Experience +Identity
Sophie Leo and Grace Harrison
We have chosen to look at a music video that identifies a cultural group as working class, or in some cases living in poverty.
The perception of black neighborhoods across the world is one that absorbs drug use and violence, alienating this race from the middle
class taste we are used to being presented with in the media.
The negative generalisation that modern hip hop has produced for this culture, is one that we are all familiar with because of the exposure and success hip hop music has had in the industry.
Wednesday, 5 November 14
Pusha T - BlockaThe narrative of this music video represents how we are now fed
the identity of a social group that was originally praised for its focus on urban poverty, alternative story telling and the demonstration of
the abandonment of Black neighborhoods.
However, hip hop has now saturated mass media and young audiences as a culture run by violence, drugs, gangs and money.
We are exposed to this through out the hip hop genre however within this video there are clear references to how this culture has been alienated from society as a social group that is trapped in a cycle of activities (Drugs, violence and gang culture) that we are
taught to frown upon due to the middle class taste we are used to seeing.
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• Alienates audience from the culture seen in the video, we become curious making us want to watch more so we can be exposed to his ‘playgrounds’ (Neighborhoods)
‘Most of you wouldn’t be comfortable in some of my
playgrounds’
• This wide shot shows young black boys in balaclavas, in a run down location. The positioning of the people in this video creates a gang like feeling to the audience, as if we are surrounded with all eyes on us. Intimidation has become a common part of this type of hip hop, because it seems to pull people in. This may be because, in real life, we would not approach a group of people looking like this, so by hiding behind our computer we are able to see the traits of this sub-culture, making more sales for the artists that make music like this.
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• This collection of shots found in the music video establish the type of setting in which Pusha T talks about being his ‘playgrounds’. By showing run down, dull and very basic places like this we assume that this social class struggle to support themselves, alienating them even more from the middle class. Although a story is being communicated here about the hard aspects of their lives and the struggle that they may be faced with, it becomes hard to learn about this when a lot of the rest of the video features young people causing trouble and taking drugs.This is why we no longer see hip hop as a way of telling stories, because this has been masked with shots of gangs and violence which capture more peoples attention.
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Both these shots demonise young men making it seem like they are in control. Images like these could be why they have a bad reputation
among society because of the way they are presented to us in mediums like music videos.
By covering their faces and glaring out over the city gives us a sense of control that these young people have, making
audiences fear them. This is reflected in the way our society works and translated into real life situations where many middle class people fear young black men because of how they appear in the media. Often we see this done on news
reports and TV dramas , where they clearly create a common type of personality for young black man in a
negative manor. However, surely hip hop videos like this should be used as an opportunity for these young people to
reconstruct the way the world views them.
This close up seems intimidating giving the audience a reason to feel fearful. Use of a weapon also builds on this
supporting the idea that hip hop is becoming widely related to violence. This issue reflects historically negative white
racial attitudes that are supported by videos like these being consumed by mainly white consumers.
Wednesday, 5 November 14
Many people will be familiar with the left photo below after being used as the main picture across news reports following
Mark Duggan’s death.
However, the picture to the right is the un-cropped version, showing him holding a plaque at his daughters
funeral. The way the media has presented Mark Duggan was questionable and raised many talking points around the way we are fed news like this.
Could this be a result of the way many hip hop videos have encouraged the demonisation of young men that are from an African or Caribbean ethnic background?
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After completing this research task we've found that this perception of identity sells records and
makes money. Ideally we should praise black performers for their urban story telling bringing a completely different sound and message to British music, instead we are sucked in by the culture traits that are exposed to us in videos like this one.
It seems unfair for so many people to just be captured by a culture that rebels against what many white middle class people are used to,
instead of the message and story these performers are trying to tell. However, is this our fault, or performers like Pusha T’s fault for incorporating such violence and drug culture
into their music videos just to make sales, leading us to have this perception?
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