An Introduction To Hip-Hop:- Lesson_Two

AN INTRODUCTION TO HIP HOP—LESSON TWO

You cannot actually know Hip Hop objectively; to truly comprehend Hip Hop you have to become it; you have to become Hiphop. This, of course, is true of any living culture. Here, the true practice of Hiphop begins with an anthropological approach to Hip Hop’s culture; apprentices/students are urged to live the culture for a while in order to truly understand it. Approaching Hip Hop first as a cultural anthropologist gives the apprentice a firsthand experience as to the very real and empowering nature of Hip Hop.

When Hip Hop is real to you, when it is fixed and immovable from your being; YOU ARE PRACTICING REAL HIP HOP. When something is real it is considered to be genuine and/or authentic; it is what it proposes to be, it is not imaginary it is actually existing and occurring to your physical senses. The term real Hip Hop relates to the fixed conditions and genuine nature of Hip Hop as it appears to our physical senses today. Breakin, Emceein, Graffiti Art, Deejayin, Beat Boxin, Street Fashion, Street Language, Street Knowledge and Street Entrepreneurialism are all fixed conditions of Hip Hop. These elements are permanent and immoveable from the existence of real Hip Hop. These elements are real Hip Hop, and those who promote and preserve these elements promote and preserve real Hip Hop. If one or more of these elements are not present in one’s self-expression one is not doing or being real Hip Hop.

Hiphop is a new global urban understanding that communicates an alternative reality through art. Again, Hiphop is a perceptual ability that transforms intellectual subjects and physical objects in an effort to express the character of one’s inner-being in Nature. Most people don’t and/or can’t approach Hip Hop like this because most people are still using hip-hop to escape poverty as opposed to being Hiphop to gain its cultural awareness. Of course, those who only use hip-hop to escape poverty can never call themselves real “scholars” of the Hip Hop arts and sciences, and this is why such knowledge is simply out of their intellectual reach. However, for Hip Hop’s true scholars, Hip Hop is far more than a popular mode of entertainment.

Hip Hop appears to us today as rap music entertainment because of how American Black and Latino youths were discriminated against in the early 1960s and 1970s. The only way to be heard or even survive in the American society at that time was to either join the military, play sports, or entertain in some way or another. Even if you had any aspirations to be a doctor, a lawyer, an architect, an engineer, etc., you were either discouraged from pursuing such professions, or even if you managed to secure a degree in these professions, you were still not hired or even trusted. No matter what your academic credentials were in a racist and discriminatory society, you were still deemed a second or third class citizen; a nigger!

As a result, many young minds with great capacities for careers in the medical, engineering and law professions put their talents to simply surviving in the very violent and lawless streets of New York. Many did not survive; others repurposed themselves into b-boys and b-girls, graffiti writers, deejays and emcees; and still, many were even discouraged from pursuing these arts. Hip Hop has never been taken seriously because organic Black urban intelligence has never been taken seriously in the United States. This is simply the painful truth, and this is why the correct teaching of Hip Hop is so important.

The teaching of Hip Hop begins with two simple questions; why is it important to teach Hip Hop, and why is Hip Hop important to know? The quick answer to the first question is simply because no one else is going to correctly do this for us. The preservation of Hip Hop is connected to the teaching of Hip Hop. If you care at all for the culture you claim, the teaching of Hip Hop becomes simply a matter of self-respect and self-preservation. Why would you not want to preserve, teach and improve your own craft and culture? This is the short answer to the first question—care. Only those who care about the existence and preservation of Hip Hop can correctly teach it.

But now the second question; why is Hip Hop important to know? Most people feel that if they do not rap, or break, or do aerosol art that they have no need to understand Hip Hop. And they are partially correct until they are reminded that Hip Hop is one of last of the human skills. It doesn’t matter what you may think of rap music or rappers; rapping itself is still a human skill. In fact, rapping is one of the last things modern humans can still do today without technological dependency. Plus, rap (rhythmic speech) and its brother breakin (rhythmic dance) are both physically healthy and mentally stimulating. Breakin is physical exercise and emceein is mental exercise. It doesn’t matter what these activities are in the music and theatre industries, breakin and emceein as human exercises for both mind and body are simply healthy for humans.

