound of any variety, most first definitions of noise carry a negative
valence, referencing an unwanted sound, usually devoid of much value.
30
perspective acknowledging at least the potential for positive articulation. We saw this
with early resistance to jazz music, a backlash to the advent of rock and roll and, later, a
rejection of rap as lacking some critical musical quality. Rose’s (2008) most recent
articulation of this negative attitude seems to be an interesting split: critics reject
mainstream rap music because it often revolves around a series of tropes that glorify sex,
drug, and violence while the industry continues to push hip hop with more nuanced
messages to the periphery. Perhaps we may understand certain manifestations of rap
music as a more positive articulation of “noise” because of the ways that they challenge
dominant (public) discourse. Indeed, my own assertion is that there are particular
elements within hip hop that are pushed to the periphery precisely because they violate
the accepted musical practices of the industry.
Noise is the force that serves to disrupt the prevailing political and social order by
rejecting the codes that structure/govern that system. The emergence of hip hop was
initially received as a striking challenge to the musical codes structuring the social order
of, say, the 1970s (though, as noted, hip hop finds its roots in much earlier forms of Black
cultural expression, even dating back to the emergence of jazz – another style once
viewed as threatening to the traditional codes of music).
The notion of “noise” is, in itself, a harbinger of change. For some, hip hop is
noise because it represents a challenge to the social order constructed by prior,
established musical practices. The roots of resistance inherent in the history of hip hop
suggest that it was considered “noise” because it posed a threat. For Attali (1977), this
process of new musical forms interpreted as noise is a cyclical one. He notes that “Each
network pushes its organization to the extreme, to the point where it creates the internal
31
conditions for its own rupture; its own noises. What is noise to the old order is harmony
to the new” (Attali, 1977, 35).
This theorization of new musical codes challenging previous systems of
understanding until one is replaced with the other is not unlike Burke’s (1984a) notion of
casuistic stretching. Symbolic representations of the world challenge our allegiance to
the prevailing symbols of authority and we must choose either to “stretch” our frames to
accommodate these new symbols or to abandon our allegiance to the old in favor of the
new. The group of artists in the underground is, in a sense, requesting this switching of
allegiance – from the mainstream to the underground.
Attali’s articulation of the political component to music seems a fitting way of
understanding the battle between mainstream and underground hip hop (though, to be
certain, he was writing about much different, older styles of music). For Attali (1977),
music is an inherent representation of power and control. Thus, we may understand the
world of mainstream hip hop, the sham public sphere of hip hop, as that which holds (and
enforces) power, and the underground as the fringe voices demanding a platform to voice
the concerns of the marginalized. He explains:
The monologue of standardized, stereotyped music accompanies and hems in a
daily life in which in reality no one has the right to speak any more. Except those
among the exploited who can still use their music to shout about their suffering,
their dreams of the absolute and freedom. What is called music today is all too
often only a disguise for the monologue of power. However, and this is the
supreme irony of it all, never before have musicians tried so hard to communicate
with their audience and never before has that communication been so deceiving.
Music now seems hardly more than a somewhat clumsy excuse for the selfglorification of musicians and the growth of a new industrial sector. Still, it is an
activity that is essential for knowledge and social relations. (Attali, 1977, 8-9)
32
What is the mainstream world of hip hop if not a glorification of the artist’s lifestyle and
the calculated dissemination of songs in the service of the industry and its controlling
elites?
For Attali (1977), music is both a construction and reflection of society. It helps
push changes while simultaneously enforcing the structures of the controlling order. It is
a means of replacing the sacrificial violence involved in the erasing of difference, in part
by stomping out elements of noise (understood here as breaks in structure; threats to the
order created by erasing difference). My interpretation of both mainstream hip hop and
academic approaches to hip hop functions in a similar way. I view both as systems that
erase (either intentionally or unintentionally via the process of simplification) difference
in the service of preserving order. They do this in different ways and with different
results. The mainstream demonstrates the power inherent in the industry that promotes
and filters hip hop to consumers. The academy simply fails to embrace the full wealth of
resources available to understand the theoretical and practical benefits of integrating hip
hop into various fields of study. Both are, nonetheless, power plays that serve the
function of preserving the current social order – one that continues to marginalize
particular voices. We have, at best, the recognition by some academics that hip hop has
productive potential as a site for criticism.
Rose (1994; 2008) is certainly not alone in her analysis of hip hop as a site of
oppositional discourse. Indeed, works range from those who evaluate the role of
particular artists in the production of counter-hegemonic discourse (Baker, 2011; Hill,
2006; Walser, 1995) to those who contextualize the response of the genre to specific
events (Bloodworth-Lugo & Lugo-Lugo, 2008; Hill, 2006; Kish, 2009) to those who
33
engage in a more general discussion of the potency of hip hop as medium for political
message. This last group is, of course, divided between those who identify and support
the genre as a space for oppositional political discourse (Ards, 2004; Dyson, 2003; 2007;
Kitwana, 2003; Lusane, 2003; Martinez, 1997; Potter, 1995; Stewart, 2005; Williams,
2008; Wood, 1996) and those who question the value of such practices within this
particular medium (Allen Jr., 1996; Boyd, 2003b; Chang, 2002; Neal, 2003; Sullivan,
2003). The former finds value in various elements of hip hop that serve a rhetorical
and/or critical force – the signifying practices, the history of hip hop as protest music, the
positionality of artists as members of minority (racial, class) populations. The latter
express concerns over the ability of hip hop to avoid cooption and stay free from the
influence of commercial interests.
The more recent works on rap music provide an interesting series of approaches
to understanding the genre as a site for social and political criticism and the
transformative potential therein. Baker (2011) acknowledges the analysis emerging from
earlier hip hop scholars (Rose, Kitwana, Dyson) on the content-level criticisms of
political and social ills. His work, then, attempts to situate hip hop as equally politically
charged at the level of form (borrowing from discussions in literary studies on the
form/content divide). While not directly addressing the hidden politics of the hip hop
industry, his work provides a platform for articulating the ways in which certain forms of
hip hop are denied access to the public space (of the genre) because of either content or
style. In general, however, nothing in the last seven years is as useful as Rose’s 2008
work The Hip Hop Wars. This work sets up the distinction (upon which I rely) between
mainstream and underground elements of the hip hop industry. It is this distinction, as
34
mentioned, that becomes critical for my articulation of hip hop as composed of both a
public and counterpublic spaces.
The academic study of hip hop embodies a variety of perspectives that interact
with my own academic approach to the medium. Certain works engage hip hop as a
cultural force for the African-American community; one that provides hop, economic
strength, an inspiration for community connections (Cummings & Roy, 2002; Dowdy,
2007; Dyson, 2003; 2007; Potter, 1995; Rodriguez, 2006; Rose, 1994; 2008). This
ranges from discussions of the transformative potential of hip hop to improve the social
and economic status of African Americans, to the way(s) in which hip hop operates
within postmodern discursive structures that engage more complex linguistics concepts
such as signification (Potter, 1995). Some evaluate this cultural product historically to
understand how earlier iterations of hip hop mirror the movement of social and/or
political forces, thus tying the evolution of hip hop to movements for the advancement of
minority rights (Alridge, 2005; Boyd, 2003a; Dagbovie, 2005; Williams, 2008).
Others engage in more targeted discussions (targeted in terms of its particular
relevance to my specific research) of hip hop as politically motivated forms of resistance.
This group, of course, follows their own varied paths. There are larger discussions of the
genre (and/or cultural milieu of hip hop) as a general site for resistance practices (Ards,
2004; Haupt, 2003; Martinez, 1997; Pinn, 1999; Potter, 1995; Wood, 1996). These work
through the elements of hip hop culture that afford individuals the ability to articulate
broad scale social and/or political critique.7 This is, of course, accompanied by the
7
I include these citations to indicate the depth of work done on hip hop as a site for criticism, but my
specific discussion of hip hop publics and counterpublics below better situates the critical nature of hip hop
as it pertains to my research.
35
various articulations of the pitfalls with hip hop (beyond the critiques of problematic
content such as the glorification of violence and the denigration of women). Academics
in the same fields examine the ways in which hip hop represents failed forms of
resistance or, at a minimum, failing to reach its potential because of, in part, the diluting
of content by forces within the industry seeking to promote profit over art (Allen Jr.,
1996; Boyd, 2003b; Chang, 2002; Kitwana, 2003; Neal, 2003).
Works vary on the ways that hip hop can be deployed as a pedagogical tool,
helping to understand the ways in which certain elements of hip hop operate rhetorically
to respond to heightened moments of tension. Kish (2009), for example engages the
rhetorical value of hip hop as a healing tool to engage embroiled race relations in the
wake of hurricane Katrina.
Finally, work on hip hop as active political message solidifies a conversation on
the rhetorical potential of the genre (a conversation that I seek to extend). Baker’s (2011)
work is a more recent articulation of this stance, but it echoes the writing of a variety of
previous voices that engage the potential value of hip hop as a site for meaningful
dissemination of messages that extend beyond the simple articulation of status or style
and connect to core issues of race, class, and political ideology (Lusane, 2003; Stewart,
2005; Sullivan, 2003). More specific to my work, Hill (2006) suggests that the work of
Jay-Z could be used in the classroom to help students wrestle with the complexity of race
relations in the post 9/11 era. This work helps individuals think through the metaphors
used in hip hop songs that can both help in better approaching the act of literary criticism
as well as wrestling with potentially foreign concepts (to the average listener), such as
life on the battlefield (Hill, 2006).
36
What’s left? - Identifying the gaps in the literature
The above discussion suggests that there exists a confluence of forces at play in the
examination of hip hop, theories of publics and counterpublics, and the discourse of 9/11
and the War on Terror. While certain work (Bloodsworth-Lugo & Lugo-Lugo, 1998)
looks at hip hop to help unpack the embedded ideological assumptions, particularly
centered around race, at play in the discourse of the War on Terror, there remains little to
no examination of what hip hop’s response to 9/11 and the war on terror signifies - to
borrow from Gates (1988) and Potter (1995) - about the hip hop community itself, or the
medium as a platform for criticism. This is one potential gap that, I argue, theories of
publics and counterpublics help to fill. Furthermore, the application of notions of
counterpublicity to the hip hop community, while not necessarily a radical leap, has yet to
be evaluated in terms of how hip hop in response to 9/11 can be understood as a
significant iteration of this counterpublic space. Theories of counterpublics in this
context allow us to move beyond the simple articulation of Blackness as the key element
for a hip hop public toward a consideration of ideological marginalization that intersects
with race and class. While Pough (2005) identifies a potential gender-based
counterpublic in hip hop, the way that underground works function in opposition to
mainstream spaces is still under-developed. There is certainly a dearth of research on how
9/11 may have served as a catalyst for the underground. While my particular sample of
texts may, ultimately, be too small to definitively prove a connection, my argument is
that it represents a catalyst by providing a specific rhetorical situation to activate voices
from the underground. This “activation” then becomes a means for members to articulate
37
their concerns about the state of hip hop by packaging them with rhymes about the more
timely (or acutely present) concerns circulating in public spaces.
Again, there exists a solid literature base on pop cultural responses to 9/11,
including work within the hip hop community. There also exists works couching hip hop
within the language of publics and counterpublics. Still, the connection between all three
is, as of yet, unexplored. It is the goal of this work to examine a specific intersection of
the three. The goal is not necessarily a broad articulation of all three, rather an
examination of a distinct counterpublic spaces operating within, and in relation to, the
publics and counterpublics of hip hop. In doing so, I hope to broaden approaches to the
rhetorics of race, class, and politics by extending the ongoing conversations on how hip
hop can engage these varying forces. This, in turn, expands work done in the study of
rhetoric to engage the varying ways in which messages circulate within and across
varying spaces and serve to mobilize populations to, at a minimum, consider or question
the validity and/or purpose of dominant narratives. Connecting prominent concepts in
rhetorical theory with a discussion of counterpublic space within hip hop helps to
understand how this type of discursive space functions, and how alternative forms of
criticism operate.
38
Chapter 3: The Second Verse - Publics and Counterpublics
While many authors engage in discussions of a Black public space occupying more than
simply the discursive productions of hip hop culture, my claim is that hip hop asserts its
own public that operates both within and beyond the Black public. The evolving nature
of hip hop culture necessitates its own public in part because it now incorporates the
voices of a variety of nationalities, ethnicities, and racially diverse subjects. Thus the
public of hip hop is not representative of a particular racial identity, rather it circulates
around an identification with a particular form of musical expression, set of linguistic
practices, stylistic elements, and temporal affiliation.
The particular counterpublic I envision within the underground represents an even
smaller sub-space: a series of voices and texts (in this instance) specifically engaging a
period of time and series of political events. While these discourses certainly situate
themselves as responsive to a narrative that spans a more significant period of time than
the events immediately surrounding 9/11, it is nonetheless a discursive space born from
and in response to the discourses that emerged in the wake of the September 11 attacks
and the series of political and military responses thereafter. As Warner (2002) notes,
publics emerge as a response to a particular historico-termporal period. Thus there are
publics emerging in the wake of 9/11 that respond directly to the specter of terrorism, the
role of American government, and our military response. How might we connect the
genre of hip hop, the events on and after 9/11, and some theoretical grounding in core
concepts within the discipline? As noted, this thesis will blend cultural and rhetorical
approaches to examine hip-hop’s response to the official government discourse on 9/11
and the War on Terror. In particular, my work seeks to apply the notion of publics and
39
counterpublics to the medium of hip hop, specifically hip hop works addressing political
and/or social issues connected to the events of 9/11 and the American response.
The theory of public space emerged from the work of Habermas (1991) on the
public sphere. Habermas examines the rise and fall of what he calls the “bourgeois
public sphere” by tracing the move from feudal society (representative publicity) to the
rise of both literary and political public spheres in the 18th century. Prior to the
emergence of the public sphere, individuals lacked a collective avenue for voicing their
concerns or opinions in a way that could connect them with some unknown set of likeminded thinkers. The public sphere developed as a collection of individuals emerging
from private space to engage each other in dialogue and/or debate, often centered around
particular political or social concerns. Still, for Habermas, this public sphere and the
ability for individuals to engage in genuine dialogue is dependent on a very specific set of
political, social, and economic conditions. The industrialization of society and the
increasing distribution and availability of news media made possible an expansion of the
public sphere as a space to engage in dialogue, including practices of dissent against the
official discourse of the state.
As modern industrialization continued, we began to observe a collapse in the
divide between public and private space, such that the public sphere became increasingly
bombarded with discourse from private interest groups, diluting its effectiveness as a
truly public space. Indeed, Habermas’ notion of the public sphere may be more of an
ideal than a realistically achievable goal. As modern techniques for sharing/circulating
information expand, so too does the potential for outside forces (political and financial
interest-based parties) to influence the content and reach of information presented within
40
these public spaces. As the public sphere begins to cater to specific interests and
individuals, it became necessary to cultivate spaces for those pushed to the periphery.
Habermas articulated this shift in his conceptualization of the public sphere as a
movement from real to fake, or “sham” publics. As private interests began to infiltrate
public discursive spaces, they influenced the discursive products to serve their own
agenda. As Calhoun notes, “…the public sphere was turned into a sham semblance of its
former self. The key tendency was to replace the shared, critical activity of public
discourse by a more passive culture consumption on the one hand and an apolitical
sociability on the other” (Calhoun, 1992, 22-23).
