The Words Have Changed but the Ideology Remains the Same: Misogynistic Lyrics in Rap Music
Abstract
Rap music emerged as an aesthetic cultural expression of the urban youth in the late 1970s. It has been denoted as the poetry of the youth who are often disregarded as a result of their race and class status. Since it first came on the music scene, rap has gone through a number of phases, and it has been used as a medium to express a variety of ideas, feelings, and emotions. Hope, love, fear, anger, frustration, pride, violence, and misogyny have all been expressed through the medium of rap. This article examines the use of misogynistic ideology in gangsta rap and traces the connection between its prevalence in rap and the larger cultural picture of how African American women have been characterized historically.
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1. Although the misogyny in gangsta rap is degrading to all women, the characterizations of women in this genre of music specifically target African American women, as the images of women portrayed in the songs, on the CD covers, and in the music videos are most often that of an African American woman.
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Article first published: July 2006
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