The dance styles of modern Breakin are used in aerobics and other exercises that refine the body and relieve stress. Dance appears at the genesis of human awareness and remains at the center of good health. Breakin gets our hearts pumping at about 120 beats per minute, and if we can break or dance at least three times a week for only 20 minutes we would have enhanced our physical health and prolonged our very lives by years.

Emceein is the mastery of the spoken word. It is in the mastering of emceein that we also express our inherit understanding of rhythm, linguistics, physics, mathematics, memory, logical reasoning and high communication skills. Emceein expresses a total integration of right and left brain co-ordination. It doesn’t matter what we may think of certain b-boys, b-girls and/or rappers, breakin and emceein are simply healthy human skills.

In a world that is becoming more and more technologically dependant, it is healthy to practice the elements of Hip Hop as human skills, not just as artistic performances. Breakin’, rappin’, drawing, writin’, and beat boxin’ are all human skills; they can be produced with no technological assistance at all. Respect is also a human skill, and the more we show respect to one another the more humane we actually are. Communication with one’s perceived higher source is a human skill; weaving and sowing are human skills; swimming, running, fighting, speaking, imagination and sexual intercourse are all human skills.

This is important because in a world of text messaging and emailing, people seem to be losing their ability to communicate face-to-face as well as correctly apply their own human skills. The skills that it once took to think and then convey one’s thoughts to another person in person are fading fast. People are forgetting how to actually write with their hands, or express their emotions, or even feel the same of others. Privacy is becoming a thing of the past, while people actually laugh less writing LOL as oppose to actually laughing out loud. Imagine that, some have allowed technology to interpret their very laughter—originally a human thing to do. The teaching of Hip Hop restores all of this.

Hip Hop reminds us of our humanity. Everything about Hip Hop is human. Besides the commercial or even aesthetic value of Hip Hop’s core elements, Hip Hop is simply a useful and safe way for humans to spend their time. Simple and plain; Hip Hop enhances human life. This is real! And this is why it is not only important to know Hip Hop, but to also teach it correctly. Hip Hop is a human skill that raises one’s self-worth.

But another thought on this question, why is it important to teach Hip Hop, brings us to the fact that in this day and age in any modern urban American community to not know what Hip Hop is, is to be illiterate of American society. Hip Hop is everywhere and enjoyed on several levels by everyone. How can anyone remain ignorant of Hip Hop, yet claim to be informed on American society and culture? 10 or 20 years ago you might have been able to get away with such ignorance, but today in 2013 to live in any urban environment on the Earth and not be familiar with Hip Hop is simply UNACCEPTABLE!

Here, we can see that Breakin, Emceein, Graffiti art and Deejayin are far more than entertainment pastimes. These artistic elements when seen as human abilities points us toward our ancient human origins. Breakin is dance, emceein is speech, graffiti art is writing, and deejayin is the manipulation and repurposing of the objects in one’s environment. Cutting, mixing and scratching is deejayin; not turntables, microphones and computers. Looking at deejayin more closely we can see that deejayin is not about the technology used to produce music; it is more about what humans do with that technology to produce their ideas which may include music. Music is vibrational communication; it is the display of organized sounds.

None of this would mean anything if Hip Hop’s artistic elements were simply new versions of modern art. Like our unique dance styles were simply updated versions of the Waltz, or even the Hustle. Or, if our graphic art was done in the tradition of Michelangelo or in some other classical European style. Or, if our style of poetry was similar to others, and our modes of music production was done exclusively with a live band. If our artistic self-expressions were even similar to modern art none of this would matter. But the fact that Breakin, Emceein, Graffiti Art and Deejayin individually and combined can be traced back to the self-expressions of early humans demands some investigation as to where our self-expressions come from and why.

Graffiti Art alone is more ancient and more human than any other graphic art in human history, and an investigation into OUR Graffiti Art is sure to reveal the truth about our being and character as Hip Hop human beings; Hiphopians. Six times older than the Pyramids in Egypt and eight times older than Stone Hedge in Europe, stenciled human hands were found in 1905 in Toulouse France dating back some 30,000 years ago.

