Pamela Speed
Alison Teichgraeber
English 1301
October 10, 2010
A Look into the Life of Hip-Hop
The misunderstood subculture of music that many have come to know as “hip-hop” is given a critical examination by James McBride in his essay Hip-Hop Planet. McBride provides the reader with direct insight into the influence that hip-hop music has played in his life, as well as the lives of the American society. From the capitalist freedom that hip-hop music embodies to the disjointed families that plague this country, McBride explains that hip-hop music has a place for everyone. The implications that he presents in this essay about hip-hop music suggest that this movement symbolizes and encapsulates the struggle of various individual on …show more content…

Africa is believed to be the birthplace of the hip-hop music, although many music experts might debate this fact. Once again the reader is presented with a situation where a group of people cohabitate a country, but due to widespread economic disparity many different socioeconomic groups exist. “Rap doesn’t belong to American culture; it belongs here, it has always existed here, because of our pain and our hardships and our suffering.”(471) This statement exemplifies that hip-hop speaks to the hearts of those who feel disenfranchised by their government, and by society as a whole. As the Africans describe the French men and women that they wait on in hotels that they themselves will never be able to afford to stay in, we see why hip-hop has been the extension in which people have used to express loathing for contemporary situations.
McBride has brought to light the music that has embraced many untraditional values in our society and has shown that it is more than just a marketing spectacle. The music in which he writes about in this essay represents the struggle that many men over vast continents face today. “At its best, hip-hop lays bare the empty moral cupboard that is our generation’s legacy.” The music of hip-hop is a story rather than a guide to “Americas greatest social problems”, and like most of our history we must learn it in efforts of not to repeat the same mistakes. Works Cited
McBride, James. "Hip-Hop Planet" The Writer's Presence: A