Hip Hop’s Future in the University
Written as a reflection upon the lecture series Getting Real: The Future of Hip Hop Studies Scholarship at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
At the first presentation for the lecture series Getting Real: The Future of Hip Hop Studies Scholarship, authors Jeff Chang and Mark Anthony Neal provided a backbone to understanding that one’s identity within hip hop culture can have a vital synthesis with one’s academic pursuits. Hip hop goes well beyond just the four artistic elements with which it is most commonly associated. As Neal described it, hip hop is a culturally specific movement that allows one to engage with the world around you in an expressive and artistic manner. This means that as a culture, it can be expected to move beyond its origins as an art form birthed in the inner cities of America, and that becoming a part of academia is a natural progression. Though some may suggest that hip hop arriving at the university level is a signal of its demise, Chang says that instead it is a sign that hip hop has made history and should no longer be ignored by the academy.
As a commodity, hip hop has long had a disconnect between the artists and the individuals responsible for promoting that product. Now that hip hop art has appeared to have bridged many of these gaps, Neal suggests that the next connection that needs to be made is within the academy. He describes the current state of hip hop studies as a cottage industry, where the innovators find themselves outside of the established curriculums of the universities. While that may work to the benefit of established writers like Chang and Neal, who are readily called upon for their expertise in the field, the future of this new academia relies upon an expanded inclusiveness of new writers and ideas. With more and more scholars developing ideas within the context of hip hop culture, new connections within universities are bound to take hold.
Hip hop’s rebellious nature should also be considered academically, since its strength has always come from its tendency to question authoritative voices and established modes. When well applied, this confrontation has long been regarded as a core element of any kind of innovation, whether that is in social movements, educational modes or even scientific developments. In addition, this will add to the layers of viability and excitement within the culture, which continues to find ways to include new voices throughout the world, representing unique struggles and breaking old boundaries.
As new voices continue to get added to the dialogue of hip hop, the spaces in which they interact become increasingly important. Hip hop may have started out in the communities, but over the years this has continually evolved with the development of technologies. S. Craig Watkins, a professor in the Radio-Television-Film and Sociology and the Center for African and African American Studies at the University of Texas at Austin, presented the second lecture in the Getting Real series, where he discussed young people’s interaction with hip hop in the digital age. He explained his notion of a Digital Underground, an online culture where youth are comfortable connecting with each other and sharing new ideas and art within different communities. These spaces offer outlets for the traditional mobilizers of the culture, the DJs, writers, journalists, photographers and activists, as well as those engaged in newer digital modes like graphic arts and blogging. As Watkins puts it, the digital sphere is the new town square where all are invited to participate.
One concept that results from this participation is that audiences are no longer set up to be passive consumers of the culture, rather they are now active citizens in these digital spaces with the opportunity to contribute. This helps ease any burden of being weighed down by cultural legacies of the hip hop canon, which is important to a generation that is growing up in an era where new mediums are constantly taking form. Young people are being encouraged to participate based upon their own interests and talents, with the only prerequisite seemingly being their own creative expression. Regardless of the openness of hip hop in a digital culture, this presence of creativity, like their predecessors, is subjected to intense criticism within the movement itself.
Watkins describes three tensions that have been present in hip hop culture from its origins until the current day: the subversive versus the commercial, grassroots versus mainstream, and the creative versus the formulaic. Regardless of the space in which people operate, these are important tensions to recognize, because they represent not only authenticity of expression, but ultimately who is allowed to maintain ownership over that expression. For hip hop studies in the universities this is important to recognize, because one of the risks of bringing the culture to the academy is that the academy could then claim ownership. One way that the Getting Real series is vital is that it is engaging individuals to maintain their hip hop identity while they engage in other academic realms, while at the same time acting as gatekeepers of cultural authenticity.