Graffiti art is the earliest form of human writing in human history. Some of the most ancient forms of art and art as a means of learning, communication and identity can be found at stone-age cave sites and on ancient rock art. Scientists still call these writings graffiti.

Emceein, or utterance, is also has its origin at the birth of human expression and awareness. Not so much the ability to speak through organized language but in fact, the ability to make sounds with one’s mouth or body; we call this particular self-expression beat boxin. All creatures beat box as a form of emceein. All creatures make some kind of communicative utterance that carries the intent of that being. Vibrational tones (singing) not speaking, but vibrating to express intent is also at the genesis of human awareness and self-expression.

Breakin, or dance, or rather moving one’s body in rhythmic/vibrational motion is one of the most common characteristics of being Human and one of the very first things Humans did to communicate and express their ideas to one another. Before language and before writing there were other descriptive ways of communicating ideas; sign language leading to dance was one such idea. Many ancient cultures danced or moved descriptively according to the wind, the water, the swaying of trees; even the movements and characteristics of certain animals and insects.

The idea of moving rhythmically like the creatures and objects in your natural environment appears at the origins of human self-expression. This is important to us because our main dance style (breakin) is not like other modern dances of our time; neither is our graffiti art and emceein. Breakin imitates early rhythmic movements as well as the way in which these movements came about—through subjective observation; we became what we saw. Like early humans, we too expressed our rhythmic dances by imitating our natural environments as well as the events such environments produced. Like most of our artistic expressions, we learned them by being them.

Approaching breakin, emceein, graffiti writing, deejayin, beat boxin, street fashion, street language, street knowledge and street entrepreneurialism as stages in human development we can begin to see the evolution of the Hiphoppa.

Breakin—dance/synchronization with Nature’s rhythm.

Emceein—utterance of existence/communication with Nature.

Graffiti Art—art, writing, and the symbolization of Nature.

Deejayin—manipulation of Nature/tool making.

Beat Boxin—imitation of Nature and Nature’s sounds.

Street Fashion—tribal clothing, body art, hairstyling.

Street Language—tribal communication.

Street Knowledge—tribal wisdom/survival skills.

Street Entrepreneurialism—tribal trade.

A scientific academic understanding of “hip-hop” is good for classrooms objectively reviewing rap music and its impact upon mainstream society—this is a good thing for first-time students of Hip Hop. But for those seeking to actually create rap music, or create breakin, or graffiti writing, or deejayin, etc., and then have successful careers performing these arts in real life, knowing and being the cultural essence of Hip Hop outside of whatever commercial gain can be achieved through the performance of Hip Hop’s artistic elements is the key to a successfully lived Hip Hop life. For the Hiphoppa, it is Hip Hop’s culture that produces Hip Hop’s arts.

Approaching Hip Hop in this way, as a living culture, expands ones perception and thus one’s abilities in Nature. Here, it is first one’s cultural understanding that empowers one’s artistic, and even academic, understanding. Without cultural literacy which includes spiritual literacy Hip Hop can only be intellectually known; it cannot be lived. Teaching Hip Hop void of its cultural principles and the miraculous events that actually occurred for Hip Hop to exist, denies the apprentice the real power and protection that accompanies one’s overstanding of Hip Hop. Remember, we are not teaching the techniques of rapping or deejayin only, we are teaching Hiphop; the cause of rapping and deejayin.

Here, the teaching of Hip Hop is all about the teaching of our cultural perception. Hip Hop is a perceptual ability that helps the apprentice see more opportunities in his/her world than those ‘seeing’ through the paradigm of a basic education. Hip Hop introduces a new way to function in urban environments, and teaches the apprentice how to create opportunities where there appears to be none. Again, the teaching of real Hip Hop is not only about the teaching of rap music, graffiti art, and break dancing, it’s more about teaching the perception that caused these artistic activities to exist. Here, we remind the apprentice that Hip Hop was first an original way to think and act before it became commercially successful, and if you can perfect and present Hip Hop in its original form you can actually raise your self-worth and self-awareness as an attuned Hiphoppa.

To Be Continued..