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Topic subjectRE: I still don't think hip hop should be studied in college
Topic URLhttp://board.okayplayer.com/okp.php?az=show_topic&forum=17&topic_id=93963&mesg_id=94042
94042, RE: I still don't think hip hop should be studied in college
Posted by gluvnast, Wed Aug-01-07 02:13 AM
Even though alot of people will object to the idea of the hiphop culture being taught in colleges and universities, the hiphoppers of today's generation really don't have a true concept or knowledge of the culture itself.

We keep stressing on people to study up on the history and the culture and the essence and so on and so on, and everybody wants to claim they know the culture but either fail in reaching others to pass on the culture or really don't know the culture in full scale just their variation of that culture.

I mean, lets be real. Alot of people today look at hiphop and get it confused with just the rap music, regardless of how popular or mainstream of how novelty or underground that music is from. And most of the time overlook all the other key elements of the hiphop culture as well as the additional elements that were tagged on as the culture evolved.

So, I am down for SOME TYPE of authentic education (keyword: "authentic"). This cry about it's not something to be learned, but live is utter bullshit, because truthfully, are you REALLY living the hiphop culture? Or happen to like rap music and wear baggy clothes? Are you being urban rebels of a society, bombing the alleys or subways with your expressionist art, or b-boying as a lively-hood or experiementing and perfecting your DJ techniques? Or are you just sitting here in this message board arguing over which rapper is wack and which rapper is wacker than that rapper? I'm not saying it have to be that fine tune, however, the culture is so satuated and watered down that there's no such true existence of a "culture" per'se. Most of the time, people speak on the music and how degenerate it become and proclaim "hiphop is dead" just off of that. Or they look soley from a corporate aspect and seeing how much money is being made off the charts (which is still mostly music related) and gauge hiphop- not as a culture, but a corporation.

So I do believe that people of today's and even yesterday's generation needs to be educated and for hiphop to keep having a future, education IS needed so kids of tomorrow would understand as well as respect the culture that we so-call "live" in. Apparently, "word of mouth" have failed us, or this ignorance that is going on in hiphop today wouldn't of existed. So having educated "professionals", someone like Davey D or Chuck D that have an unbiased understanding of not only the past, but the present as well educate those interested in understand the hiphop experience as a whole. Then I'm all for it, personally. The only worry I got is 9 times out of ten you'll get an educator that's not tuned to the entire culture or have a regional biased or so many other negative issues.