As Tricia Rose argued in Black Noise, “rap is dependent on technology, and mass reproduction and distribution.” However, technological advances have recently debased hip-hop’s longstanding efforts to break free from white social, economic, and political hegemony in America. The vast economic disparities from which hip/hop arose throughout in the late 1970′s bred an intensified competition amongst the disenfranchised youths living within the South Bronx of New York City, as Rose outlines. As this competition increased, it bred an unparalleled sense of self-reliance among the urban youth and created a new entertainment market that would later thrive in the American music industry under the title of hip-hop. In her opening chapter, Rose details hip-hop’s rise and the white upper-class’s reactionary attempt to limited its expanding power. As hip-hop has struggled to confront white dominance with cutting edge creativity; the upper-classes have continually adapted new methods of control to effectively stop lower class progress.
More recently, this control has manifested in the form of the Internet. The onslaught of free-streaming interfaces on the Internet has effectively destroyed any lower-class attempt to shift the American power balance away from white dominance. The Internet has functioned similar to the major white-owned record companies’ successful buy up of privately owned independent labels, or MTV limiting artist’s creativity in music videos throughout the 1980’s and 1990’s. Privately owned record labels run by prominent hip-hop moguls Jay-Z and Russell Simmons that once provided clear examples of hip-hop’s ability to confront that dominance, have since struggled to maintain their power. Web interfaces such as Grooveshark.com, and YouTube.com that allow the free exchange of music have assured that hip-hop culture remains subjugated by white owners. Advertisers, not artists, have begun to reap the profits of hip-hop’s success. Artists now face an interesting dichotomy where they must post their musical endeavors online to gain popularity while they lose substantial profits in the process. Yet, the slow commercialization of the Internet, has recently allowed artists to gain back much of the influence that they have lost through evolving copyright laws and legal battles. Nonetheless, advances in technology continue to pose a challenge to a hip-hop movement struggling to gain recognition in the face of white oppression.
Technology Jeopardizes Hip-Hop Advances
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A little confusion on the homefront
The more sources that I begin to discover throughout these first few weeks of research, the more uncertain I become about the scope of my topic. I do not seek to change my topic, not in the least, but in reading for my book review, I understand that my familiarity with the topic has been called into question. I have yet again been forced to redefine the questions my paper proposal had set out to answer. Was the issue of race truly the most significant topic of debate amongst the major newspapers? And if this was not the most pronounced aspect of the newspapers’ focus, then what is? Furthermore, if that topic were to change, do I have enough material to subsequently enhance and prove my thesis?
It has also been a tremendous challenge for me to develop my thesis into a clear and concise sentence rather than my previous technique of developing it throughout the course of an entire paragraph. But I feel confident that, through the completion of both my book and literature reviews, my thesis will become more tangible and easier to weed out amongst the bulk of scholarship that I am presently sifting through.
Second question
In light of my recent research not only would i like to inquire about the assessment of media guilt after the events of the New York City Draft Riots, but i would like to narrow it down further to ask if media attention of the draft continued to the same extent as it had before the Riots or was it diminished due to a fear that rioting may spark again and diminish moral?
First Question
The first question that I hope to answer in my paper is whether or not the newspapers had developed a more cohesive stance towards the war after the New York City Draft Riots. If they had, was this triggered by a sense of responsibility for the riots and their earlier coverage before those occurred?
My Research Thus Far (Paper on Draft Riots of 1863)
The research that I have so far conducted for my paper has given me excellent results in sources that can better establish my thesis. The recent class discussion which turned me onto the Proquest page on the library site has been a tremendous help.This site aided my work in finding primary source accounts from the media (namely the New York Times and Washington Post) during the events in July of 1863 in New York and helped me to establish the editorial standpoints in the paper in relation to the draft. Now, with a large chunk of my research largely taken care of, I am more at ease about developing my paper. But I do have one question for anyone that may know it, has anyone found the New York Tribune archives dating back to the 1860′s? I still have been unable to locate them and it would be a huge addition to my research if I knew where to look. Can anyone help?
Thanks for listening!
“Why am I a History Major?” That is a Good Question.
Speaking honestly, history has always been my best subject. Fortunately, I also happen to love learning about past cultures and peoples because it allows me to relay the mistakes of the past to my associates in the present with the hopes that those mistakes will not happen again. Unfortunately, even in the last ten years of my very short life, I have seen multiple occasions where histories lessons have failed to transcend into the event of the present. Despite these disappointing instances, I do enjoy learning more about the past, no matter how discouraging they make present events appear. Those two reasons combined together, that I’m proficient and interested in learning about and from historical events, made me want to be a history major.
The Unpredictable Past: Lawrence Levine (A Brief Summary)
Lawrence Levine argues that history, congruent with the current perceptions of future events, is just as unpredictable. His argument states that as historians begin to unveil more about the past in their research, they are continually shattering their earlier conceptions of past societies. Yet, Levine argues, history is subject to change even when all past artifacts have been recovered. This is true because the social tendencies in the present continually alter the viewpoints through which historians view past events, says Levine. For instance, a historian from 17th century Europe may present a past event such as the Medieval Witch Hunts as being a necessary chain of events in order to cleanse the society of witchcraft. However, modern historians of the 21-century have changed their opinions of thee witch-hunts during that same period and maintain that they were in fact brutal and unnecessary.
This is in fact an example of how the past has developed unpredictable tendencies due to developing research and the influence of society, as Levine suggests. Levine believes that this process is largely a positive trend because it welcomes historians to view history in different lights and without jeopardizing changing histories path in the future. The article highlights the discrepancies between major contemporary historians as well as new age historians and contrasts the major dividing actors that occur between them.
Reading this article helped to further my own understanding of histories changing vantage points and better understand why histories concepts have radically change from those of my parent’s generation to that of my own generation.
