Hip Hop

Mexico: Indigenous Women Fight Femicide With Hip Hop

November 28, 2017 Staff, telesurtv.net Resist! Art, Hip Hop, Indigenous Women, Mexico

By Staff of Tele Sur - Through music they are denouncing the stealing of their lands and violence against women. Indigenous women arrived in Mexico City to present their work defending their territory and to denounce femicides inside and outside their communities, through hip-hop. They arrived from different parts of the country to the Chopo University Museum to talk about feminism and gender violence. Zara Monrroy, an Indigenous woman from the Comca'ac community of Punta Chueca, Sonora, said she started rapping to spread culture and tradition. She added that music has been a tool for her message to reach indigenous women since many of them do not know how to write. "Especially among young people, because there they listen to music from outside that sometimes they don't understand, because they don't speak English, but they prefer it to songs in our language." She said she spreads her experiences and the traditions of her people and the injustices that are committed especially toward women. The rapper said she uses her music to bring to other women under violence clear messages that can help them change their situation. For Monrroy, to find acceptance by the older people of her community wasn't easy. "When I started singing, there were grandmothers and grandparents who were not in agreement with the musical fusion that I was doing," she said.

New Anthems Of Resistance: Hip-Hop & Black Lives Matter

August 23, 2015 Alexander Billet, www.inthesetimes.com Resist! Arts, Black Lives Matter (BLM), Hip Hop, Police Brutrality

By Alexander Billet of In These Times. It’s been a year since the death of Michael Brown, a year since the rebellion in Ferguson, a year since the Black Lives Matter movement began to shift the conversation in just about every avenue of American life. That shift can be seen in politics (from#BowDownBernie to Donald Trump’s threats to beat up protesters) and economics (the Black Youth Project’s embrace of the Fight for 15). It can also be seen, perhaps most obviously, in our culture—and in music, in particular. Not surprisingly, hip-hop has led the way—not just through a predictable barrage of tweets by musicians and artists, but a sustained, meaningful wave of creativity and outspokenness engaging with a bold, sometimes chaotic movement.

Artists Defending The Integrity Of Hip Hop

January 9, 2015 Shamako Noble, www.popularresistance.org Resist! Black Lives Matter (BLM), Corporatism, Hip Hop

Over the last couple of weeks, a lot of controversy and discussion has swirled around Azealia Banks and the positions that she has taken along with how she taken them. We, as artists, educators and community leaders would like to recognize and honor our Sister Azealia and Brother Q-Tip as they work to clarify both the current state and historical struggle of Hip Hop. While many are turned off by the raw nature and passion of Ms. Banks, we find her position refreshing, enlightening and illuminating important conversations around cultural ownership, appropriation and exploitation. We stand in solidarity with Azealia Banks, Q-Tip and all those who defend the integrity of Hip Hop and Black Culture.

Why Movements Should Care About Azealia Banks

December 28, 2014 Kate Aronoff, www.wagingnonviolence.org Educate! Art, Hip Hop, Politics, Racism

The #BlackLivesMatter movement is quickly creating a national context whereby celebrities across industries are being forced to take sides. To date, sports stars have been the most active in their support of the movement. As it grows, more TV, movie and music personalities are likely to follow suit. Iggy Azalea’s racism, then, isn’t just in poor taste, but also beginning to fall out of step with a new mainstream of dialogue on race in the United States, one being crafted by organizers both online and in the streets. It’s a context, like that of the 60s, which gave artists like Harry Belafonte an even wider audience, and made his messages — not dissimilar from those of King and other movement leaders — resonant with increasingly broad swaths of the American public. Hip-hop artists have kept a critical consciousness on race alive in the United States, even as other genres — and a number of mainstream hip-hop artists — have drifted back towards a detachment from politics.

Dropping Knowledge Like a Clumsy Librarian {#NSA edition}

April 25, 2014 Dennis Trainor Jr, www.PopularResistance.org Resistance Report CIA, FBI, Hip Hop, NSA, shahid buttar, usa

Shahid Buttar, the Executive Director of The Bill of Rights Defense Committee drops knowledge on the NSA in his new House track The NSA vs. the USAwhile appearing on a recent episode of Acronym TV. A sample verse: Some people think Edward Snowden is a Traitor / They forget everything that happened later / Congress LIED TO by EXECUTIVE OFFICIALS / We’re talking about CORRUPTION in the Capitol FO SHIZZLE / Democracies FIZZLE when their people are watched / That’s why the NSA’s got to be STOPPED

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