50 cent on the dollar: Shortchanging contemporary popular hip-hop consumers through authenticating dominance
Abstract
Popular music often, unsuspectingly, promotes social and political inequalities and the commodification of hip-hop culture in the United States represents is one example of capitalist mechanisms that operate the country's music industries. This thesis constructs a theoretical frame around authenticity, a notion that centers on expressions of materialism and misogyny in the lyrics of contemporary, popular hip-hop music. By understanding the evolution of hip-hop from its early years, through gangsta rap, and into contemporary hip-hop, it is clear that generations represent authenticity differently. In the prior two periods of hip-hop, illumination of the urban condition by hip-hop artists was central to the expressions of power. However, today, discussion of those conditions is omitted from the lyrics of contemporary hip-hop, creating a misrepresentation of the artist's epistemic stratification in popular culture.
Subject Area
Mass media
Recommended Citation
Lechuga, Michael A, "50 cent on the dollar: Shortchanging contemporary popular hip-hop consumers through authenticating dominance" (2007). ETD Collection for University of Texas, El Paso. AAI1444075.
https://scholarworks.utep.edu/dissertations/AAI1444075