I expand on this articulation when I examine, in the analysis section, the ways in
which these artists critique the public (mainstream) of hip hop. To put it briefly here,
what was once understood as the public of hip hop has been transformed by this “culture
of consumption” into a medium stripped of any critical activity (or, at least any such
activity that pushes against the interests of the controlling elites that regulate
distribution). What I describe as the mainstream, public space of hip hop may be more
accurately termed a sham public sphere. This space offers itself as the open terrain for
free artistic expression, but that expression comes with strings attached. For ease of
analysis, I will refer to this space as the “public” of hip hop (also interchangeable with
“mainstream”), and my articulation of particular counterpublic spaces still reflects their
exclusion from and dialogue with this space.
Regardless of whether public spaces are legitimate or mere shams, they still
engender counterpublic spaces, which represent a collection of voices marginalized by or
41
denied access to publics. Warner (2002) engages in an examination of publics and
counterpublics by setting up his own criteria for the constitution of a public or publics.
Warner (2002) articulates a few key features of publics. A public is selforganizing. It involves a relation among strangers. The address of public speech is both
personal and impersonal. It is simultaneously addressed to a series of strangers, and
received, very personally by individuals invested or affected by its content. Because of
this, a public must exist based on some level of active uptake from its audience.
Discourse is circulated but also adopts a level of reflexivity.8 “Publics act historically
according to the temporality of their circulation” (Warner, 2002, p. 68). A public
involves the discursive formation of a world. “Public discourse says not only: ‘Let a
public exist,’ but: ‘Let it have this character, speak this way, see the world in this way’”
(Warner, 2002, p. 82). This final factor is of particular importance to this work, because
it speaks to the potentially restrictive nature of publics. When the discourse of a public
dictates the character, stylistic choices and, indeed, who may engage the public discursive
space, inevitably there are those pushed to the fringe, excluded from participation in the
public because they don’t meet the necessary criteria for public membership. What
happens to those that want to participate in conversations within or across publics but
don’t have access because they refuse to conform to the normalizing forces inherent in
publics?
Fraser (1992) articulates the creation of counterpublics as "parallel discursive
arenas where members of subordinated social groups invent and circulate
8
This is not to say that one inhibits the other. Rather, it is a comment on the dual nature of publics as
internal and external.
42
counterdiscourses to formulate oppositional interpretations of their identities, interests,
and needs" (Fraser, 1992, p. 123). Her initial characterization of counterpublics
contextualized them as “subaltern” spaces because of the level of marginalization its
members experience in the adjoining public spaces with which they engage. For
example, female voices may feel displaced from publics on business or politics because
of the masculine norms constructed and enforced within those spaces. More specifically
within hip hop, one may identify the female voice as lacking discursive standing because
of the various elements of misogyny that tend to permeate the genre (Pough, 2004).
Articulating criteria for counterpublics helps to better understand what may or may not
qualify for said classification.
For Brouwer (2006), a counterpublic is characterized by three key elements: the
expression of opposition, constitution of discursive spaces (not necessarily physical
locales, but imagined discursive communities as well), and participation in multiple
publics. The participation in multiple publics invokes a dialectic of inward and outward
address – counterpublics address within the group before addressing the discursive space
of other publics. More specifically, it is “a dialectic of retreat from and engagement with
other publics” (Brouwer, 2006, p. 197). A mutual influence exists between this inward
and outward address. Dominant and marginal groups operating within and across publics
exert influence on one another in ways that shape their communicative acts and
participation within these spaces. Brouwer (2006) finds this notion of counterpublic
advantageous for a variety of reasons. Counterpublics make possible (perhaps “brings to
the forefront” is more apt) a recognition of resource disparity. This disparity can take on
any number of forms and is not necessarily limited to material wealth, but can be cultural;
43
this disparity influences the persuasive potential of the communicative acts. Second,
counterpublic allows for a critique of the process of self-abstraction (evident within
public discourse) which makes possible the utilization of embodied oppositional
discourse as a rhetorical tactic. The counterpublic space engages the personal element of
politics in way(s) that publics often efface (or at least reduce). Finally, counterpublic
advances interdisciplinary scholarship. It invites approaches that combine rhetorical and
cultural studies, performance studies, feminist study, sociology, and history. Brouwer
describes it as promiscuity between concepts/disciplines.
I tend to rely primarily on Warner’s notion of publics and Brouwer’s
conceptualization of counterpublic spaces to evaluate potential publics and
counterpublics within hip hop because both provide a clear outline (who doesn’t love a
simple list?) of the constitutive elements. The ensuing section on the role of publics and
counterpublics within writings on hip hop will help to better situate how these key
features operate within a less abstract context.
Publics and Counterpublics of Hip Hop
Within this work I attempt to situate a particular group of hip hop artists operating from
“the underground” as representative of a counterpublic discursive space. This, of course,
requires that the discourse emerging from this space operate in conversation with (or
opposition to) a series of publics. While Habermas and Warner are clear that publics
operate as distinct from the sphere of government discourse, I argue that the discursive
spaces of the mainstream news media and rap/hip-hop reproduce a narrative that
continues to solidify the ”official” government story. That is to say, while these
44
institutions (publics) engage in discourse that is potentially critical of government (both
broadly and in specific contexts) they nonetheless enforce particular norms for discursive
production that push these underground voices to the fringe.
Complicating this notion of publics and counterpublics is the inherent level of
contradiction that resides within each particular space. As such, the counterpublic is, in
itself, a type of public (Warner, 2002, 81). Rose’s articulation, then, of the mainstream
and underground as distinct elements within the larger discursive space of hip hop points
to the construction of two publics housed within a larger cultural expression. I contend
that hip hop culture writ large represents a public and a variety of smaller publics (and/or
counterpublics) emerge from within. As Brouwer (2004) notes, counterpublics can only
exist in conversation with a series of publics, thus this grey area is a necessity.
Articulations of counterpublic groups/spaces/movements range widely across
spaces oriented around gender or sexual orientation (Warner, 2002), ethnic, religious, or
national identity (Hirschkind, 2001; Stephenson, 2002; Salazar, 2003), race (Dawson,
1994; Squires, 2002; Brooks, 2005), or social and/or cultural affiliation. While my focus
is on participation in a particular culture that finds its roots in the African American
experience, it would be inaccurate to describe this particular space as distinctly an
element of Black culture. Rather, the “underground” is an increasingly diverse group of
artists united by a desire to infuse a heightened level of social and political awareness
back into hip hop and a feeling that they don’t belong within the hip hop mainstream. An
understanding of the literature focused on hip hop as rhetorical and/or cultural expression
helps better situate my own approach to the genre.
45
My own articulation of the underground elements of hip hop as counterpublic
reflects a view of these discourses as “having no place” within the larger public of hip
hop, precisely because they refuse to conform to the idealized image of the mainstream
artist, song, album etc. The underground seems to represent all three of Brouwer’s
criteria for counterpublic space. The underground participates in the larger public of hip
hop (popular culture, the United States as a whole), it maintains its own discursive space
(and, indeed, speaks to a particular abstract membership of artists and fans), and acts in
opposition to certain elements of the larger public of hip hop.
The notion of public space as a site of contest is a vital element of rap’s on-going
struggle to combat oppressive institutions and uneven power relationships. Rose (1994)
explains, “The frontier between public and hidden transcripts is a zone of constant
struggle between dominant and subordinate groups” (p. 101). This, in a sense, mirrors
the larger notion of public and counterpublic spaces. While hip hop may have emerged
as a counterpublic space in relation to the larger discursive public of the music industry, it
has evolved to form its own public. An attractive element of rap as a genre is the ability
to articulate an oppositional stance to the public transcripts offered by dominant groups.
The genre, emerging as a subordinate form of cultural expression and transforming into a
more dominant form for a subordinated group, thrives precisely because it provides an
outlet for these voices of opposition. Rose (1994) continues:
Rappers are constantly taking dominant discursive fragments and throwing them
into relief, destabilizing hegemonic discourses and attempting to legitimate
counterhegemonic interpretations. Rap’s contestations are part of a polyvocal
black cultural discourse engaged in discursive “wars of position” within and
against dominant discourses. (p. 102)
46
Thus the hip hop community represents its own complex discursive space, public in the
sense that it addresses a large, abstract audience while still affording criticism of
government institutions, but simultaneously producing counterpublic offshoots that
refuses to work “within” dominant discourses. While these “dominant discourses” most
commonly induce responses from the hip hop community based on the role of race and
class in the uneven distribution of political and social capital, there is no limit to the
range of issues addressed by the hip hop community. Thus Rose helps solidify a broad
understanding of hip hop as a cultural and discursive space engaged in both external and
external criticism.
Beyond Rose’s (2008) articulation of the underground as distinct from
mainstream hip hop, other scholars situate particular styles and subject matter emerging
from the hip hop community that represent this counterpublic space. Folami (2006)
discusses the ways in which the Telecommunication Act of 1996 actively discouraged
more “positive” or “progressive” voices within hip hop in favor of the stereotypical
“gangsta rap” that fit within the larger mainstream vision for hip hop. While her work
argues that the voices of gangsta rap contribute to the construction of a Black public
sphere, there seems to be an implicit contention that those progressive voices in
opposition to gangsta rap may represent a counterpublic in contrast to that space.
McLaren’s (2000) works seems to acknowledge the initial formulation of gangsta rap as a
counterpublic within the larger space of hip hop, and Folami’s (2006) essay shows the
transformative (or, perhaps, evolutionary) nature of public and counterpublic spaces.
That is to say, gansta rap became the prevailing public space because it served specific
financial-driven interests. The big business groups that drive the production and
47
circulation of mainstream hip hop produce particular visions of their accepted forms, and
those forms are privileged to the detriment of others. As with many forms of dissent, as
soon as they reach a level of popularity, they are taken up by the dominant forces and
folded into the mainstream (Frank, 1997). A common level of cooption is at play in the
evolution of hip hop publics and counterpublics. Just as the transgressive space of
gangsta rap became threatening (NWA and their active criticism of police tactics, for
example) they are coopted and reformed into a product deemed more palatable for public
consumption. This new public then breeds a counterpublic space that seeks to embrace
those reactionary and/or transgressive roots.
But what is the role of hip hop in engaging these publics? While there is no direct
literature base situating the particular discursive space I reference, there are a series of
endeavors in the literature that may serve as analogous works.
Within research on Black culture, academics identify certain elements of Black
political voices as counterpublic (Dawson, 1994; Morgan, 2009; Prier, 2009). More
specifically, suggestions of hip hop as counterpublic space are not a new phenomenon.
Still, the work on hip hop as counterpublic seems to identify a much larger grouping of
the genre (McLaren, 2000). This work also predates the particular events that I suggest
led to the establishment of a distinctly new voice emerging from the fringes of hip hop.
Even more, McLaren’s (2000) work speaks to a “gangsta pedagogy” or particular form of
street knowledge disseminated by earlier hip hop groups such as Los Angeles based
NWA. Rose’s (2008) latest work would suggest that these voices were absorbed into the
mainstream and saturated in potency such that the knowledge aspect was replaced by a
bravado that simply glorifies a particular lifestyle. While I will acknowledge that this
48
expression of bravado is an element present even in the works studied for my own work,
the artists I identify are more in touch with the gangsta pedagogy identified by McLaren
than what passes for “gangsta rap” these days. “Gangsta pedagogy” here speaks to
utilizing lessons of life on the streets as both an equipment for living as well as an entry
point for criticisms about the particular social and political ideologies that inform street
life: poverty, the police, prisons, the drug trade.
There is, perhaps, no better work to help ground my discussion of a hip hop
counterpublic than Gwendolyn Pough’s (2004) analysis of a Black, feminine
counterpublic within hip hop. Pough articulates that hip hop culture can function as a
series of publics and counterpublics, and that a slight reworking of the original
foundation laid by Habermas allows further investigation into how these spaces are made
manifest (Pough, 2004, 18-19). While her work details a potential feminine
counterpublic within (or engaged/in response to) hip hop, both the origins and evolution
of hip hop demonstrate the genre as a space for the public articulation of previously
inarticulable ideas and voices representing a variety of sub-groups. As Kitwana (2002)
noted, “Rap marked a turning point, a shift from practically no public voice for young
Blacks – or at least an extremely marginalized one – to Black youth culture as the rage in
mainstream popular culture” (Kitwana, 2002, 202). Hip hop provided a new public space
to engage primarily with the larger Black public sphere, but also with other publics both
locally and globally.
Indeed, a constantly evolving Black public sphere, via (in part) an acceptance of
emerging stylistic practices, makes possible new avenues for the dissemination of
previously marginalized voices. As a series of Black theorists noted, the Black public
49
sphere “marks a wider sphere of critical practice and visionary politics, in which
intellectuals can join with the energies of the street, the school, the church, and the city to
constitute a challenge to the exclusionary violence of much public space in the United
States” (Black Public Sphere Collective, 1995, 2-3). But the Black public spaces
articulated in, for example, the above collection of essays, are still vulnerable to
exclusion and abuse. As Pough (2004) suggests, the violent history of the Black
experience in America reveals the problems associated with the ability for Black publics
to maintain stability:
Unlike Habermas’ model, in which the bourgeoisie ideally was able to use the
regulated public sphere against the public authorities that sought to suppress and
squelch their public voice, today’s rappers do not have access to the regulatory
aspects of the public sphere in the same way. Bearing Black history in mind, we
can see a pattern in which whenever Black dissident voices enter the public space,
variables of containment and severe oppression – sometimes from outside forces
and sometimes from inside mistakes and misjudgments – go into play that inhibit
the strength and forcefulness of their message. (Pough, 2004, 20)
This necessitates the continuing emergence of new publics (and counterpublics) to
maintain spaces for the articulation of Black concerns, even those concerns that don’t
directly (or exclusively) bear on Black communities.
Thus we find a new public space in the form of the hip hop community. But as
quickly as this community developed (in the mid to late 1970s) it has been met with
varying levels of resistance and marginalization from the variety of public spaces in
which it engages. Hip hop is an intriguing case study for the examination of publics and
counterpublics precisely because it reveals the ways in which divisions emerge even
within communities bound by a shared history of exclusion/marginalization. Pough
explains:
50
…today, rappers suffer marginalization from official governmental offices – via
police harassment, harsh restrictions on concert venues, censorship, and strict
copyright laws that affect sampling – because of the themes they choose to speak
about in their lyrics. Some mass-media representations of hip-hop cast the culture
in a negative light, simultaneously vilifying it and granting it a public voice. This
vilification leads to moral panic and public outcry that serves to alienate the HipHop generation from other members of Black communities. This alienation
highlights not only the generation gap but also the class schisms that divide Black
communities. (Pough, 2004, 19)
While my own articulation of niche counterpublics within hip hop does not directly
engage any generation gap, there is certainly an element of class that comes into play in
understanding how particular voices in hip hop are excluded from the mainstream.
Pough helps to reveal how the particular elements of mainstream and underground may
activate certainly exclusionary forces within hip hop.
She notes that the notion of spectacle becomes a key vehicle for Black voices
within hip hop to articulate messages in ways that grant them access to a previously
inaccessible public space (Pough, 2004). The distinction between deliberative and
epideictic rhetoric (of Aristotle’s three branches of oratory) serves a useful function here.
