This is from an awesome (dissertation?) paper written by Erik Pihel about the oral tradition in Hip Hop music and how it relates to the oral traditions of past cultures. Check it out on Rap Genius:

A Furified Freestyle: Homer and Hip Hop

This goes back to subcultures “communicating through commodities”, but there is this sort of paradox within subcultures where it’s almost impossible to have a clear cut distinction between commercial exploitation on one hand and creativity & originality on the other. For example:

• Style/Clothing – Necessarily depends on the commercial lanes of production, distribution, and marketing.
• Feelings/Thoughts – The process of producing music is inherently commercial. Not only is a commodity being made right then and there, but it often involves taking pieces from a separate musical commodity – sampling – in order to make something new.

Since the values of Hip Hop can’t completely cut ties with the larger commercialized society, some of its subversive power is defused. Nonetheless, it remains inherently political.

This is not to say that Hip Hop is black or white or brown or anything like that. Race doesn’t necessarily have a direct connection with the characteristics of a subculture. However, when thinking about how/why a cohesive culture forms in America, and what that culture stands for, race is an important piece of the puzzle.

In studying Spike Lee’s Do the Right Thing, Victoria Johnson, professor of Media Studies at UC-Irvine, said:

For Lee, commercial popular cultural artifacts which are produced by blacks-here, explicitly music (the word), but also fashion (the image)-are inherently political, as they emerge from a position marginalized by dominant control of capital and communication.

Do the Right Thing is considered “culturally significant” by the Library of Congress, but it was also a commercial success. In this sense, Hip Hop culture is clearly embraceable by the mainstream in terms of style and art, while at the same time maintaining that political opposition.

As in the power structure here in America – and the rest of western civilization – is still dominated by white capitalist values.

For him, this manifests most clearly in the disrespect that Hip Hop culture gets from so many different industries; fashion, design, media, etc. Check out the links below for more context.

Kanye West BBC Interview Part 1

Kanye West BBC Interview Part 2

Kanye West DONDA Project

Notice that “white capitalist values” has nothing to do with white people making money and no one else. It refers to a system that is Anglocentric by nature, but allows anyone to operate within it as long as they accept the rules.

Not that he should be humble…the way he went about changing the rules was equal parts hilarious and impressive.

https://twitter.com/S_C_/statuses/346682205168357377

The Jay & ‘Ye bromance is one of the all time greats.

Assuming readers know this, but…

1. MCing
2. DJing
3. Break dancing
4. Graffiti

Those are the four elements of Hip Hop culture, but there is a 5th element, which informs the other four, that many leave out:

• “Knowledge of self”

This element was promoted by early artists such as Afrika Bambaata, Queen Latifa, KRS-One, and Public Enemy. It was highly influenced by the teachings of the NGE, which are inextricably linked with Hip Hop.

http://youtu.be/zz-PPQM110w

The main point here is that the media’s reflection of society is highly skewed, especially when it comes to minorities.

During the civil rights era and up until the 80’s, blacks were generally portrayed as Steppin' Fetchits or caricatures. By the 80’s, a number of “black sitcoms” contained more appropriate images of black families, yet all of these shows were highly segregated…Fresh Prince, Family Matters, The Cosby Show…Even today, only 19% of respondents say the media does a good job portraying black culture

Portrayal in the media is part of a larger cultural narrative. These narratives are connected to both the past and the future, as they often inform us of core cultural values.

When an issue or movement becomes too big to ignore for much longer, the media will then appropriate that issue and frame it in a way that serves their interests.

Subcultures tend to communicate through commodities, i.e. Punks wore Doc Martins, B-boys wore track suits, etc. What this means is that subcultures are particularly open to capitalist co-opt. For this reason, the elite media tends to portray them in a harmless light, often times, getting some old reporter to go out and assimilate into the subculture in some way. Good times…

From the New York Times

Note: This article was written 16 years after DJ Kool Herc laid down the first “break” during a house party at 1520 Sedgwick Avenue.

Recalling that “myth of consensus”, i.e. the bandwagon effect, if the elite media ignores an event, that event simply doesn’t exist for a vast majority of people. It’s one of those “if a tree falls in the woods…” things. This can happen on a local, regional or global scale. Some prominent examples of global issues that were ignored by the media include the Khmer Rouge genocide, which went unreported in the 70s, and the Rwandan genocide, which the media completely ignored in the 90s.

Like these two examples, it’s usually marginalized people who are ignored. In this case, Hip Hop culture was universally ignored by the mainstream media throughout the 1970s. Despite this, Hip Hop flourished in the streets:

How Hip Hop – not Napster – Created P2P Sharing