Reimagining Solidarity: Hip Hop as Revolutionary Pedagogy

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Cultural Logic: Marxist Theory & Practice 2013, pp. 46-66

Reimaging Solidarity: Hip-Hop as Revolutionary Pedagogy

Julie A. Gorlewski

State University of New York, New Paltz

Brad J. Porfilio California State University, East Bay

Introduction

Current neoliberal educational reform movements in K-12 schools in the US—such as for-profit charter schools, corporate control over school boards, corporate financing of schools, corporate "donations" in the form of computers and computing software, and test preparation materials and assessments—operate to concentrate knowledge production and economic power in the hands of corporate leaders. To take one example, the implementation of standardized examinations have positioned schoolteachers and educational leaders to support pedagogies that intensify youths' and teachers' alienation—a condition that promotes continually expanding inequalities rather than promises of social justice. Under the Obama administration's RTTP (Race to the Top) program, corporate intensification and youths' and teachers' alienation have only been further exacerbated. In order to compete for needed resources from the US federal government to operate schools, state government officials have been coerced to "evaluate teachers by student test scores, to award bonuses to teachers based on student scores, and to permit more privately managed charter schools" (Ravitch, 2010). Consequently, more and more teachers in public schools are subject to regulatory evaluations that require them to use their own, and their students’, labor to generate data. In turn, these data are being reported and publicized as evidence of the failure of public education. These actions represent some of the increasing influence of neoliberal policies and practices in public schools.

This article presents the perspectives and experiences of participants in a grass-roots, Indigenous hip-hop group called Beat Nation. Study participants offer insights about how the world's most dominant ideological doctrine—neoliberalism—is sapping the humanistic nature of education, perpetuating a maldistribution of wealth and power across the globe, and maintaining human suffering and environmental degradation. According to Hursh (2011), neoliberal ideology is grounded in the belief that economic prosperity and improvements for segments of the social world, such as healthcare, education, and the environment, emanate from “unregulated or free markets, the withering away of the state as government’s role in regulating businesses and funding social services are either eliminated or privatized, and encouraging individuals to

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become self-interested entrepreneurs.” Since neoliberalism is a term rarely uttered in most dominant (mainstream) media outlets, most North American citizens are not cognizant of how it is linked to many deleterious economic and social developments at today’s historical juncture (Hursh, 2011; Ross & Gibson, 2007; Scipes, 2009).

The purpose of this article is to articulate how some elements of Indigenous hip-hop culture hold the emancipatory potential to "decode and interrupt" neoliberal capitalism (Sandlin, O'Malley, and Burdick, 2011, p. 347). The authors will also capture how the historical legacy of colonialism intersects with neoliberal capitalism to fuel Indigenous youths' opposition to the current social order as well as spark their desire to formulate identities that disrupt hegemonic stereotypes associated with the Indigenous "Other." Finally, the authors will explore how the results of these qualitative inquiries can help educators re-imagine pedagogies for new generations and the youth cultures they produce.

Before presenting the Indigenous hip-hop intellectuals' counter-narratives, we provide a brief overview of the revolutionary potential imbued in the cultural manifestations and activism of a segment of hip-hop intellectuals across the globe, including the cultural work and artistic representations generated by the participants of this study. Finally, implications for further scholarship and social action will be discussed. —

Hip-Hop and its Revolutionary Potential

It has been more than thirty-five years since subjugated youth gathered in New York City in response to the unjust social conditions impacting their schools, families, and communities (Forman & Neal, 2004; Chang, 2005; Dimitriadis, 2001). Through various and innovative forms of cultural production—such as break dancing, graffiti art, spoken word, and song—racialized youth have offered powerful analyses and critiques of their schools and social conditions (Hill & Ladson-Billings, 2009). Over the past three decades, as hip-hop has grown from a local youth movement to an international phenomenon, the corporate music industry has wielded its power to redirect hip-hop’s social energies away from critical expressions of struggle, protest, and resistance toward messages of materialism, greed, and individualism (Hill & Ladson-Billings, 2009; Viola & Porfilio, 2012). The music that typically dominates the top of the charts speaks to this shift with social messages propagating individualistic pursuits of extravagant cars, flashy jewelry, and stylish clothes. Furthermore, the hip-hop icons of today often describe themselves as successful entrepreneurs (“hustlers in the game”) with their standpoint aligning closely with White, male corporate executives who promote a materialistic, misogynistic, homophobic, and violent “gangsta’ image” of hip-hop culture (George, 2005; Magubane, 2006; Viola & Porfilio, 2012).

