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1. Black cultural dysfunction as an argument against black people
2. Black culture seen as a threat
3. Fictitiously self-generating cultural patterns
4. Undermining the value of black cultural expressions
Undermining of the Value of Black Cultural Expressions
"Hip hop and its commercialized decline are being used to confirm two key aspects of America's racial problem:
1. The tradition of denying racial discrimination and its impacts
2. The tradition of imagining black American culture as separate, self-propelling, and dysfunctional" (71-72)
"The issue of black culture and its relationship to American culture remains central to our public conversation and grows out of this deep historical legacy. The claim that black people have a sexually excessive and violent culture and that they lack proper values has remained a fundamental vehicle for the denial of centuries of compounded structural discrimination and institutional racism as the real sources of self-destructive behaviors." (65)
"The pattern of responding to new black expressive cultures as dangerous invasions while venerating older ones is a pillar of contemporary racism even as it appears to be evidence of racial tolerance." (67)
Black Culture Seen as a Threat
"Black cultural expressions such as dance, art, style, poetry, and, especially its recent musical developments were considered constant threats to larger American society during their early years, even as many whites appreciated and participated in them." This was true for both blues and jazz, both of which came to be accepted and celebrated. (66).
"There are four problems with the grossly simplistic idea of poor black people as culturally dysfunctional:" (63)
Chapter 2: Hip Hop Reflects Black Dysfunctional Ghetto Culture
Black Cultural Dysfunction as an Argument Against Black People
- "Myths of black cultural dysfunction have served as a key explanation for racial inequality throughout most of the twentieth century" and beyond, including in the justification of enslavement and maintenance of slavery. (63)
- "Forms of cultural expression such as jazz, blues, and black youth style, slang and attitude have all been considered major threats to society and evidence of black cultural dysfunction, sexual excess, and violence," both contemporarily and in 'the good old days.' (64)
Claims about black cultural dysfunction are not new.
"...virtually all the highly visible supporters of the claim that 'hip hop reflects black dysfunctional culture' deny society's overall role in creating the conditions that foster problematic or self-limiting behaviors." (72)
Structural Racism
Individual Action
The Power of Media Seduction
"Hip hop has been roundly criticized for representing and celebrating what many critics, scholars, and media talking heads consider a black underclass urban 'culture of dysfunction.'...it can be hard to defend some of the specific behaviors identified in lyrics than can be lumped under this gross claim." (62-63)
Fictitiously Self-Generating Cultural Patterns
"...it is absurd to talk about black cultural dysfunction as if black people reside in total cultural and social isolation from all the main institutions in American society...The black dysfunctional culture argument identifies widespread cross-racial behaviors such as violence, nonmaterial sexual activities, reproductive choices, and conditions like illiteracy -- which are direct results of individual responses to highly complex and difficult social contexts (including sustained racial, gender, and economic oppression as well as high rates of black male incarceration) -- as independent, self-propelling black cultural traits and traditions...This confusion of behavior and culture...paint[s] a lopsided, distorted portrait of people who have few legitimate spokespeople." (68)