Spectacle for the pure sense of the word may be understood as epideictic – done for
praise, flash, to excite or entertain. However, hip hop employs spectacle in a much more
purposeful manner, as almost a form of deliberative oratory – as a suasory device.9
Pough (2004) discusses the need for Black voices to engage spectacle as a means of
overcoming the inherent invisibility of Black bodies (and voices). She notes that “one has
to be seen before one can be heard. Spectacle and cultural representation (when more
9
I don’t mean to deny the ways in which epideictic forms of discourse operate as suasory. To be sure,
these forms of oratory were designed to persuade the audience to accept a set of values associated with the
object(s) of praise and/or blame. I make the distinction, here, to highlight the ways in which spectacle is
employed as a means of granting legitimacy to Black voices.
51
direct political access are not available) are the first steps in creating a disruption, the first
steps in bringing wreck” (Pough, 2007, 21).
Spectacle, then, is a form of vernacular. It is a cultural representation that takes
on elements of performance as a means of making the invisible visible. It relies on, in
part, use of overdramatization, of description bordering on the absurd: explicit details of
sex and violence designed to shock the listener, for example, serve as one of Immortal
Technique’s primary uses of spectacle. Spectacle does, of course, cut both ways. As
much as some acts of spectacle can bring attention to the marginalization of peoples and
struggles, it also runs the risk of cooption and manipulation to serve the interests of
controlling elites.
While Potter (1995) contends that spectacle is an integral element of hip hop that
grants it a postmodern dimension (and, thus, an ability to serve as a medium for active
critique), I argue that (many of) the voices emerging from hip hop in the 21st century fail
to utilize spectacle in an effective manner such that they do not fully embrace its critical
potential. Pough articulates this possible pitfall:
Spectacle, however, becomes a double-edged sword, because while without it
rappers would have no vehicle to represent to the public at large or themselves,
with only spectacle and no semblance of the political projects inherent in other
forms of Black public culture the rappers risk becoming stuck in forms of
publicity that have limited usefulness. Spectacle is limited because it works only
as long as the group attempting to impact the public sphere controls the gaze. As
soon as the spectacle is co-opted, it ceases to be effective. (Pough, 2004, 30)
This spectacle qua spectacle seems more and more characteristic of mainstream hip hop,
in part because the economic forces driving the evolution of hip hop find spectacle
without substance as non-threatening. Thus the elements that still attempt to infuse a
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political project into the music are pushed to the periphery. This leads some (Dawson,
1994; Kitwana, 2003) to question the sustainability of hip hop as a venue/vehicle for
public (or counterpublic) discourse.
Dawson’s (1994) work on Black publics and counterpublics offers an articulation
of the potential within hip hop to reclaim a (he suggests) lost role as either public or
counterpublic space. He finds that the commercialization of hip hop has diluted any
value to the message, such that even the space that I contend serves as the hip hop public
fails to reach the argumentative level of discourse. Pough (2004) theorizes the potential
for hip hop to emerge as a space for the contestation of sexism because “rap music’s
oppositional standpoint, which provides media that are somewhat controlled by members
of the Hip-Hop community and thus can offer critique and open up discussions on a
variety of subjects” (Pough, 2004, 36). Still these works seem to discuss the way that hip
hop can play a vital role for individuals that coalesce around a particular shared identity
category (race, gender, economic status) rather than, say, a shared ideology or political
orientation.
Morgan (2009) comes, perhaps, closest by suggesting that underground hip hop
emerged to establish a counterpublic space for artists seeking refuge from he trappings
and demands of the mainstream. She notes:
The underground began in earnest when hiphop was on the verge of losing its
place as a socially relevant arts movement. It did not resurrect itself outside of
other styles of hip hop but rather in discourse with them. As such, it added to and
created hip hop’s counterpublic representations through unauthorized biography,
critical artistic and linguistic expression, and think-tank ciphers. Through its
presence in the counterpublic, the underground re-created the political and social
critique of early hip hop while developing new lyrical styles and standards to
53
critique political and social symbols and promote artistic expression. (Morgan,
2009, p. 189).
Still, this seems to beg the question of exactly how underground artists come together to
form their own discursive spaces enacted through shared social and political criticisms.
If all underground hip hop represents a counterpublic space, how do we differentiate
between the specific cultural or rhetorical moves of, say, Dead Prez and Immortal
Technique? My contention is that this distinction is shaped, in part, by the construction
of discourse in response to a rhetorical situation. While specific works on hip hop
publics and counterpublics are a critical component of the larger conversation, the
collection of works on hip hop as cultural or rhetorical help to address the process of
internal groupings.
54
Chapter 4: The Chorus – Analysis of the Texts
In analyzing these three texts, my goal is to consider the ways in which these works
operate rhetorically to construct a counterpublic space. More specifically, I am
concerned with the particular forms and functions of this space. Which ideologies are
constructed and which are contested? What power relationships are revealed and/or
examined? What is the value of this discursive space and how does it contribute to larger
discussions of politics, social organization, race relations, and the music industry? What
are the particular rhetorical tools employed to critique these power dynamics? Animated
by these questions/concerns (that reflect the series of research questions discussed
earlier), and striving to examine the levels of discourse as articulated by theorists of
Critical Discourse Analysis, I seek to uncover (or make more clear) particular themes,
tropes, and techniques that emerge from each album and help provide a picture of how
these artists help construct and enact their counterpublic space.
I began this project working under the assumption that these artists were
connected as part of a unique counterpublic space devoted to articulating a counternarrative on 9/11 and the War on Terror. However, as I began to immerse myself into the
process of analysis, guided by the principles of CDA (attention to discourse, criticism,
and power/ideology), I began to notice that these artists are more simply engaged in the
continuation of a larger counterpublic space – that of underground hip hop – and were
using the events surrounding 9/11 as a topical vehicle for continued ideological criticism
on a variety of social and political ills, including their concerns with the state of
mainstream hip hop. My goal is still driven by explaining/articulating how this
counterpublic space functions, with particular attention to the rhetorical moves made to
55
sustain the circulation of discourse in the underground (and in dialogue with the publics
of mainstream hip hop and political discourse more broadly). To that end, I have
organized a series of thematic elements that occur within all three albums. This analysis
section identifies and discusses the particular tracks on each album that demonstrate these
themes, the ways in which they operate rhetorically, the levels of criticism that emerge,
and the various power relationship and/or ideologies to which they respond. I make no
specific claims that any one thematic element is more or less important than another.
Rather, they all contribute to the functioning of a counterpublic discursive space that
serves a valuable function (for members of hip hop culture/spaces) toward the continued
questioning of dominant ideologies circulating in their adjoining public spaces. One of
the critical elements at play in all three albums is, indeed, a counter-narrative on 9/11 and
the War on Terror. However, it would be an incomplete analysis to only examine this
particular connection across these works. The critiques of mainstream hip hop, for
example, are just as forceful, and are woven in and around discussions of political events
or social conditions. While I don’t parse out the albums individually (or sequentially),
nor do I address every song on each album, I was able to group almost every song within
the following categories. In this section I look at the rhetorical devices employed within
each thematic grouping. I have separated the themes into three broad groupings covering
a total of nine sub-themes. Group one, “key roles of the author”, looks at the sub-themes
of censorship, the artist as prophet, and use of religion as a trope. Group two, “the active
criticisms”, evaluates critiques of media, of mainstream hip hop, and of narratives on
9/11 and the War on Terror. Finally, group three examines “critical elements of
counterpublicity”, namely: dialogue with publics, identification as a member of the
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underground, and articulated desire for change. I will reserve drawing sweeping
connections across all three albums/artists for the final chapter.
While my analysis is primarily devoted to unpacking the specific lyrical content
and the rhetorical nature of those symbolic choices, it would be a disservice not to
address the sonic quality of these works and the ways in which they serve to disrupt the
codes established via the privileging of mainstream hip hop. Paris, for example, has an
almost militant quality – hard, jarring beats that harkens to earlier, message-oriented
artists such as Public Enemy. As I note later, this choice is quite intentional and is also
reflected in his lyrical choices that directly reference an earlier era of hip hop. Immortal
Technique has an almost playful quality that, perhaps, comes closest to the sound of
mainstream works that one might hear on the radio, but with a subtle series of variations
that hint at a mimicry for the purpose of mocking at times. At others, his beats have a
solemn, somber quality – a contrast to the upbeat, pop-based sounds of the mainstream.
It is this intriguing interplay between mocking and solemnity that seems fitting for his
form of criticism while simultaneously challenging the musical codes of the mainstream.
Finally, Mr. Lif seems to be a combination of the jarring and solemn sounds. They lack
the playful, simple quality of pop-music beats. Hard drums set up his slightly fasterpaced rhymes while combining with minor chords designed to impart a serious and
sorrowful tone. All three artists depart from the standard, established musical codes that
seem to define works of the mainstream. Attali (1977) suggests that the movement to
invoke both codes of the past and new styles, while simultaneously rejecting the
prevailing structures of the present represents the cyclical movement in which “noise”
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challenges the power structures and social order that the codes of the present
(mainstream) system help to enforce.
While it is difficult to assess the rhetorical form of these works purely through
their sonic quality, the variations that these works take away from the mainstream
represent a significant symbolic move. They establish a consistent rejection of the codes
constructed by the mainstream (public) spaces that also serve to limit the lyrical content.
The series of following themes demonstrate the ways in which the lyrics represent
rhetorical strategies aimed at the critique of various power structures.
Group One – The Role of the Author
There is a clear presentation of self that echoes across all three albums. The artists take
careful and dedicated work to situate their own position as artist and storyteller, both as a
means of establishing themselves as credible members of the underground and as
legitimate sources for information that may have been censored out of public spaces.
Censorship
One critical component of a counterpublic space is a feeling of exclusion or
marginalization from public spaces. What better way to express this exclusion than
suggesting that your words are so controversial that you risk censorship or outright
punishment for tackling these topics? The theme of censorship or policing runs across all
three albums and is a tool for artists to position themselves both as members of the
underground and as in possession of some secret information. It almost reads as some
enticing advertisement. “Behold! Here come the real truths that the government, media,
and mainstream hip hop don’t want you to hear!” The suggestion here is that their works
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are so revelatory that they would likely incite censorship if they were to attempt
circulating their discourse in public spaces.
Emergency Rations opens with an introductory discussion (entitled “Missing
Person’s File”) between two of Lif’s friends (fellow underground rappers Akrobatik and
Brotha PC) attempting to figure out the mystery surrounding his (implied) disappearance.
His friends meet on the street and discuss that he has been disappearing for three months.
They express concern that the subject matter of his raps has resulted in him going into
hiding, or worse. One of his friends, in the skit, comments:
That brother came to me and played me some of his new jams and I said ‘look, I
appreciate what you’re doing, those thoughts need to be out there and exposed,
but you’re functioning in a country where people are not at all cynical to actions
of their government, a, and b, they’re ready to believe everything they see on the
motherfucking tube. Look, you gotta look at situations like Mumia; the brother
spoke out, he’s locked up now. (Lif, Missing Person’s File)
In one move, Lif both literally and figuratively positions himself underground. This
introductory skit also immediately situates Lif in this counterpublic space: operating at
the fringe of hip hop discourse, wanted by authorities for engaging in a lyrical practice
that calls into question the prevailing narratives on the political. The mere act of adding
to the larger discursive public of hip hop has marked Lif as a target. His lack of any radio
play is, thus, not surprising. One can flaunt or criticize the government in a variety of
ways and still gain acceptance within the larger public space of hip hop, but a particular
discursive style and content is prohibited and punished. There is an explicit reference to
this form of prohibition/punishment within the imaginative world of the skit which
implies a similar level of castigation within the real world of hip hop politics, radio, and
record labels. This fear of punishment for his word/content choices marks him as an
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outcast from the larger public of America, and the lack of national exposure via radio
play or major concert showcases generally excludes him from the public space of hip
hop. In this opening sketch portraying Lif as an artist in hiding, we may understand this
move as symbolic of his retreat into a hip hop counterpublic. Perhaps more importantly,
this theme of censorship seems to be a way that members of this space situate themselves
as marginalized. The silencing of artists, here, mirrors the ways in which minority
populations are denied a voice in public spaces because of their socioeconomic status or
minority ethnicity. Lif returns to this notion of excluded and/or scrutinized content later
in the song “The Unorthodox” and in a continued series of short interludes (similar to the
introduction) featuring his colleagues commenting on their concern for his well being in
light of his controversial content choices.
Once again we have Lif’s friends speaking about his disappearance, but now there
is mention of this album as emerging from the space of his absence. This intimates that
this work, created in a counterpublic space, slowly infiltrating publics. Even in the
conclusion there is a suggestion that this work is illicit in nature. El-P comments: “just
trust us, something is going down. It’s personal, it’s political. Just…you didn’t hear it
here, okay? Seriously. You didn’t hear it” (Lif, The Unorthodox). This feeling of
policing or surveillance is not a new phenomenon either within hip hop or in African
American communities historically. The less insidious manifestation of policing in hip
hop is apparent in the various lyric censorship practices that have long-plagued hip hop
artists. Gates (2014) examined the notions of censorship and surveillance when he
discussed his work testifying on behalf of Miami based hip hop duo 2 Live Crew when
they were prosecuted over alleged explicit content in their 1989 album Nasty as they
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Wanna be. More than simple censorship, surveillance is a problematic issue for the hip
hop community dating, in part, back to historical state-based practices engaged against
militant African American communities/groups. Consider the work of COINTELPRO
infiltrating Black militant activist groups to gather intelligence for the FBI. Gwendolyn
Pough (2004) does a brief tracing of the practices put in place in response to movements
of the Black Panther party as a historical trend that resulted in the creation of Black
discursive spaces as counterpublic in nature.10 These same concerns echo through the hip
hop community and, for many theorists on the notion of Black publics, calls into question
whether hip hop, as a whole, can be anything but counterpublic (Black Public Sphere
Collective, 1995; Pough, 2004). While Lif’s album may hint toward the validity of such
a perspective, I think that the moments in which he (and others) distance themselves from
the mainstream of hip hop seems to suggest that this mainstream serves as the public to
their counterpublic. Even more, Lif’s reference to “going into hiding” seems to contrast
his counterpublic space to a variety of publics, not exclusively that of mainstream hip
hop. It is this contrast that is noted in his (as well as Paris and Technique) criticism of
public spaces outside of hip hop proper.
The first full song (track 2) on Immortal Technique’s Revolutionary Vol. 2 is
“Point of no Return,” a fitting beginning as Technique suggests that his lyrical content
will be so shocking that, upon its release, he will have set in motion a counter-narrative
that cannot be undone. As with the opening of Lif’s Emergency Rations, Technique
begins with a concern that his (potentially) incendiary commentary will result in his
incarceration, or worse. He expresses his concern for this most extreme punishment by
10
The use of COINTELPRO to monitor the movements of “Black radicals” is a prime example of the type
of practices Pough discusses.
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noting “I know too much, the government is trying to murder me” (Technique, Point of
no Return). This fear of harsh retribution for articulating any sort of narrative counter to
one officially sanctioned by the government seems to be a critical (perhaps defining)
element for this counterpublic space. As noted above, it is this response to multiple
publics that makes this underground space a particularly dynamic counterpublic.
