Aboriginal Hip Hop by Denni M

It has been established that since its beginning, Hip Hop has always been a multiracial construction. Hip Hop is often understood as a process that is constantly being created, changed and recreated. The meaning of Hip Hop changes among the cultures that are exposed to it and to it each culture contributes its own understandings and interpretations. Different cultures utilize the elements of Hip Hop (be it graffiti, breaking, emceeing or DJing) for different reasons. The perverseness of mainstream American Hip Hop has created the image of Hip Hop as a medium for hostile opposition towards the dominant society. This new image contrasts the roots of Hip Hop which largely began as a way to identity and give voice to a community largely abandoned by society. This image has been forsake for images portrayed by such Hip Hop performers such as 50 cent who glorify a fabricated image of a ‘gangsta’ or ‘thug’ lifestyle. It is this image that is being condemned by mainstream society and it is also this image that is being shown to viewers across the world through their television screens.

One such place in which these images are filtering through is in Australia. As an indigenous peoples living with the reality of settler colonialism, the experience Australian Aboriginals differs from the experience of the minority communities in America. Their realities are more on par with the experiences of other such indigenous peoples such as Native Americans and Native Hawaiians. Instead being used as a tool of confrontation Hip Hop, and with respect to Aboriginal culture the practice of emceeing is used as a means of self – reflection and self – identification. George Stavrios from the University of Melbourne wrote an article detailing his analysis of Hip Hop culture as it has been constructed with the Aboriginal community. From the interviews emerges an insight into how Hip Hop culture is formulated outside of the U.S.  

One way in which the Aboriginal community utilizes Hip Hop is by using it as a means in which to come to terms with a Native identity. As most children of mixed or multiracial ancestry Little G a female rapper in Australia was able to embrace her Aboriginal identity through rap music. Little G herself stated that she had once denied her indigenous identity and took direct measures in order to hide it from her peers (Stavrios, 47). Instead of denying her status as an Aboriginal, Little G now had the means and desire to express her roots and to encourage others in similar situations to identify themselves.

The other two interviewees MC Wire and Morganics took a similar approach to Hip Hop but wanted to use as a means in which to educate the youth within the Aboriginal community. As a ‘settler’ or non – Native inhabitant of Australia MC Wire has found a welcoming attitude within the Aboriginal Hip Hop community and is actively engaged in various Hip Hop workshops as a means of outreach to help steer the indigenous youth into a new communal consciousness and inspire hope in the new generation of Hip Hop performers (Stavrios 50, 55).

             

           Through these examples Hip Hop as global culture develops a local context and continues its function as a socio – historical process, shaping and reshaping as the reaches of its influence expand across the globe.