Stereotypical Backgrounds in Hip-Hop and Rap

Music today has heavily evolved from the music our parents and grandparents enjoyed. Almost all music is now most readily available in digital form, through programs like iTunes and Rhapsody. This has lead to many changes in how different genres of music and their listeners are viewed. Psychologists have argued that people can make many accurate assumptions about a person based on their musical taste, commonly by judging what is on their favorite playlist. In Benny Evangelista’s “You Are What’s on Your Playlist” he quotes Christopher Breen when saying “It’s similar to when “your mother tells you always to wear clean underwear because you never know if you’re going to end up in the emergency room, now you have to worry if someone sees you have ‘Me and You and a Dog Named Boo’ in your music collection.”(Evangelista 283) Situations like this worry people today because there are so many different stereotypes associated with every genre of music. If you have the wrong artist, group, or artists on your playlist, you could be categorized as different, weird, or “uncool”. Evangelista also writes, “The old adage used to be ‘you are what you eat.’ But with the advent of digital music and the popularity of gadgets like the iPod, now it’s ‘you are what’s on your playlist.’”(Evangelista 281-282) Almost every popular artist today has certain thoughts and stereotypes associated with them. These stereotypes could come from the artist’s lyrics themselves, their appearance, or maybe even their personal lives. One thing is for sure, the stereotype an artist projects has to start somewhere, whether it be from their childhood, personal experiences, or other influences.

            An artist’s childhood and uprising could greatly affect the type of music they produce when they are older. Many Hip-Hop/Rap artists for example tend to write lyrics about growing up and living in difficult situations. This could be a result of the feedback and popularity lyrics about these situations generate, seeing that many of the most popular artists from this genre have similar backgrounds. Two of the earliest and the most popular rappers 2-Pac and Notorious B.I.G. both had tough childhoods, growing up in rough neighborhoods and getting heavily involved with drugs at a young age. Popular artists Lil Wayne, Eminem, 50 Cent, Snoop Dog, and Dr. Dre all had difficult childhoods in hard neighborhoods, and all have a history involving illegal drugs as well. Why is it that these artists with similar rough backgrounds become some popular in today’s society? Is it because the lyrics they write are more interesting to people or possibly because it is what is expected of rap artists today.

            One possible explanation for the artists of this genre having common stereotypical backgrounds could be it is what the fans of this music want to hear about. Not many popular rappers today come from a good uprising, in a safe neighborhood, with a loving family. Record companies might not sign an artist with this background because they would not be as marketable as an artist with the common “street image” would. Rapper Kanye West, who in his early career could not get a record deal partially because he did not fit this popular stereotypical rapper image, exemplifies this situation. If artists that do not portray the common “street image” have a harder time getting record deals, than artists who do portray this stereotype will most likely easily dominate the genre.

Works Cited

Evangelista, Benny. “You Are What’s on Your Playlist”. Text Messaging: Reading and Writing about Popular Culture. Ed. John Alberti. Boston: Houghton Mifftin Harcourt Publishing Company, 2009. 280-284. Print.