Technique portrays himself (and his ideas) as almost parasitic on the official government
line. He notes, “Immortal Technique is treason to the PATRIOT Act” (Technique, Point
of No Return). An interesting synecdoche of sorts, Technique implies that the PATRIOT
Act is a new stand-in for post-9/11 America and that his words, in questioning the
discourse of this “new” nation, represent an act of treason.
Burke notes that synecdoche – a trope based in substituting a part for the whole,
or vice versa – is a tool for revealing motive (or orientation) by using language to draw
connections or distinctions. Put most simply, synecdoche is another word for symbolic
(Burke, 1973, 25). It is a form of abstraction that enables representation. While it is a
trope that occurs in common language use, it is, perhaps, more easily recognized in poetic
contexts (of which hip hop certainly qualifies). By holding concepts (institutions,
individuals, etc.) in relation to one another, we gain a sense of perspective perhaps
previously undiscovered. Synecdoche affords the audience the ability to think through
relationships via a poetic application of language. The uses of synecdoche in the works
of Mr. Lif, Immortal Technique, and Paris represents an opportunity to put forward more
complex and nuanced critiques of prevailing ideologies or exercises of power by various
institutions. For Technique, here, the PATRIOT Act as representative of an emerging
ideology enables his use of the short hand to critique a much larger assemblage of power
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relations. Technique is not simply “treason” to a particular set of laws, rather he
challenges a way of thinking that animates decisions by government officials and
business elites that serve to marginalize populations, one (or more) of which he considers
himself a member.
This opening song (Point of no Return) sets the stage (it primes the listener) for a
musical experience that challenges previously held assumptions and opens up a space to
engage his alternate readings of events and relationships. The track, fittingly, closes with
a sentiment that we should be willing to reconsider what we hold to be truth. Technique
raps, “Universal truth is not measured in mass appeal. This is the last time that I kneel
and pray to the sky, cause almost everything that I was ever told was a lie” (Technique,
Point of no Return). We see here both a questioning of the prevailing narrative, a critique
of consensus (or popular appeal) as truth-making, and an articulation of a refusal to sit
idly by and accept these truths. All operate as prevailing elements of this counterpublic
space, and much like Lif, Technique uses these series of claims to ground an album
packed with much more nuanced and specific critiques.
This reference to the last time that Technique will “kneel and pray” invites a brief
discussion of the role of religion as somewhat of a continuing side element throughout his
work. Kneeling for prayer, here, seems to operate as synecdoche for faith in religious
practices or institutions as a whole (perhaps this reduction may be more accurately a form
of metonymy because the singular act of kneeling to pray becomes the stand-in for a
series of practices and philosophies/ideologies). Much of Technique’s larger critiques of
political failure are, for him, a failure of religious promise. Or, perhaps more accurately,
a politics of failure too often wrapped up in religious discourse used to justify this failure
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(or to justify the confluence of forces of evil – big government, corporate interest). I
examine his particular use of religion in greater detail below.
Technique’s continued critique in the song “Freedom of Speech” is one of defiant
refusal to submit to the demands of censorship. He proudly positions himself as a voice
outside of the mainstream spaces precisely because he does not conform to their norms
regarding content. He notes:
“And now they say they wanna get me signed to the majors / If I switch up my
politics and change my behavior / Try to tell me what to rhyme about over the
beat / Bitch niggas that never spent a day in the street / But I repeat that nobody
can hold my reigns / I put the truth on tracks, nigga, simple and plain.”
(Technique, Freedom of Speech)
There is an interesting use of a bit from a Pinocchio song as the hook (“I’ve got no
strings, so I have fun, I’m not tied up to anyone”) repeated throughout the song. This
metaphor of having strings attached is the perfect representation of the control that major
corporations have over the content and style of artists operating in the mainstream.
Technique is suggesting that the celebrity and wealth associated with acceptance into
mainstream, public spaces of hip hop come with serious strings attached. Effectively, the
artists become puppets of the major financial interests that back mainstream artists. They
are, thus, beholden to particular standards, including the restrictions imposed on content.
Thus the threat of censorship, for Technique, is less about a group of government agents
storming his studio to shut him down and cart him off (like we see in the works of Mr.
Lif), and more about censorship of space and place.
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Technique is refused entrance into mainstream spaces of hip hop unless he is
willing to submit to their censorship practices. To which he defiantly gives a middle
finger salute. As he explains in the song:
”Independent in every single sense of the word / I say what I want, you fucking
little sensitive herb / This is America, I thought we had freedom of speech / But
now you wanna try to control the way that I speak / And O’Reilly, you think you
a patriot? / You ain’t nothing but a motherfucking racist bitch / Full of hatred,
pressing a button, trying to eject me / But I don’t got no motherfucking deal with
Pepsi / No corporate sponsor telling me what to do / Asking me to tone it down
during the interview.” (Technique, Freedom of Speech)
Because he is not beholden to any corporate sponsors, he does not have to submit to their
power. This is simultaneously a statement of allegiance to his counterpublic discursive
space. The restrictions imposed by the public of hip hop force artists like Technique to
reject the symbols of authority that govern that space and, thus, seek to circulate an
alternative set of symbols in an alternate space.
The censorship inherent in Paris’ Sonic Jihad is apparent before one even plays a
single song. The album cover, itself, was a topic of significant controversy, and one that
caused many to invoke a call for censoring the incendiary artwork. While the album
cover represents Paris pushing back against what should be almost an expectation for
censorship, the image of a plane headed on a collision course with the White House may
be a theme better reserved for discussions of 9/11 and the War on Terror and, thus, I
reserve further discussion of album art in that section below.
Prophetic figure
While the previous section discussed the ways in which these artists construct discourse
that dialogues with the various narratives circulating in public spaces, notably by
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replicating some of the discursive elements of these publics, I want to switch to a slight
variation of this theme, one that moves beyond simple boasting of lyrical prowess (a
question of technique) and into a discussion of access to content. While the prior theme
discussed pure stylistic prowess, this theme implies a knowledge-base to supplement the
technical skill. It involves a combination of bravado with a specific focus on the prowess
of the artist as a scholar of sorts. The underground artists position themselves as almost
prophetic figures, possessing access to some set of hidden truths that can only be
accessed by engaging their particular discursive space. While “Heavy Artillery” implies
a certain lyrical dexterity, other works suggest that the artist can provide a critical
function, a pied piper of sorts, leading his audience down the path of enlightenment. In
Lif’s “Get Wise,” for example, he asserts that he has access to some obscured truth. He
remarks, “I’m the son probable, I see through all the bull” (Lif, Get Wise). This
declaration of himself as “the son” may be an analogy to Jesus, son of God, delivering a
set of higher truths to the people of the planet. Or perhaps his reference of “son” serves
as synecdoche for the underground, itself. Lif is birthed from this space and represents
the emerging generation of artists devoted to exposing dangerous power relationships and
misleading narratives circulated in pubic spaces.
Mr. Lif’s “Heavy Artillery” bridges the two themes in a way that illustrates each
element, and is an excellent example of an artist touting the forcefulness of his lyrical
prowess. The song begins with a description of Lif residing “at the bottom of the sea,
dormant,” invoking a potential dual reading that suggests both Lif’s position outside of
mainstream (read: public) hip hop circles and one that hints at particular sets of
conditions necessary to energize his (vocal) artillery (Lif, Heavy Artillery). There is an
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exigence within hip hop that prompts Lif to verbally arm himself and prepare to wage
war. Lif seems to reference the presence of particular events, individuals, and constraints
that motivate him to “call upon the torment” and “prepare to tear and devour” (Lif, Heavy
Artillery). The metaphor here is intriguing. This reference to calling upon the torment
suggests that he can erupt with a lyrical forcefulness that the mainstream hip hop public
might not be prepared to handle. At the same time, Lif calling upon “the torment” is also
a metaphor about the initiation of metaphors as a rhetorical device. Lif notes that once he
is called upon, “then I start to finish ‘em: metaphor, simile, Mr. Lif has broken out the
heavy artillery” (Lif, Heavy Artillery). While Lif seems to suggest that particular
situations activate the rhetorical potency of his “artillery,” the song itself is more of an
abstract allusion to the forceful nature of his wordplay.11 However, when considered in
relation to the album as a whole one may infer a specific set of rhetorical situations that
sets the stage for Lif’s construction of this political and social commentary within the
counterpublic discursive space of “the underground.” While 9/11 represents a rhetorical
exigence that may have inspired these works, the subject matter surrounding this incident
(and the associated War on Terror and occupation of Iraq) seems a vehicle for these
artists to reinvigorate the importance of underground hip hop in relation to the capitalist
forces that drive the mainstream. This is an idea discussed early on but bears repeating
mention here. Because the events surrounding 9/11 created an exigence for public
discourse more broadly, it served as a means for members of the underground to
reintroduce their own perceived exigencies within hip hop into/across public spaces.
Because exigent circumstances are often filled with concern and confusion, establishing
11
There is, here, an additional synecdochal element, as Lif suggests that he stands in for the concept of
vocal artillery itself. He is Metaphor.
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oneself as “in the know” (a prophetic figure) garners attention. If these artists can
provide the public with access to privileged information about the War on Terror, it
makes them more credible to speak on the ills of the hip hop community itself.
“Obnoxious” is the fifth track on Revolutionary Vol. 2 and provides a slight
departure from the more serious criticisms levied to open the album. “Obnoxious” is a
boisterous, flamboyant personal introspection on Technique himself, which underscores
one of the more grating elements of his style: a tendency to openly discuss the gratuitous
violence and sexual obscenity of the world. Without going into unnecessary detail,
Technique discusses (among other things) masturbation and menstruation. The song
doesn’t serve much critical purpose except to demonstrate that, for Technique, there is no
topic off limits and he has no problem adopting a controversial stance. The figure (or
voice) in this counterpublic, then, is one that exhibits a willingness to tackle the tough
subjects in defiance of popular sentiment. In a sense, it also demonstrates his rejection of
the norms dictated by mainstream hip hop.
Paris’ album is a prime example of how the new underground harkens to an early
time (and counterpublic) of hip hop. The album begins in full with “Field Nigga
Boogie,” a song that speaks to an earlier time in hip hop when artists were, perhaps, more
politically oriented and goaded by a search for the truth in spite of prevailing counterdiscourses. Paris begins by saying he will “take it back to the days when we raised us up,
before coward-ass rap made the game corrupt” (Paris, Field Nigga Boogie). Here we can
find a continuation of the same theme centered in the comparison of two edges of hip
hop: the mainstream, influenced by corrupt elites, and the fringe, underground artists that
present their audience with “the raw shit” (Paris, Field Nigga Boogie). “Raw” here has a
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double meaning: it is both in its original form, untainted by the diluting influences of the
mainstream, and it takes on the meaning within the hip hop vernacular as something
deserving of praise (raw as a term for positive valence: cool, hip, smart). Paris sets the
stage by suggesting that he has access to (and will disseminate) some repressed truths
(Harkening back to the theme of censorship), and that this particular underground (read:
counterpublic) space is the only appropriate venue to “rush truth to the youth and shine
the light, take the red pill, open up ya eyes to life…and roll deep, keep it underground for
the streets” (Paris, Field Nigga Boogie). Here, the reference to The Matrix speaks to the
dual edges of hip hop (really, of the underground and its competing public spaces), one
steeped in fantasy (or at least a series of constructed screens), the other in reality. Paris,
here, occupies the figure of Morpheus, lifting back the veil to reveal the illusions
proffered by varying public spaces.
While the rest of the song retreats a bit into some of the old stylistic bravado of
early gangsta rap (bragging about committing violence against the police, repetitive use
of a call and answer chorus) this image construction is not uncommon. Indeed, it seems
to demonstrate that Paris finds himself a participant in the multiple publics (or
counterpublics) of hip hop. The notion of “the police” in this song also seems to operate
as synecdoche for a much larger series of dominant forces (government, military) that
serve to marginalize people of color, people in poverty, and, more specifically, hip hop
artists such as Paris. “The police” is often a stand-in in older, politicized hip hop, used to
represent the various disciplining apparatuses of elites. Still, Paris’ juxtaposition of the
mainstream hip hop world with his own work product (“the raw shit”) seem the most
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valuable element of the song, and a critical set-up to implicate him in this specific
counterpublic space.
“Spilt Milk” and “Tear Shit Up” (Paris) don’t engage in any direct criticism of
political or social institutions, but enact a broader discussion of the failures of mainstream
hip hop. Both songs utilize a sing-song pattern that harkens to the call-and-response and
rhythmic movement of earlier hip hop. This is, perhaps, an attempt to recapture the
counterpublic spaces and political force of hip hop from the 1980s (and into the early
1990s). Paris, here, seems to be reinforcing the work of academics that find hip hop in
the 20th century wanting in terms of its political potency (Chang, 2002; Boyd, 2003b).
We have moved from the biting criticisms of the prison-industrial complex or racial
tension found in the works of, for example, NWA and Dead Prez, toward a vacuous
parade of rappers featuring “L’il” and “Young” in their names, rhyming about drinking in
dance clubs. While these two songs don’t get into much (if any) direct criticism of
particular ills, they do reinforce the notion of the artist as underground. In the final verse
of “Spilt Milk” he references that the radio will never play his music because the radio
only plays songs thematically suited to reinforce the same stale, destructive stereotypes
(Paris, Spilt Milk). Similarly, in “Tear Shit Up” he notes that he “can’t fade the bullshit
noise that the radio play” (Paris, Tear Shit Up). This seems to blur, a bit, the distinction
between the themes of censorship and prophesy. I put it here because I want to stress the
ways that Paris (and the others) contrast their content with that of mainstream hip hop.
For Paris, the “truth” is parasitic to mainstream hip hop and its various venues.
Track six on Sonic Jihad, “Freedom,” is the catchy anthem of the album, rallying
the audience around a common shared goal and “bringing back what you’ve missed in
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hip hop,” a particular political leaning that engages a return to the militancy of Black
revolutionary figures such as Malcolm X and the Black Panthers (he raps, “back to the
days of – grenades up, Black fist raised up”), and a refusal to remain complacent in the
face of tactics designed to disguise war - in this case, the War on Terror - as a ruse to
continue committing violence against Black and Brown bodies. He notes, “Anywhere
that it’s color it ain’t never peace, Africa, South America, and the Middle East” (Paris,
Freedom). What seems to separate Paris from Lif or Technique is this consistent
emphasis on a particular time and place within hip hop that better embodied a devotion
toward resistance or revolutionary practice. While Technique dubs himself a
“revolutionary,” it seems to lack the historical grounding present across Paris’ album,
complete with his specific references to a “Black fist raised up,” the tactics of a
“Malcolm X cocktail, ready to burn the streets up,” or the consistent references to himself
as an OG (original gangster).
Mr. Lif’s “Pull Out Your Cut” is another excellent example of the divergence I
articulate between mainstream and underground and the reference to past artist in hip hop
that engaged their political sensibilities. Lif, in fact, situates past works that inspire his
particular style (including a shout-out to NWA member Easy E) and identifies himself as
a unique presence in current hip hop because of his choice to educate his audience via a
return to “real rap.” He then contrasts his work with the “rappers today’ whose “rhymes
drop in weak spurts” (Lif, Pull Out Your Cut). Thus we see both a criticism (across the
album) of particular societal and political ills accompanied by an internal critique of the
public space of hip hop. This is an intriguing element that I find characteristic of all three
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artists (and, thus, of this particular counterpublic space) but perhaps best typified in the
work of Immortal Technique.
