Post-Course Video Updates

Hi All-
Please note that I have posted some video and sound files from the presentations. Please continue to send me presentations from last semester and I will post them. Thanks- NHP

Thanks

Dear THR 380-
What a privilege it has been to be your guide through this course on Hip-hop in Popular Culture at The University of Kansas. I have had the pleasure of watching your growth over the past semester. I will be posting video and PowerPoint's (as you submit them) to the blog for you all to share comments and ideas. I thoroughly enjoyed getting to know all of you and hope that you will take more courses with me in the future.

I was blown away at the amount of research, work and creativity you put into your final projects and exams. The reward for me is that you not only do well, but that you find something that inspires you to facilitate change.

I love what I do every day. I figured out a way to remix all of the things I love to do and to create opportunities for myself to do them. If you don't see an opportunity out there for yourself, make one. If there is no job or major that fits what you want to do--make one. If kids in the Bronx could make Hip-hop out of nothing, you can make whatever you want happen.

I only hope that taking this course will open up new ways for you to imagine your lives as blueprints for something great. You make a plan, build it, work hard and smart--the rest will come.

Thanks for a wonderful semester- Nicole Hodges Persley

Freestyle Blog: Global Hip-hop

This week is a freestyle blog. You can blog on whatever you like. Think about the global impact of a music genre that started in a low income community in the Bronx. Can you think of any other music genre has had as siginificant an impact on people regardless of race, gender, ethnicity, sexual orination, class or disability? Love it, or hate it, Hip-hop has created social change for both the postive and the negative. As KRS-One says: Freedom is where the work is.." Think about it. Free speech- NHP

Hip-hop and Fashion

This week we are blogging on Hip-hop Fashion and Self-Adorment. In what way do you see Hip-hop influencing the way people present themselves? How has Hip-hop shaped your style? Self-adornment is the practice decorating yourself. Using hairstyles, clothing, jewelry, etc. Think about the ways that Hip-hop has impacted all of these styles in fashion and the media.

Hip-hop,Politics and Identity

My apologies for the late post. As you blog on key words POLITICS AND IDENTITY in relationship to Hip-hop music and culture this week, think about the intersections, overlap, contradictions that occur when presenting one's political views. Some prompts to consider are as follows: In what ways are identities inherently political? Is it possible to separate politics from personal identity? How do institutions and individuals present political perspectives? What types of direct actions do individuals and collectives take to assert political ideas? Think broadly about Hip-hop's impact on the construction and performance of identity in our everyday interactions. How do Graffiti, Mcing, Breaking, DJing shape/reflect expressions of identity?.

Hip-hop Theater and Performance

This week we are discussing Hip-hop's impact on theater and performance practices. We can broadly understand "mainstream" and/or "Western" concepts of theater as those that adhere to a linear narrative and plot. Hip-hop Theater often disrupts this linear storytelling to employ other devices such as circular storytelling, abstract characters and the incorporation of inter textual references and artistic devices such as media, dance, politics, etc. As you blog on the words Hip-hop Theater and Performance, think about the ways that Hip-hop Theater incorporates many of the themes and subjects of Hip-hop music and culture. Some prompts that may help you craft your response are: How does African griot storytelling shape Hip-hop Theater if at all? How do Hip-hop Theater artists use the theater space to perform personal narratives of struggle, identity, etc.? How do Hip-hop Theater performers sample from Hip-hop's elements using their voices and bodies?

Hip-hop and Fine Art

Hip-hop Fine Art usually contains a particular set of social codes that can be linked to Hip-hop's larger aesthetic which includes the use of Hip-hop language (vernacular, visual, embodied), addresses themes of polyculturalism, engages the dialectic between public and Private space and also engages in what Danny Hoch calls the "reappropriation by hip-hop creators of materials, technology and preserved culture"(2006). When you discuss Hip-hop Aesthetics and Fine Art this week, think about the culture of Hip-hop and the themes Hip-hop artists explore. How do fine artists in Hip-hop create bridges between private and public and notions of "street" and "fine" in their art? How is Hip-hop Arts inaccessibility to the urban working class a contradiction of the street art aesthetic?