Gangsters 1

The crack epidemic and the “War on Drugs” heavily influenced hip hop’s early content and aesthetics. As Prof. Jeffry Ogbar states,

The illicit trade with all of its complexities had an indelible imprint on the core aesthetics, style, iconography and messages of hip hop….No force has been as remarkably central to the lyrical landscape [of rap music] as the drug trade.

Viewing

Prof. Jeffrey Ogbar speaking at the 2012 Tupac Shakur Conference in Atlanta.

Listening

• White Lines (Don’t Do It) (Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five 1983)
• Dope Man (NWA 1988)
• Trapped (Tupac Shakur 1991)
• Things Done Changed (Notorious B.I.G. 1994)
• Changes (Tupac Shakur 1998)

Quiz

• Gangsters 1