Religion
The themes of God and/or religion are oft-circulated across publics and counterpublics of
hip hop, thus it is no great surprise to find it employed within these selected works. What
makes the use of religion valuable for these artists are the ways in which it serves to
facilitate the construction of metaphors that engage their varying levels of criticism.
While Paris’ album title, Sonic Jihad, speaks to religious terminology to engage his
criticism of the American government’s conflation of terrorist forces and Islamic faith
(while simultaneously positioning his own work as a rebellious/revolutionary use of
sound and symbol), I focus here on the ways that religion is used as a broad metaphor for
levying critiques of public spaces.
Immortal Technique’s “Crossing the Boundary” does not represent any significant
departure from the general themes of the album, nor does it directly engage in a
discussion of 9/11 or the War on Terror. Still, I find it of interest because of the ways in
which Technique implicates religion as an element utilized by the elite forces that serve
as the targets of Technique’s criticism. Technique notes that he “used to be a Christian
and a political pawn, the bible is right and all your native culture is wrong,” but that “this
ain’t about Jesus” (Technique, Crossing the Boundary). While this isn’t directly linked to
the amount of religious fervor associated with 9/11 (included but not limited to the false
associations made between, for example, Al Qaeda and the Muslim faith writ large) the
inference seems to be that religion is used as a political tool to shape representations and
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justify potentially nefarious policy – notably, the repression of non-western cultures. I
want to jump ahead to a track titled “Internally Bleeding” because it seems the closest
connection to a criticism of religious faith. This song is a meditation on God and death
with a particularly nihilist viewpoint on the inevitability of suffering. There seems,
again, almost an acknowledgment that, for Technique, government (or elite) serves as
synecdoche for God.
The use of “faith” in general allows the user to question their allegiance to
particular symbols of authority. Just as Technique feels a dissatisfaction with the
proffered narratives of the government and established news media outlets, his lament on
a world in which he is “searching for meaning” is an invitation for his audience to do the
same (Technique, Internally Bleeding). Burke’s discussion of frames suggests that on
powerful feature of symbol use is that it can help us confirm or reject the prevailing
relationship and institutions that guide our understanding of our world (Burke, 1984a).
That is to say, we construct an understanding of “what goes with what” (his discussion of
piety) and this understanding guides our decision-making and language choices (Burke,
1984a). Immortal Technique, then, is asking the listener to reject the frames constructed
via the “official” narratives circulated in public spaces by questioning their faith in the
prevailing symbols of authority. The metaphor of religion is (particularly when thought
through Burke) a fitting theme. This theme also seems to build off of the others in this
section. The prophetic figure, censored by forces determined to hide truth from the
public as a means to keep their grip on the levers of power generally gestures toward the
stories of many a prophetic figure in religious texts. Or perhaps constructing oneself as
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having some higher calling/purpose is a strategy to lend legitimacy to the series of active
critiques that follow.
Group Two – Overt Criticisms
Active criticisms are plentiful across all three albums, but here I focus on the three most
significant in terms of the repetition and detail of argument in each text. I begin with the
artists’ presentations of alternative narratives to explain the causes and implications of
9/11, a theme that is incredibly detailed, suggesting both a defining condition for
underground hip hop works, as well as one that makes possible the sustained production
of the two other critiques that are not necessarily as bound to the specific temporal
moment surrounding the release of these works.
9/11 Counternarratives
Burke’s notion of a representative anecdote seems a fitting way to think through the
specific focus on 9/11 and the War on Terror as both a unique thematic element of each
album as well as an entry point for articulating a series of other critiques (Burke, 1945,
59). The representative anecdote is an appropriate metaphor that helps one understand,
interpret, or think through a particular idea, relationship, or set of conditions. We might
understand 9/11, or particular references therein as representative anecdotes for a much
larger string of narratives circulating in public (and private) spaces. However, as soon as
the vocabulary surrounding that anecdote ceases to engage within the world of that
representation, we find a disjuncture (the lack of engagement calls into question the level
of piety at play). It is, perhaps, this disjuncture that gives rise to alternative ways of
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thinking or understanding these events. It shatters a particular frame and demands a new
orientation. There is, of course, an additional way of thinking about representative
anecdotes, and that is more as a form of story, rather than a story as metonymy (fairy
tales, for example, have a particular form) (Burke, 1945). Underground hip hop may be a
small enough space that its discursive product can be understood as such. It has a
particular form that its creators utilize, with differing variations, of course. Thus, the
increasing number of connection we find between Lif, Technique, and Paris is, perhaps,
demonstrative of their adherence to a particular form. And this form, or course, has an
appeal to a select group of people that self-identify as the audience of these (and other
members of the underground’s) works. What seems to be the case about my chosen
selection of representative anecdotes is that they emerge as a response to a particular
historical moment. And this seems true, generally, of forms. They contain linguistic
resources for manipulation (for example, the structure of mythic narrative arcs develop
forms that afford the construction of heroic figures and scapegoats) that they may adapt
to an exigence or the various needs of the group. Thus, the historical moment of 9/11
proves a vehicle for these artists to engage the series of topics that drive works from the
underground. The exigence of 2002 required a slightly new language for the voices of
underground hip hop to function as a counterpublic space.
Track four on Emergency Rations, “Home of the Brave” is, perhaps, the
quintessential representation of this particular theme. Framed within an entire album that
presupposes some access to inside information, the song opens by inviting the listener to
open her/his mind to a narrative on 9/11 and the War on Terror that calls into question
previously held assumptions or, at least, the grand narrative propagated by government
75
and mainstream media outlets. Lif begins by inviting the listener to join in on some sort
of secret discussion in which the listener must cast aside previously held assumptions and
truly open up her/his mind to a new narrative. He raps, “Now let’s talk about selfexpression, true expression, open your minds without question. No doubt, tell me what
you’re thinking about, it’s time to set aside pride and clout” (Lif, Home of the Brave).
Demonstrative of the creation of a counter-public discursive space, Lif contrasts the
setting of this particular song with a more public setting that privileges a particular
narrative, denies “true expression,” and creates conditions that actively inhibit the coming
together of these like-minded individuals that “truly do believe these modern ways have
fooled” them (Lif, Home of the Brave). Lif speaks of police repression in the face of
these alternative narratives of social and political realities. He speaks of police brutality,
unjust imprisonment, corruption of public officials who feign interest in the perspectives
of the public while turning a blind eye to their alternate visions in favor of lining their
pockets via the support of elites. The first verse concludes with Lif positioning himself
as a revolutionary figure with “the mind of Mandela and the heart of Rosa Parks” and
suggesting “we need a different way of life” (Lif, Home of the Brave).
While that first verse provides some context for understanding how this type of
hip hop may be counterpublic in nature, the second verse delves deeper into his specific
alternate reading of the actions taken by the Bush Administration. He not-so-subtly
accuses Bush of stealing the presidency and then manufacturing the events of 9/11 to
instill national fear, scapegoat a potential enemy, and justify “blood lust as patriotism”
(Lif, Home of the Brave). Lif accuses the Bush Administration of fabricating the anthrax
epidemic as an additional scare tactic in the wake of waning support for the War on
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Terror. He then weaves a narrative on the historical relationship between American
forces and Afghanistan, one built on the support of Taliban forces during the Cold War in
order to secure a potential oil pipeline. He rhymes, “American supported the Taliban to
get Russia out of Afghanistan, that’s how we got the arms in. We’re in a war against the
Northern Alliance, and we can’t build a pipeline in hostile environments” (Lif, Home of
the Brave). Reaffirming his narrative as counter to the public discourse, he describes this
story as “what your history books won’t show” (Lif, Home of the Brave). The song
concludes similarly to its beginnings, with a brief commentary on refusing to believe the
official, public narrative: a TV-generated, patriotic rant about anti-terrorism. Turning off
one’s television is positioned as an eye-opening experience, and Lif’s questioning of the
historical narrative on America in relation to the Taliban fundamentally calls into
question the demand for patriotic fervor in response to 9/11. In a defiant tone harkening
to the aggressive style of his predecessors, he concludes: “You can wave that piece of shit
flag if you dare, but they killed us because we’ve been killing them for years.” (Lif,
Home of the Brave).
What separates this particular criticism of government from more mainstream
manifestations of hip hop is the depth and precision to the narrative construction. One
might contrast this song to Jadakiss’ “Why?” – a mainstream hip hop track that poses the
question “Why did Bush knock down the towers?” but only in a laundry list of other
disconnected concerns. Jadakiss was granted acceptance into the mainstream because the
majority of his works stick to the less controversial topics (the standard bravado about his
wealth and proclivity for extravagant partying) espoused by the majority of radio-played
hip hop. Though it was fairly well received and highly accessible, even this song
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received some backlash from certain radio stations simply for issuing this singular
statement (USAToday, 2004). It is a fine line, indeed. Issue generic criticisms of social
and political policy and you may still be granted access to the mainstream public space of
hip hop. But begin naming names or crafting more detailed narratives and you can forget
about hearing your songs on the radio or playing in large concert venues. This is
language utilized more implicitly by Lif or Paris but repeatedly by Technique (for
example, he introduces “The Message and the Money” with this type of concern).
Generally, however, the artists of the underground don’t seem to mind occupying this
marginalized space. For them, specificity serves to illustrate a representative anecdote
for the underground space wherein I position them. They have a specific form that runs
in contrast to the works of the mainstream, and they happily embrace it. Technique, for
example, seems to celebrate his position outside of the mainstream (for example, his
repeated claims that he doesn’t want the major radio play or big record sales), while Paris
produces albums from his own record label, and constantly openly throws a shout-out to
his “Guerrila Funk” family.
“The Cause of Death” may represent the most overt, and carefully crafted,
counternarrative to the official discourse on 9/11 and the War on Terror. Here,
Technique lays out a detailed historical account of the various connections between
American officials and those responsible for the attacks on the World Trade Center and
Pentagon. Much like Lif’s “Home of the Brave,” this song calls into question the
motivations behind the 9/11 attacks and suggests that there were underlying forces
guiding the geopolitical decision-making (over decades) that set the stage for 9/11.
Similar to the other artists, Technique envisions himself as a member of a minority group
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willing to speak truth to power. He also suggests that his account challenges what the
larger public assumed to be the “truth” surrounding 9/11. He notes:
My words will expose George Bush and Bin Laden as two separate heads of the
same seven headed dragon. And you can’t fathom the truth, so you don’t hear
me. You think illumanit’s just a fucking conspiracy theory? That’s why
conservative racists are all running shit. And your phone is tapped by the federal
government. So I’m jamming frequencies in your brain when you speak to me.
(Technique, Cause of Death)
There is much here ripe for consideration. He characterizes his opinion as threatening to
the larger order (not accepted within public discursive spaces), there is this element that,
in fact, forces are actively conspiring to bury this counter-narrative.
Most importantly, though, it is the care and precision with which Technique crafts
this story that serves as an intriguing challenge to the dominant forces working to
propagate a narrative on the War on Terror that seeks to obscure the level of involvement
by American government and business interests. What makes this theme so intriguing is
that it has a rhetorical depth that some of the other ideological criticisms don’t possess.
By depth, I mean that the level of precision to the counternarrative is beyond that of any
other content engaged across the other themes. Lif had a detailed account of the history
of the American relationship with the Taliban, Paris discussed the ways that the actions
of the first President Bush produced the conditions engaged by his son. While it still
engages metaphor, the concrete detail in the narrative has a distinct affect. Technique
raps that “the CIA trained terrorists to the fight” and “they gave Al Qaeda 6 billion
dollars in 1989 to 1992” (Technique, Crossing the Boundary). The precise, and detailed
series of claims can’t be found in any iteration of mainstream hip hop and it is a marker
that makes all three of these artists (Lif, Technique, Paris) a unique grouping. There is a
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clear conversation at play with other public spaces. Technique goes as far as to anticipate
the arguments of others and respond in kind. The third verse demonstrates this
engagement:
And just so conservatives don’t take it to heart, I don’t think Bush did it cause he
isn’t that smart. He’s just a stupid puppet taking orders on his cell phone, from
the same people that sabotaged Senator Wellstone. The military industry got it
popping and lockin’, looking for a way to justify the Wolfowitz Doctrine. And as
a matter of fact, Rumsfeld, now that I think back, without 9/11 you couldn’t have
a war in Iraq. Or a defense budget of world conquest proportions, kill freedom of
speech and revoke the right to abortions. Tax cut extortion, a blessing to the
wealthy and wicked, but you still have to answer to the Armageddon you scripted.
And Dick Cheney, you fucking leech, tell them your plans, about building your
pipeline through Afghanistan. And how Israeli troops trained the Taliban in
Pakistan. You might have some house niggas fooled, but I understand
colonialism is sponsored by corporations. That’s why Haliburton gets paid to
rebuild nations. Tell me the truth, I don’t scare into paralysis. I know the CIA
saw Bin Laden on dialysis, in ’98 when he was top ten for the FBI. Government
ties is really why government lies. Read it yourself instead of asking the
government why, ‘cause then the cause of death will cause the propaganda to die.
(Technique, Cause of Death)
The discussion of corporate interest here runs consistent with Technique’s larger
criticisms of capitalist motivation for the engineering of global events, and his narrative
calls into question the larger public discourse while simultaneously placing a demand on
his audience to speculate on the motivations of these narratives circulated in public
spaces. There is something rhetorically powerful about the depth and specificity of his
narrative that, he suggests, is excluded from the mainstream of hip hop precisely because
it threatens the order imposed by elites (both financial and political). There is something
structurally distinct from the typical rap song. While the standard lyric (in public spaces)
may weave a story, it is often short and simple. Technique, here, takes a linguistic turn
by offering a complex thesis of sorts on the factors at play influencing the events
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surrounding 9/11. His notion of colonialism as “sponsored by corporations” positions
two previously separated (at least in public discursive spaces) concepts in a way that
moves close to (but not quite the same as) perspective by incongruity. While not entirely
incongruous, the official story works to distance these elements to deny their connection.
Technique rhetorically positions them, like the method of a pun, in concert to reveal
previously unarticulated connections (Burke, 1984a).
In one impressive lyrical tour de force, Technique constructs his own discursive
space engaged both in dialogue with and in opposition to a variety of publics. While it
seems directed at some abstract, unknown audience, it directs that audience to look
inward and call into question previously-held assumptions about the discourse circulated
in public spaces. In this sense, the song succeeds in meeting all three of Brouwer’s
(2006) requirements for a counterpublic space.