Not only has the corporate world's debased depiction of hip-hop caused the public to believe that the youth who embrace this culture are responsible for social maladies such as crime, drug use, and violence, but it has also attracted youth across the globe to consume hip-hop artifacts generated by corporate record exclusives. Despite corporate desire to remake hip-hop into purely a corporate configuration, there currently exists a socially transgressive hip-hop counterculture that spans the planet. The alternative movement is marked by the cultural forms associated with hip-hop pioneers, the revolutionary fervor emanating from hip-hop intellectuals and philosophical ideas (e.g., Marxism and anarchism), and the dissident work of youth and others bent on establishing a social order on the ideals of democracy, justice, freedom, and equality. This movement consists of "racialized youth from the ghettos of Western Europe, the

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occupied territories of the Middle East, the shantytowns of Southeast Asia, and the favelas of Latin America who have utilized hip-hop as their own unique counterspace to explore possibilities for critical inquiry, sites of historical reclamation, as well as avenues that nurture an emancipatory imagination" (Viola and Porfilio, 2012, p. 6).

For the purpose of articulating how Beat Nation's artistic work and activism is linked to generating revolutionary pedagogy to aid scholars, educators, and citizens in their pursuit of building a just society, we detail briefly how capitalism is tied to the alienation of working-class citizens and how revolutionary pedagogy is predicated on providing the pedagogical encounter to global citizens to "transcend their own alienation" (McLaren, 2005, p.7).

Historically, capitalist intentions have been positioned as antithetical to the natural world. The natural environment is perceived as a “resource” for creating capital, rather than possessing intrinsic value, on its own. Marx (1867) explores the connections among humans, nature, and labor:

Labour is, in the first place, a process in which both man and Nature participate, and which man of his own accord starts, regulates, and controls the material re-actions between himself and Nature. He opposes himself to Nature as one of her own forces, setting in motion arms and legs, head and hands, the natural forces of his body, in order to appropriate Nature’s productions in a form adapted to his own wants. By thus acting on the external world and changing it, he at the same time changes his own nature.…At the end of every labour-process, we get a result that already existed in the imagination of the labourer at its commencement. He not only effects a change of form in the material on which he works, but he also realises a purpose of his own that gives the law to his modus operandi, and to which he must subordinate his will….Besides the exertion of the bodily organs, the process demands that, during the whole operation, the workman’s will be steadily in consonance with his purpose. (p. 124)

Numerous tensions emerge between man and the material world in this excerpt. First, humans are both part of nature and labor in opposition to it: “He opposes himself to Nature as one of her own forces, setting in motion arms and legs, head and hands, the natural forces of his body, in order to appropriate Nature’s productions in a form adapted to his own wants.” [source,page?] Here, Marx identifies an essential, ongoing internal and external conflict of labor; that is, since humans are, themselves, natural beings, when they act to transform nature, they are also changed in the process. This recursive, reciprocal process is evocative of culture itself: humans shape, and are shaped by, their cultures. However, these interactions do not occur in a vacuum; they are affected by operations of power that surround and infuse social relations. Power, and its corollary constituent resistance, permeates people’s day-to-day cultural endeavors in ways that tend to contribute to the perpetuation of hegemonic power.

In contemporary Western society, neoliberal policies have augmented the influence of cultural power reproduction, allowing for a geometric increase in forces sustaining capitalism; a concomitant result of these conditions is increased alienation from labor. In essence, people are more and more divorced from the purposeful exercise of their labor, less and less connected to the essential imaginings Marx mentions as essential to the desire to subordinate one’s will. Without a sense of purpose and agency, human labor is exploited, and—because labor

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exploitation is a manifestation of power—this exploitation reflects and exacerbates social inequity. Privileging capitalism affects relations of laborers in society, resulting in experiences of alienation, exploitation, and isolation. To counter these negative effects, humans must seek connections—seeking purpose in their labor, empowerment in their culture, and solidarity with nature and one another.

