I'm currently doing a Masters in English Literature, and am going to be doing my dissertation on representations of death in (primarily 'underground'/'conscious' <-both contentious terms, I know)) Hip-Hop. Did my undergraduate dissertation on The Wire/Fate/Greek Tragedy, so continuing to avoid writing about books at any cost!

My idea isn't fully formed yet, but I'd like to analyse songs detailing various types of death (e.g. abortion, suicide, lost love, revenge fantasies, e.t.c). As it's in the school of English, it's going to be primarily a lyrical analysis... I'm particularly interested in storytelling tracks/usage of simile,metaphor,figurative language, etc. I've had one meeting with a tutor and they talked about the whole sociological proximity to death (high death rate in african american community etc) aspect, which I don't really want to go down (and think would be more relevant to something focusing on more traditional 'gangsta' hh). I think in the end I'd like to pose how death, or representations of it, can be ultimately positive in Hip-Hop, although I'm not quite sure how I'm gonna reach this point!

I've yet to properly dig into 'hip-hop academia' but haven't been too thrilled by what I have read... a lot of it that I have read seems like the author has half a clue about hip-hop, but their inclusion of certain songs and exclusion of others was pretty revealing to me.
I'd be really interested to answer any questions/take any feedback or criticism on the topic....