“What Would you Do?” is Paris’ most striking critical engagement with the
events surrounding 9/11. While reinforcing the larger shared themes (across all three
albums) of a particular access to a set of hidden truths and the desire to enact change
(among his audience), it also reflects his most detailed counter-narrative of the history of
American politics and the events that conspired to make possible the 9/11 attacks and
justify the American military response. Before the first verse, Paris takes a series of
sound clips featuring Bush talking about the War on Terror. There is an interesting
perspective by incongruity at play as he replaces the word terrorist with “American” or
“citizen” (Paris, What Would You Do). The lyrical content begins with an homage to the
voices of earlier, political hip hop, Public Enemy, by playing off of the lyrics to their
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iconic song “Black Steel in the Hour of Chaos” (Public Enemy, 1989). Paris adapts the
lyrics to engage in a criticism of the official government narrative on terrorism:
I see a message from the government like every day, I watch it, and listen, and
call ‘em all suckers. They warning me about Osama or whatever. Picture me
buyin’ this scam, I said “never.” (Paris, What Would You Do)
The intriguing play on Public Enemy’s lyrics invite an understanding that this song is a
staunch political criticism (by harkening to a political anthem of sorts from an earlier era
of hip hop) while reshaping the context to respond to the specific historical moment.12
Paris then weaves an intricate narrative about 9/11 as a complex conspiracy
designed to improve Bush’s approval ratings, justify engrossed military budgets, and
continue the active repression of Black and Brown bodies, both at home and abroad. He
concludes the second verse with a particularly chilling account of the financial and
political motivations at play:
We in the streets, holler “jail to the thief!” / Follow, fuck waving flags, bring
these dragons to they knees / Oil blood money make these killers ride cold /
suspicious suicide, people dyin’, never told / It’s all a part of playing God so you
think we need ‘em / While Bin Ashcroft take away your rights to freedom / Bear
witness to the sickness of these dictators / Hope you understand the time brother,
‘cause it’s major.(Paris, What Would You Do)
The interesting perspective by incongruity of “Bin Ashcroft” calls into question
previously held assumptions about the purity of American government intentions. Paris
invites the listener to consider that our political decision makers, supposed democratic
leaders, may in fact have more in common with dictators and terrorist figures. He
12
Public Enemy’s original work begins: “I got a letter from the government the other day / I opened it, read
it, it said they were suckers / They wanted me for their army or whatever / Picture me giving a damn, I said
‘never’!”
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continues by openly suggesting that our leaders planned 9/11 as a ploy to prey on mass
public fear. In a final play, he suggests that the public outrage, and accompanying
discursive production in public spaces, amounts to nothing more than “talking loud but”
not “saying shit” (Paris, What Would You Do).
Though artwork for Technique’s album was not a real representation of the
content, Paris, like Mr. Lif, demonstrates a return to a decisive critique of the events
surrounding 9/11, and thus deserves mention. In fact, the only real media attention
surrounding this album came because of the rather incendiary imagery displayed on the
cover. Many were outraged to view the image of an airplane, headed in a collision course
with the White House. While, some recycled a familiar line of argument citing the
inappropriate nature of the artwork (Strauss, 2003), others viewed the imagery as
specifically designed to provoke this type of response, and thus articulated the artwork as
an embedded element of the larger critique (Chonin, 2003). Much like Lif’s depiction of
bombs disguised as humanitarian aid, this artwork demonstrates another example of a
type of symbolic practice that would be actively restricted by major record labels and,
thus, unfit for the larger public of hip hop. But it is precisely this type of symbolic
practice - the juxtaposition of uncomfortable images in specifically political contexts that contributes to the rhetorical constructions of alternate political narratives. It is,
again, a component of their alternate form that signifies these works as outside of
mainstream spaces.
The album artwork for Emergency Rations is consistent with the overarching
criticism about the duplicitous nature of American foreign policy. It displays two similar
images of a town: the first image with planes overhead dropping bombs, and the second,
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the same town (and townsfolk) engulfed in flames as similar looking planes drop
humanitarian aid supplies. The juxtaposition is simple, but striking. The story of the
American response to 9/11 told throughout the album reflects this simple message. The
American exceptionalist mission to free the world of the terrorist threat mirrors this
duality: violent aggressor disguised as compassionate savior. This is not a new
perspective, as William Spanos often criticizes this disturbing duality, first in his
discussion of the American role in Vietnam, and more recently in his analysis of the War
on Terror (Spanos, 2008). One senses the rhetorical move of perspective by incongruity
at play here. As noted, while not a verbal move, this symbol positioning nonetheless
makes possible the “cracking of atoms” by positioning the act of humanitarian aid
directly in relation to the initial act of aggression (Burke, 1935, 308). The common
narrative of the American government as global defenders of freedom stands in sharp
contrast to the notion that we are, indeed, responsible for creating the very conditions of
violence and/or oppression that we later seek to remedy. “Emergency Rations,” then, is
a critique of the public narrative that attempts to obfuscate the American government’s
complicity in the disastrous state of global affairs that, then, require our assistance. We
happily tell the stories of the assistance end of this series of events while conveniently
removing the American role in the origins of said events.
Critiques of Media Discourse
Moving away from a direct criticism of government tactics, “The 4th Branch”
represents Technique’s most overt criticism of the popular news media. Keep in mind
that this album is over ten years old and, thus, the prevalence of internet news media was
growing but not to the dominant position that it holds today. Nonetheless, his discussion
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primarily focuses on a corrupt and misleading entity that seems more concerned with
serving government interests than providing objective reporting of events to the public.
This is a theme that (again) connects all three artists; a mistrust of media outlets and a
feeling that they simply serve elite (or government) interests runs heavily through all
three albums. This mistrust of public spaces of media is at the heart of the larger
criticism of the relationship between mainstream and underground hip hop.
“Harlem Streets” is a song rather emblematic of Technique’s general strategy: a
large criticism of social and political ills that centers on a particular people living in a
particular community. In this instance he engages the plight of Black and Latino peoples
living in Harlem. This song truly runs the gamut. The drug trade, poverty, the criminal
(in)justice system, education, 9/11 are all recognizable just from a cursory listening. But
the real value of this particular song lies in the continued articulation of Technique as a
voice in opposition to a patterned, deliberate dissemination of lies by the government and
popular news media. Technique criticizes “the sound of conservative politicians on
television, people in the hood are blind so they tell us to listen” (Technique, Harlem
Streets). There is, thus, a rather explicit critique of the confluence between media and
politicians, and one that runs throughout all three albums.
“Sheep to the Slaughter,” the third track on Sonic Jihad, continues this intriguing
narrative and is, perhaps, the best - and most direct - discussion of the various publics
(and voices emerging from those publics) in which, in this instance, Paris (but,
seemingly, the other two artists as well) stands in opposition. He begins by offering a
generic rejection of the public narrative, noting that he can “see right through corrupt
plans and these bullshit scams and untruths” (Paris, Sheep to the Slaughter). This both
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calls on his positioning of his own view as prophetic figure while also setting up his
criticism of media discourse. Like Technique, he implicates this misrepresentation of
events as operating within a power relationship between elites and impoverished. He
calls out conservatives and corporate entities for denying knowledge to the public and
turning the poor into “human ammunition for these capital wars” (Paris, Sheep to the
Slaughter). He concludes with a laundry list of voices from various popular culture
public spaces and considers them as representing the majority (or, official) narrative.13
Without bludgeoning you with the rather exhaustive list, it is worth noting the
vast array of personalities that he mentions, crossing media, government, music, film and
television personalities and entities. Dennis Miller, Rush Limbaugh, Toby Keith, Kid
Rock, Tony Blair, Rob Lowe, Colin Powell, Joseph Lieberman, as well as MSNBC,
CNN, and Fox News are all implicated as propagating a complex narrative of untruth and
misdirection, while simultaneously stifling dissent practices. As noted, there is, perhaps,
no greater direct reference (across all three albums) to the various public voices,
operating and/or influencing discussion within and across a variety of public spaces. This
direct call-out is discussed earlier as a rare element even within politicized hip hop. We
often find the naming of names when rappers engage in bravado vis-à-vis their
contemporaries, but this rarely moves beyond the level of trash-talking. The metaphor of
sheep being led to slaughter continues to use this notion that media elites (and their
various representatives) have constructed conditions that strip their audience of the will to
critically question their discourse. This path allows the media elites to continue their
elaborate construction of this implied version of The Matrix.
13
Which he implicitly alludes to by suggesting that these individuals “ain’t supporting dissent.”
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“Evil” represents, in some sense, a continuation of these themes, but it engages in
such a rich, description of dueling, dual perspectives that it seems deserving of special
discussion. Paris describes the motivations and tactics of those that he feels represent a
consortium of evil. This is the media, government, and mainstream (read: money-driven)
forces in hip hop, conspiring to create a complacent, obedient populace. This is made
possible via the construction of false idols, promotion of stereotypes, rewriting of history,
and the control of lyrical content. Paris, here, draws a connection to 9/11 by suggesting
that it was engineered as a control tactic to justify a crack-down on freedoms and further
repression of minority populations. The comparison here to the works of Technique and
Lif is clear. His critique of the official discourse on 9/11 is complemented by the
positioning of himself as revolutionary, rebel figure, intent on exposing the lies in the
face of these forces conspiring against him. He notes that he will continue to “fight the
evil surrounding me” (Paris, Evil). The display of power relations and the counternarrative in response to more accepted notions of the governing of the nation, and hip
hop, represent an intriguing depiction of the public (mainstream) and counterpublic
(underground) spaces within hip hop.
Critiques of the Mainstream
Here I move from the larger criticisms aimed at the various media and governmentinfluenced publics to the specific public space of hip hop: the mainstream. This is the
heart of the underground’s oppositional stance, and it is observable across each theme
and seems the primary thrust of each album. The works take aim at the economic and
racial ideologies of the hip hop industry and the ways in which that industry shapes
norms dictating style and content within the genre.
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Immortal Technique’s main criticism of what I dub “the public of hip-hop”
manifests as a larger criticism of capitalism and the ways in which financial interests
guide global and domestic political decision-making (including the decision to engage in
conflict), as well as the privileging of particular types of hip hop. For the purpose of my
distinction between underground and the mainstream, Technique is not shy about
declaring himself a member of the underground while launching scathing attacks on the
mainstream machine of hip hop. No song better typifies his critique than “The Message
and the Money,” the sixth track on Revolutionary Vol. 2. The song begins (in spoken
word) with the instant categorization of “underground MCs” accompanied by a demand
that members of this particular group attend to the commoditized nature of hip hop. His
initial call is simply one of recognition; a recognition that artists operating within hip hop
writ large are necessarily subject to the forces of commodity that dictate acceptance into
the mainstream. But this initial call for MCs to recognize the conditions of the industry is
accompanied by a rather odd series of statements that seem to indicate a desire for proper
compensation for their (read: his) contribution to hip hop. He criticizes promoters that
are “doing showcases, throwing events, and not even paying the workhorses”
(Technique). In reality, it seems that this still serves as a criticism lodged at non-artist
members of the hip hop industry that exploit artists, must like the bourgeoisie exploit the
proletariat in classical Marxist criticism.
Without veering too far off course, I want to draw on Technique’s criticism of
capitalism to aid in my articulation of the underground as counterpublic space. In some
sense, the underground is pushed to the periphery of the public (of hip hop) due to the
selection of a particular subject matter that does not conform to the normative
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assumptions regulating discourse in mainstream hip hop, a discourse generally, devoid of
anything too politically charged in nature. Technique, in the same song, notes that while
there is a market for a variety of odd fetishes, one “can’t find one for cultured, hardcore,
reality hip hop” (Technique). The second (albeit complementary) edge of this exclusion
may be a refusal to participate in the money game that dictates behavior (and discourse)
in hip hop. Here, Technique points to two distinct identities for artists in hip hop: the
“niggas talking about the same shit with the same flow over the same candy-ass beats”
and those that “refuse to feed the machine” (Technique). He closes, in his own
aggressive style, by calling for underground artists to recognize the value of their
contribution to hip hop as a whole while still thrusting out a middle finger at those that
attempt to belittle his style and approach to hip hop.
Thus one can see continuity of this same pattern. An articulation of two distinct
artist identities within hip hop, a refusal to conform to normative assumptions regarding
artist behavior and lyrical content, and an attempt to carve out a distinct discursive space
reserved for those members of the hip hop community that don’t see room for their voice
in the mainstream (public) space of hip hop.
“Industrial Revolution” is a commentary on Technique’s perceived problems with
the record industry. It begins in a familiar fashion, with Technique boasting about his
lyrical genius, but it quickly moves back to the heart of his overarching critique. He
accuses record companies of having insidious motives that threaten the very core of his
artistic space. He notes that record executives “offered me a deal and a blanket full of
smallpox” (Technique, Industrial Revolution). The metaphor here ties nicely back in to
his earlier connection of capitalism and colonialism. The allusion to the destruction of
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Native American populations draws a comparison to the ways in which record executives
manipulate the mainstream to serve their own interests, pretending to serve a positive
interest while forcing conformity to industry norms. While this critique of capitalist
interest and hip hop industry standards is, as noted, a key part of his larger criticism, this
doesn’t seem to diverge from any other instantiations contained in other songs on the
album. He does remark, in the second verse, that he wants a sizable sum of money just
like “the Bush Administration gave to the Taliban” – a rather obvious allusion to a
historical narrative that rings across all three albums, implicating American government
as creating the conditions for terrorist organization. He concludes the song by identifying
himself as “stuck in the underground” and positioned in opposition to rappers that have
platinum albums but are all “gimmick” - another example of carving out this distinction
between the public of hip hop and Technique’s particular counterpublic (Technique,
Industrial Revolution).
While “Industrial Revolution” seems to continue the same themes of the previous
tracks, there is something rhetorically significant about the act of narrative repetition and
the ways in which it contributes to a more cohesive, persuasive message. It is difficult to
argue against the power of skillful repetition as an aid to identification. These slightly
varied messages may contribute to a feeling of connection among varied audience
members within this counterpublic space by tapping into slightly different ways of
thinking through Technique’s similar but nuanced criticisms. This narrative repetition,
then, is part of a larger strategy among members of this counterpublic to fill the
discursive space with repeated challenges to a series of dominant ideologies (elitism,
racism, capitalist forces).
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“Homeland and Hip Hop” takes an interesting departure from the previous songs
by invoking the voice of Mumia Abu Jamal to comment on the oxymoronic notion of
Homeland Security.14 Still, it may be (in the same company as Lif’s “Home of the
Brave”), one of the quintessential songs on the album for the purposes of advancing a
simultaneous critique of both hip hop and political policy (thus getting to the heart of this
thesis). Mumia discusses the ways in which Homeland Security, when read through the
world of hip hop in America, reveals a wide disparity that seems to mirror the large richpoor gap that is characteristic of both hip hop culture and America more broadly. It
seems to also trace the division within hip hop that speaks to the presence of this
counterpublic space, one reserved for those still struggling to find a platform for
articulating the needs of the disenfranchised. Mumia speaks to the distinct absence of
security within the historical development of hip hop culture. He notes that:
the music arises from a generation that feels, with some justice, that they have
been betrayed by those who came before them, that they are at best tolerated in
schools, feared on the streets, and almost inevitably destined for the hell holes of
prison. They grew up hungry, hated, and unloved, and this is the psychic fuel that
generates the anger that seems endemic in much of the music and poetry.
(Technique, Homeland and Hip Hop)
It is this history of hip hop, born from a space of fear, anger, and betrayal, that makes the
genre (and cultural space) ripe for the production of alternate, oppositional discourses.
