Addict Rap?: The Shift from Drug Distributor to Drug Consumer in Hip Hop

In 2000, "purple drank," a concoction of prescription medicines was introduced to mainstream Hip Hop. The genre has seemingly always had a relationship with drug content, earlier Hip Hop artists glorified upward financial mobility of selling drugs, whereas some contemporary artists exploit...

Full description

Saved in:

Bibliographic Details
Published in:	The Journal of hip hop studies 2017-10, Vol.4 (1), p.50-73
Main Author:	Smiley, CalvinJohn
Format:	Article
Language:	eng
Subjects:	Alcohol Black Power movement Consumption Drug addiction Drug use Grammy awards Hip hop culture Hip hop music Lil Wayne (rapper) Lyrics Marijuana Musicians & conductors Pharmaceuticals Pimp C (Chad Butler) Popular music Rap music Society Studies Subcultures
Online Access:	Get full text
Tags:	Add Tag No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!

Description
Summary:	In 2000, "purple drank," a concoction of prescription medicines was introduced to mainstream Hip Hop. The genre has seemingly always had a relationship with drug content, earlier Hip Hop artists glorified upward financial mobility of selling drugs, whereas some contemporary artists exploit achievements via the consumption of drugs. In other words, there has been a cultural shift from being the drug distributor to drug consumer in Hip Hop. Celebration of drug consumption creates a new forum of deviant and criminal performance within the genre, which challenges previous Hip Hop culture. Furthermore, this promotion of drug use and emersion with societal goals of wealth, status, and prestige, offers a space for discourse about the creation of "apathetic resistance" within Hip Hop culture. Finally, this must be measured by the context of understanding how the intersection of race, gender, class and respectability plays into Hip Hop's reception compared to other musical genres' relationship with drug consumption..
ISSN:	2331-5563 2331-5563