While Mumia speaks to a disconnect in the larger public of America, one that gave rise to
14
Mumia is a surprisingly well-published political and social activist given his social location as prison
inmate. Sentenced to death in 1982 for the murder of a police officer, Mumia has long been the focus of a
series of internationally supported campaigns for prisoner justice. His death sentence was successfully
overturned but he still faces life in prison. He still actively publishes works geared toward racism, poverty,
war, and social justice broadly. It is, thus, no coincidence that he serves as a source of inspiration for
members of the underground.
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the alternate public of hip hop, Technique’s overarching critique of capitalist interest
driving the hip hop industry points to a clear division within the genre/culture itself.
Paris’ album has a string of tracks that represent, for me, a lull in the album, not
because they don’t have important messages but because they seem to represent the same
set of themes that, while intriguing, do not add to my particular argument about works in
response to a particular historical moment and the ensuing ideologies that circulate
around that moment. “Ain’t no Love,” “Lay Low,” “Life Goes On,” and “You Know my
Name” all continue the general criticism of mainstream hip hop and hip hop artists.
Whether it is an expression that there “ain’t no love” for “fake rappers” or a call to resist
the elements of materialism and the series of negative stereotypes about Black people
and/or hip hop artists, this collection of songs do not move toward any active critique of
specific political or social conditions or relationships outside of hip hop. Nonetheless,
they continue the larger theme of positioning Paris, and his work, in opposition to a
particular public space that serves the interest of material needs, negative stereotyping,
the denigration of women, the glorification of violence without purpose, and a general
level of complacency engendered by mainstream hip hop. Like Technique and Lif, Paris
is doing work to position himself in a space outside of the mainstream while
simultaneously questioning the members and norms of the mainstream that drives him to
seek out this counterpublic space.
Group Three – Elements of Counterpublics
The final set of themes identifies the works as distinctly counterpublic discursive
products. This includes their movement across/through public spaces, their explicit self-
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identification as members of this marginalized group of “underground” hip hop artists,
and, most importantly, their urgings for a desired change (within hip hop, their
communities, and across larger socio-political arrangements). These themes help to
provide the final articulation of how these spaces function to interact with the larger
spaces of hip hop and beyond.
Dialogue with Publics
A critical element of any counterpublic discursive space is that it engages in
dialogue/dialectic with public spaces (Warner, 2002; Brouwer, 2006). The public spaces
with which these artists engage, and the manner in which that engagement takes place,
illuminate a greater understanding of how the underground operates. One of the ways in
which this dialectic is made manifest can be observed in the process of code switching
between lyrical styles common to both the underground and the mainstream. While code
switching may be more popularly understood as the literal transitioning between two
different languages, we can also understand it as a movement of mixing linguistic styles.
In this case, there are certain forms that are stereotypical of mainstream spaces but when
utilized by members of the underground, represent a dialogue between the two spaces.
The first full track on Emergency Rations, “Jugular Vein,” seems to be more an
introduction of Lif as a rapper and a simple brag to other MCs that Lif’s lyrical prowess
is superior. However, this track borrows from traditional tropes that seem to circulate
from hip hop writ large that work to situate Lif as part of – and separate from – a
particular discursive community. The most popular (and oft-used) trope involves a
professing of one’s skill as a rapper while simultaneously implicating other MCs as
significantly less adept at their craft. Lif raps: “Over the years I’ve tried to sit back and
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watch niggas that think they top notch / what did I spot? Niggas is sub-par / so I came to
claim your jugular vein” (Lif, Jugular Vein). This blending of lyrical styles and subject
matter (stereotypical of both the mainstream and the underground) helps keep artists like
Lif situated within the larger hip hop community, while still demonstrating his need for a
separate discursive space to articulate potentially controversial messages. As discussed,
the distinction between publics and counterpublics is less cut and dry than one might
hope for, paving the way for elements of the former to present itself in the latter (and vice
versa). “Jugular Vein,” then, demonstrates how the typical lyrical content of the hip
hop’s public makes its way into an otherwise counterpublic space. As noted, the
dominant styles and subject matter are dictated by big business influences and generally
revolve around either rather vacuous content (partying, sex, drinking and drug use) with
looped, simple pop beats, or only surface level commentary on social and/or political
issues. My articulation of the underground is one that features both more complex lyrical
content as well as more aggressive and/or jarring beats. Lif certainly has a unique set of
produced beats, but blends deeper content with more surface level lyrics that simply
revolve around bragging about his competency as a rapper.
Lif’s “Heavy Artillery,” like works of the other artists featured in this thesis, does
dip into the patterns of many operating within the larger, public space of hip hop. There
is an element of bravado that seems endemic to hip hop as a genre and there is no
shortage of it in “Heavy Artillery”. Lif brags of his lyrical might, even describing
himself as “the god Lif.”15 But this overt declaration of lyrical strength seems less
conceited in the midst of such forceful demonstration of the veracity of his claims. As
15
Invoking religious themes/terminology is an element of all three albums that I explore in another section.
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the old adage goes, it ain’t bragging if it’s true.16 The work, in this sense, is consistent
with both McLaren (2000) and Folami (2007) and their articulation of the “gangsta rap”
origins of counterpublic voices in hip hop. Though Lif exhibits some of the qualities of
his predecessors, he nonetheless represents a divergence from the more mainstream,
modern manifestations of “gangsta rap.” Thus he is, perhaps, more Public Enemy (old
school, “gangsta rap” pioneers) than, say 50 Cent (perhaps “gansta” on the surface but
lacking any real depth to his messages). While Public Enemy and 50 Cent both engaged
the stylistic bravado, the former (and Lif) weaves that theme in and out of more
substantive criticisms of social and political conditions, rather than 50 Cent’s more
common tactic of bravado for the sake of bravado. The borrowing of certain techniques
(infusion of bragging, song structure that is aggressive or clipped, stylistic changes in
volume and tenor, more politicized album art) from past spaces of dissent is, of course,
not a practice unique to hip hop. One finds, across counterpublics, certain thematic
similarities. Thus it should not be too surprising that past and present hip hop
counterpublics share certain tendencies as well. Lif is reinventing the counterpublic style
and content of early “gansta rap” counterpublic voices, this time oriented around a
concern for the various narratives on the War on Terror propagated by government and
media elites. The use of techniques (such as boasting about one’s lyrical prowess) that
are prevalent in both the mainstream and underground demonstrates the dialectic at play
between the publics and counterpublics of hip hop. This connection is, for Warner
(2002), a critical element to understanding the functioning of counterpublic spaces.
16
“Old” here is, of course, a relative term, but many attribute this particular statement of bravado to the
great American boxer Muhammad Ali, famous Alabama football coach Bear Bryant, and Baseball hall of
famer Dizzy Dean.
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Interestingly, Lif bookends the album by invoking the same type of bravado in the
final track, “I, Phantom” (He raps, “I’m kind, friendly, your worst enemy / Charming,
crass, and potentially dangerous”). We find the same type of bragging style employed by
Technique in “The Message and the Money,” “Homeland and Hip Hop,” and “The Cause
of Death.” Paris adds his own demonstration of dialectic with the public of hip hop in
various places across his album, notably in “Field Nigga Boogie,” “You Know My
Name,” and “How we do”. Brouwer’s (2006) articulation of the three elements of
counterpublic spaces demands that they engage in a dialogue with other publics. Thus
we have dialogue between (and across) Lif’s particular counterpublic space and the larger
public of hip hop as well as even broader publics devoted to political discussion of
American government and/or military policy.
Using common lyrical strategies oft-employed in the mainstream (boastful claims
about the rapper’s own prowess accompanied by insults/put-downs about some abstract
members of the hip hop community) helps to situate Lif as a member of the larger hip
hop public, but his divergence is represented by the majority of his lyrical content
devoted to active social and/or political criticism. But this demonstration of prowess, this
code switching of sorts between mainstream and underground approaches, is also a
rhetorical move. There is an attempt at establishing identification across publics such
that members of the larger public space might feel a connection with Lif. Or perhaps
“constitution” is a more appropriate label than identification (Burke, 1945). Members of
the larger hip hop community, for example, may share a particular substance
(connections that range from race/ethnicity, to socioeconomic status, to a basic
appreciation for a particular arrangement of words and sounds). Of course, as people,
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Burke suggests that we all share a linguistic substance; that is, we are all symbol using.
The constitution of hip hop, then, is a certain shared discursive substance. There is a
particular form of expression that echoes across most (if not all) iterations of the genre.
This boastful, bravado-laden style is repeated again and again, across the history of hip
hop and transcendent of artist background, public popularity, or affiliation within either
the mainstream or underground. This discursive constitution, then, serves as an
indication of a shared substance across members (audience and artists) of hip hop publics
and counterpublics.
I distinguish “dialogue with publics” from active criticism of the discourse
circulating within public spaces (a theme analyzed in later pages) because this is a
distinct element of counterpublic spaces. While the counterpublic space of the
underground functions by employing the key constitutive elements of counterpublics, my
interest here is in the ways in which this space specifically engages in dialogues that
connect, rather than establish distant between, discursive spaces. But before discussing
the content of these artists’ critiques of various public narratives, an important theme that
connects dialogue and criticism is the artist situating themselves as in possession of some
knowledge base that individuals in public spaces cannot (or will not) demonstrate.
Membership in the Underground
Of equal importance to the criticism of public spaces (and particularly the mainstream) is
the declaration of one’s membership in the oppositional, counterpublic space. The artists
each do careful work to articulate exactly how and why they affiliate themselves with the
underground, and the importance they attach to that affiliation.
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Technique’s album opens with a very brief introduction laying out the name of
the album (“This is Revolutionary, volume two”). I mention this 12-second “song”
because the “celebrity” introduction is delivered by Black revolutionary figure and
former death row inmate Mumia Abu Jamal. The tone is immediately set for a patchwork
narrative aimed at criticizing the same larger structures of inequality that Mumia has
spent years writing/speaking on from prison: social ills primarily centered around racism
and poverty but extending to issues of (so-called) national security. At the same time,
this “celebrity introduction” helps to situate Technique as a member of the underground;
a hip hop artist devoted to active critique and/or social activism. The audience benefits
by being aware of the works and/or story of Mumia so as to truly grasp the enormity of
this introduction, but this is also an element of Technique situating himself within this
particular counterpublic space. There is an expectation that one adopts or assumes some
familiarity with revolutionary figures: pre-existing voices of the underground. In this
sense, the discourse of underground hip hop is quite self-referential. Artists will
constantly invoke past members or other marginalized voices in the search for social
justice. One need to be an insider to grasp the basic forms of criticism at play in these
songs, but insider knowledge affords audience members access to a greater level of depth
to these criticisms.
“I, Phantom” is the final track on Emergency Rations and an intriguing conclusion
that situates the figure of the artist as firmly positioned outside of hip hop’s public.
Indeed, his declaration of himself as a ghostly phenomenon (“I, phantom”) is a strikingly
overt statement of his feeling of disconnect with the living world of hip hop. It also
serves to place Lif outside of any public discursive space. As he explains, “You won’t
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hear me because I got no loot. You don’t hear me because you don’t compute. I’m
docile, psycho, have you heard of such? I’m invisible and impossible to touch” (Lif,
Phantom). What better way to articulate the voice(s) of a counterpublic than as ghosts
haunting the public sphere? There is a presence that one feels, but it cannot be fully
articulated in a public space. He occupies the physical space of the public but has no
voice. Indeed, Lif identifies himself as “a man in purgatory” and “living in oblivion”
(Lif, Phantom). This position in purgatory reflects both the imprint that he leaves on
public spaces while still residing on the periphery. It is also, perhaps, a feeling of
disconnect from the discourses circulating in public spaces, particularly the public of
mainstream hip hop. The counterpublic space of the underground affords Lif the ability
to reside in a space outside of the public while still engaging it in dialogue. This dialogue
is of critical importance because it affords the production of a set of rhetorical artifacts
that permit Lif to engage in a recuperative or redemptive process. “Phantom” serves as a
working through of Lif’s relationship to the public of hip hop while simultaneously
affording the listener the opportunity to work through their own potential feelings of
dissonance.
Following the trend of the album, he positions the narratives circulating in public
spaces as stale and contrived. He notes “I turn on the TV, I see crime. Script written
diligently and aired on time” (Lif, Phantom). The popular, public narrative is rejected
and Lif demonstrates a desire to serve as an alternate (counter) narrator to that of the
popular news media. Lif’s critique intensifies as the song builds. He offers up the (rather
common) suggestion that the media is controlled by financial powers that dictate the
nature of the narrative. He raps, “Reality in this world is bought and sold, a very limited
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scope of life is shown, And I’m just one of the mold, fully controlled, Left to erode in my
humble abode” (Lif, Phantom). Moving beyond the original criticism that the retelling of
events is scripted in advance, Lif gestures toward a certain level of complacency that
continues to sustain these pre-ordained depictions of reality.
At the same time he still demonstrates a feeling of disconnect (indeed, a split
personality of sorts) as he attempts to negotiate between the two spaces (mainstream and
underground) in hip hop. This dual figure, on one hand: the “radio pirate,” the “felon,”
the “pimp with his pockets swelllin’” (Life, Phantom) on the other: this hip hop
revolutionary: a “pre-med, 3-D dread, an academic reject” (Lif, Phantom) struggles to
situate his voice or establish a clear identity for his audience. But perhaps it is this dual
identity that gives him a unique perspective on the discursive landscape of hip hop
culture. In this same way, his position becomes uniquely counterpublic. While he has
some level of access to a variety of publics, he cannot feel fully comfortable expressing
the full range of himself within the public space, thus driving his need to help construct a
counterpublic. He goes as far as to discuss the construction of his dual self as “based on
identities public and private” (Lif, Phantom). Though the conditions have changed since
Habermas took on that duality, Lif’s reference to the split is not lost on this analyst.
There is a call for change implicit in this closing track. Lif’s call is both an eye
opener for individuals contemplating alternative explanations and/or readings of history
as well as a move for the recognition of these ghostly figures. The “single mother,” the
“office worker,” those “caught up in the system” have all become phantasmic in the
way(s) that society pushes their voices/concerns to the periphery. Lif’s call for change is
also a demand for the writing of a new story. He rhymes, “I dare you to check new
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territory. American Dream? Time for another story. One where I don’t choke to keep
afloat. I’m sick of living on visions of false hope” (Lif, Phantom). There is something
powerful in this final comparison of the standard narrative to that of choking. Lif is
perhaps “choking on” the discourse circulating in public spaces because he finds it
inedible. At the same time the stifling norms of mainstream spaces “choke the life out
of” hip hop intellectuals/revolutionaries such as Lif, Technique, and Paris. The public
space of hip hop, and the larger American public, are uninhabitable terrain for members
of the underground that dare contest the narratives circulated in those spaces.
Desire for Change
Perhaps the thematic element that best typifies the key components of critical discourse
analysis is that represented by the language choices framing a desire for change. While
the language choices of these albums are largely critical, they are often framed in
conjunction with discussions for changing the problematic state of things (hip hop itself,
the American music industry, social relations, political decision-making and the
narratives that inform and/or justify them). This framing of change ranges from asking
the audience to rethink previously held assumptions about the power relationships that
inform hip hop, to demanding answers to difficult questions about the political. After all,
what is more rhetorical than an urge to change our minds and demand explanations to
questionable answers?
“One” provides a fitting ending to Technique’s album, speaking to the coming
together of like-minded individuals driven by a desire to engage a discursive space
outside of mainstream hip hop. It is the final urge to reject the influence of elites, to seek
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answers to questions that aren’t posed in public spaces, to unite around a common feeling
of exclusion and a desire to question forces of domination. Technique concludes:
Remember that history isn’t the way the corporate-controlled media made it look
like. Read between the lines and free your mind. Revolution is the birth of
equality and the antithesis of oppression. But this is only built for real
motherfuckers. So when I’m gone, don’t let nobody I never got along with try to
make songs kissing my ass, recycling my beats or my vocals. This shit is real
over here, man. Thank you for listening and thank you for supporting
independent hip hop, the heart and soul of our culture. Keep the truth alive.
(Technique, One)
“The Unorthodox” (Mr. Lif) is an interesting thought experiment on a not-sodistant future. While the notion of afro-futurism is an interesting meditation on another
potential counterpublic strand of Black cultural expression, this particular track is less a
piece of speculative fiction and more a warning about how our failure to truly meditate
on the present could have (unexplained) consequences for future generations.17 Again Lif
seems to be intent on articulating a strong need for change, a theme present across the
album. More specifically, this track seems to push deeper into the (aforementioned)
theme that I suggest as constitutive of this counterpublic space: the dissemination of
unauthorized or forbidden information. But it is not simply the dissemination of an
alternative narrative, but a new narrative positioned in contrast to the one dominating the
larger public space of the United States. Lif raps:
I come home and watch the news after stagnating all day. Just press play, cool
out, sit back and relax. And gobble up an earful of these undelivered raps. And
just think that perhaps what we think matters. Delve into yourself and rediscover
once forbidden data. (Lif, The Unorthodox)
17
Afro-futurism is an Afrocentric offshoot of speculative fiction, combining afrocentric themes with
science fiction or fantasy, generally expressed through literature, music, and/or art. Within Black musical
expression, much of George Clinton’s work might be considered futurist. In hip hop, the group Deltron
3030 may be the most quintessential iteration of the afro-futurist motif.
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There is both the rejection of the public (news) space as a complacent position followed
by the call to look internally. This call inward is also an intriguing thematic element
across albums. A critical element of the rhetorical presentation within the counterpublic
is both a rejection of the presented narratives from the larger public and a suggestion to
engage in a more intuition-based form of critical thinking. Lif seems to be suggesting
that we not simply blindly accept information circulated in the public space and, instead,
engage this counterpublic space as a vehicle for more personal acts of critical thinking
and narrative reconstruction.
Immortal Technique concludes his song “Harlem Streets” with a strong
articulation of the need for change. Here he employs a two-pronged approach to this
process. First he expresses the desire for change, identifying himself as a catalyst. This
involves describing himself as “sick of feeling impotent” and how his concern for the
future prompts him to “educate my fam” (Technique, Harlem Streets). Second, he
criticizes those that aren’t motivated by his declaration for change. He raps: “And if you
can't acknowledge the reality of my words, you just another stupid motherfucker out on
the curb” (Technique, Harlem Streets). This second element is intriguing (and a topic for
later discussion) mostly because it identifies one way in which the counterpublic space
constructed for and by these artists, prompted by a feeling of exclusion, affords its own
set of discriminatory practices.
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Chapter 5: The Outro - Conclusions and Implications of Analysis
Conclusions
This work sought to engage whether we could envision a content-driven counterpublic
space within hip hop, and, if so, the ways in which this space was engaged rhetorically to
challenge dominant modes of discourse and invite a questioning of previously held
assumptions about politics, media, and corporate interest. Given Brouwer’s (2006) rather
loose set of three constitutive elements for a counterpublic space (expression of
opposition, constitution of discursive spaces, and participation in multiple publics), it
seems fair to conclude that the works of artist such as Mr. Lif, Immortal Technique, and
Paris do contribute to the construction of (and engagement with) such a space.
The striking comparison between Lif’s “Home of the Brave” and Technique’s
“Cause of Death” is, perhaps, the most striking example to substantiate my assertion that
these three are bound by a series of themes but, more importantly, a common narrative
thread. While Sonic Jihad concludes with the track “How we do,” a commentary on the
role of the rap revolutionary, it is the narrative on 9/11 and the War on Terror that brings
a fitting conclusion to his rhetorical play, helping to situate him within this counterpublic
space. Bound by a shared ideology, a disdain for the mainstream (and, indeed, a feeling
of marginalization or outright censorship in mainstream spaces), and a desire to reach out
to an audience yearning for change, all three of these albums carefully weave together a
critique of hip hop publics, racial interaction, capitalist interests, and geopolitical
decision-making that demands their construction of this subaltern space and challenges us
to not only engage in that space, but use that engagement to motivate action.
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The first set of research questions are explicated in the analysis section, itself.
The selected texts exhibit a variety of rhetorical tropes, primarily demonstrated through
the use of Burke’s master tropes (metaphor, metonymy, and synecdoche). While there
are, undoubtedly, a number of theoretical approaches one could bring to bear on the
rhetorical nature of underground hip hop, Burke provided a particular lens for examining
the form of these three albums. While the social and political critiques are both nuanced
and complex, I have broken them down into three large categories each composed of a
few smaller elements. This categorization helps illuminate the ways in which hip hop
offers both diverse and sustained critiques of power structures and relationships all
packed within single units of text.
I began with the conclusion that underground hip hop is a counterpublic space.
This is fairly well-articulated and substantiated by previous literature analyzing the
discursive spaces of hip hop (Pough, 2005; Rose 2008). What I sought to evaluate was
precisely how that space presented itself. The analysis suggests that there a few
additional conclusions/responses connected to this query. First, this space seizes
rhetorical situations to magnify issues pertaining to marginalization within hip hop. In
this instance, the events surrounding 9/11 served as a topic for underground artists to flex
their critical muscle while also advancing their more sustained critiques of the hip hop
industry itself. Of course, those critiques of hip hop came in many forms and they
weaved these criticisms via a series of sophisticated rhetorical practices and through a
myriad of other nuanced critiques ranging from international political issues to the schism
they identify within hip hop itself, centered around concerns over capital.
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Second, and connected to the final element of the first conclusion, economic
forces are the driving factors that both define and police the boundary between the public
and counterpublic spaces within hip hop. All three artists are consistent in their
articulation of both the broad evils of capitalism (general concerns over distribution of
wealth, the global reach and power of international financial institutions, the social and
political benefits afforded to economic elites) as well as the particular ways in which
money serves as the primary determinant of which artists (albums, songs) are actively
promoted in public spaces and which ones are actively marginalized.
Third, I suggested early on that counterpublic theory allowed one to examine a
space like hip hop to reveal a multiplicity at play. While analysis revealed a depth to the
level of argumentation within each text, it also speaks to (albeit via a small sample size)
the multiplicity of voices within the counterpublic space of the underground, and the
value of this multiplicity. Still, this conclusion deserves some parsing out.
This is, perhaps, clarified by unpacking how these three seemingly similar artists
(and works) suggest such a multiplicity. After all, their messages and tactics are
strikingly similar. Indeed, what typifies “the underground” broadly is a similarity of
message (a level of consciousness to problematic power structures both inside and
outside of hip hop). Nonetheless, I find that there exists a significant multiplicity in a
couple of ways. First, these artists point to different levels of diversity of perspective –
from a Colombian-born 37-year old living in New York City, to a 48-year old African
American born and raised on the West Coast. Rose’s (2008) more detailed (though
certainly not exhaustive) list gestures toward an even greater level of diversity of
background. Second, various groups within the underground utilize different vehicles (or
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entry points) to deliver their messages. While I articulate this grouping as seizing the
emotional and intellectual fervor surrounding 9/11, others rely on issues ranging from
their experiences with the criminal justice system, to the emotional scars and bitterness
associated with failed relationships. Each artist embraces a vehicle for criticism that
resonates with/for them and across particular slivers of the audience base. This aids in
the construction of a diverse discursive space that still revolves around a core, shared set
of concerns.
Implications
While the analysis section demonstrated one particular reading of the rhetorical forms
and functions of these specific texts, I am still left to resolve the second set of research
questions: what was the value of this exercise in analysis and discussion of these albums?
What does the invocation of publics and counterpublics, as a theoretical lens, do either
for those involved in the production and consumption of this discourse or for those
engaged in the study of rhetoric? How does the exercise in thinking about these artists as
contributors to a specific counterpublic discursive space engage power structures or
ideologies? I conclude by suggesting a series of implications of this research.
My choice of using critical discourse analysis was to help illuminate the ways in
which the discourse choices of these three artists challenge certain power structures while
simultaneously shaping a path for change. Technique’s challenge in “Harlem Streets”
typifies that point. While my research questions focused on understanding the particular
forms and functions of this counterpublic space, I also asked what this analysis does to
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promote change (in the study of rhetoric, race, the political) and the analysis brought
forth some insight into the ways that these artists advance change-promoting discourse. I
argue that this carries with it a few implications.
Understanding how hip hop (as an art form, medium, and culture) represents a
multiplicity of voices paves the wave for an examination of the nuances that make
possible specific forms of critique, mobilization of various marginalized groups, and the
enunciation of the concerns and/or needs of emerging populations. This is particularly
true when considered in the context of publics and counterpublics, spaces that are ripe for
the articulation of such needs. As Pough (2004) explains:
The Black public sphere does not represent a monolithic Blackness but rather
shows variety and multiplicity. Thus the Black alternative and counterpublics,
while not entirely rejecting Habermas’s bourgeoisie public sphere, extend and
expand on Habermas in order to create a more relevant discussion that prevents
exclusion, encourages intersections, and evokes change. (Pough, 2004, 34)
This, then, has implications for those engaged in research and analysis on the value of
counterpublics. Work in the specific marginalized of Black populations can engage and
expand on articulations of counterpublic spaces that engage identity politics but might be
more specifically centered in shared ideological concerns. Examining the intersection
between identity and ideology can help broaden approaches to social movements or
varying articulations/practices of dissent.
Specifically within Black communities, an articulation of different spaces within
hip hop, long a source for the expression of Black concerns and the articulation of
resistance to oppressive forces that historically (and continually) implicate Black lives,
new articulations of counterpublic spaces affords a recognition of the ways in which
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Black concerns differ and, thus, need to be addressed differently. Again, Pough (2004)
clarifies:
By complicating and further nuancing the notion of subaltern counterpublic
spheres, we are able to break apart notions of a monolithic Black community that
has one set of goals and one set of means by which to obtain those goals. We are
able to see not only difference within Black communities but also the ways in
which various factions of Black communities sometimes oppress one another.”
(Pough, 2004, 35)
This notion of oppressive forces within a distinct community seems particularly
important when we consider the dueling forces in hip hop, often set in opposition by
distinct class lines. Thus the intersections of race, class, and political ideology are
problematized in ways that can expand approaches to critical rhetoric.
An emphasis on the ways in which these spaces operate rhetorically allows for
continued praxis geared toward the mobilization of populations in response to forces of
domination. Combining particular Black revolutionary aesthetics with counterpublic
theory expands the critical potential of this area of research. Pugh (2004) concludes:
I think the public spaces discussed here highlight several that are ripe for critique
and transformation of the existing order. And I know that with a little
imagination we can make full use of them. We need to change the way we think
about these issues from rational to imaginative. As Audre Lorde reminds us,
‘The master’s tools will never dismantle the master’s house.’ Thus being rational
about this will not eliminate the many problems that confront us.” (Pough, 2004,
221)
Thinking through the ways in which we can apply theories of publics and counterpublics
to previously underdeveloped areas of discussion opens up this space for imaginative
politics. Given the rather pessimistic elements of many discussions on rhetoric and race,
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injecting new theoretical avenues both opens up different ways of thinking through the
rhetorical power and potential of spaces within hip hop and affords a broadening of our
approaches, as rhetorical scholars, to issues of race. Rhetorical scholar Mark McPhail
suggests that work aimed at the rhetoric of racism must build off of current approaches to
race and rhetoric “in a manner that allows for an exploration of racism which both
integrates and moves beyond traditional rhetorical theory and practice” (McPhail, 2002,
16). Similarly, political rhetoric benefits from the expanded speculation of previously
untapped venues for the practice of political critique. While music writ large is certainly
not uncharted territory within the study of political narrative and/or rhetoric, hip hop
scholars (Rose, Dyson, Potter, Pough, to name a few) certainly conclude that more work
can be done to connect these two fields of study.
In terms of political rhetoric, examining and expanding on the multiplicity of
ways in which political messages are delivered and disseminated opens up space for
engaging new platforms previously not articulated (or recently abandoned) as political.
While hip hop had a strong emphasis on politically minded rhetoric in the 1980s (and
early 1990s), scholars have expressed concern that the genre has lost that political
potency. Identifying and analyzing more recent manifestations of politicized hip hop reopens the door for new discussions on the future of rap, or music more broadly, as a
vibrant sight for politically-driven messages. When combined with a setting primarily
driven by a particular racial history and unique form of expression, further work on hip
hop might uncover new ways in which the publics and counterpublics of this cultural
space have shifted or evolved to meet the particular temporal concerns of the time. Even
more, this gestures to future work that may explore how the ways in which we
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conceptualize publics and counterpublics shape and direct research agendas. This often
happens in ways that, when done in broad strokes, miss the unique challenges,
disntinctions, cultures, and progressive possibilities illuminated by the narrow focus
taken herein.
An additional implication of import (for this author), this work invites further
investigation into a group of artists, and accompanying ideological perspective, that is
often overlooked or under-covered in both academic and broader public spaces. Given
the difficulty in drawing any effects-based conclusions about the work of these artists,
drawing them back into discussion on hip hop presents an opportunity for others to
experience the unique styles and content of artist that do not get the attention or credit
that they so richly deserve.
Finally, and perhaps most importantly, tapping into a previously unexplored space
– the nexus between underground hip hop, theories of publics and counterpublics, and
rhetorical theory – makes possible a bridging of theoretical terrains and/or media. This
bridging has enormous potential to establish additional linkages for the benefit of
improved social and political praxis. Hip hop’s history and sustained practice of critique,
combined with the theorization on the persuasive power of symbol use aids in the
understanding of how different social and/or cultural groups coalesce to engage in
resistance practices. Understanding how this practices interact across discursive
landscapes can inform future projects (both in academia and “the real world”) geared
toward dismantling systems of power that result in the marginalization of minority
populations. By no means does this work directly participate in the destruction of
economic elites that privilege a tame, normalized expression of hip hop while pushing
111
more critical voices to the periphery, but perhaps invoking new theoretical perspectives
to help understand the relationship between these voices is the first step toward the
development of practices capable of producing substantive change. As Immortal
Technique said, “The more that MCs, producers, DJs, and independent labels start to
grasp the conceptuality of what their contribution to the business of hip hop is, rather than
just the music, the more the industry will be forced to change” (Technique, The Message
and the Money).
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Discography
Immortal Technique, (2003). Revolutionary Vol. 2. Harlem, NY: Viper Records.
Mr. Lif. (2002). Emergency Rations. New York City, NY: Definitive Jux.
Paris. (2003). Sonic Jihad. Danville, CA: Guerilla Funk Records.
Public Enemy. (1989). It Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold us Back. Washington D.C.:
Columbia Records.
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