Capitalism today is intertwined with neoliberal policies, resulting in a society in which value is reduced to financial appraisals, and where almost everything can be commodified and evaluated in terms of profit (McLaren, 2005; Ross & Gibson, 2007; Hursh, 2011). Neoliberal cultural logic defines all human labor in terms of profit, including art, processes of being and becoming human, and education/knowledge. When experiences as complex, multifaceted and significant as teaching and learning in educational institutions are reduced to how students perform on corporately produced examinations, there is a clear indication that capitalism is triumphing over humanism. Youth subjected to disengaging, standardized, superficial pedagogies are further alienated from a society focused on expansion of capital at the expense of social justice.

Here we present the results from our oral histories of several members of Beat Nation. The participants' narratives offer a means of exploring possibilities for reimagining pedagogies to resist the deleterious effects of capitalism. As producers and consumers of counter-cultural narratives, participants foreground the interrelations among education, identity, and social (re)production. Specifically, they discuss ongoing attempts to prevent the will of Indigenous and youth communities from being subjugated to corporate interests. Rather than perpetuating colonial imperatives, these youth seek to claim identities that subvert neoliberal attempts to maintain dominant, colonizing definitions of culture and value.

Beat Nation

Beat Nation exists as a space where youth culture, First Nation Indigenous culture, and popular culture intersect. Here, youth work to expose their enacted identities, through hip-hop, in a composite that honors their experiences as whole, unique individuals. The Indigenous hip-hop movement represented by Beat Nation provides a space for free expression that is both unique and shared. As an intuitive response to the unjust conditions impacting their social world, and with the support of Canadian public funds, Beat Nation seeks to provide a space for the voices of First Nation youth to be heard, and to empower them politically for the purpose of seeking to build a society free from oppression and aimed toward social justice.

The participants' oral histories were developed through in-depth, semi-structured interviews, which were transcribed and then analyzed using grounded theoretical methodology. Grounded theoretical approaches, based in a critical philosophical framework, were used in order to gain a deep understanding of the lived experiences of study participants, particularly as related to their experiences with Indigenous hip-hop.

Study data revealed several themes that support the interconnections argued: three of them that will be focused on are:

• Cultural disconnection in the neoliberal world and pathways to personal and social empowerment

• Cultural consciousness as a lever for critique, imagination and transformation


• Educators, as cultural leaders, represent promise for empowering youth through critical pedagogies

After providing an overview of how we honor our readers' and participants' cultural experiences while, paradoxically, affirming the conflicts that exist amongst all diverse social groups in society, we expand on the themes of our study through discussion and analysis of the participants' narratives. The narratives are grounded in a critical theoretical framework and explore historical and contemporary connections among critical pedagogy, hip-hop, and Indigenous culture.

Context: Culture, Labels, and Perpetual Struggles

Any discussion of identity, society, and culture must be grounded in a context that affirms the complexities, conflicts, and, in a sense, the impossibility of positioning people and their experiences in terms of cultural categories. Jones describes (2007) such an attempt as ignorant of an ontological problem: that is, since lived experiences represent much, much more than a set of codes, ideals, or ideas, it is impossible to align them in ways that allow for authentic understanding—not to mention comparison or contrast. Cultural experiences represent ways of seeing the world, of being in the world; therefore, to set them side-by-side in order to juxtapose perspectives and draw conclusions is a fallacious, pointless, and damaging approach to understanding humanity. Such an approach continually reinforces cultural contexts of dominant groups and marginalizes those whose narratives are not recognized or valued—or even seen.

In addition, a simplistic, descriptive approach to cultural contexts often results in a narrative that casts victims against saviors, savages against settlers, and ignorance against scholars. These categories can be reinscribed if researchers are not careful to consider an alternative prospect to cultural essentialism: the possibility that cultures cannot be reconciled, that exact translations are neither desirable nor viable, that a perpetual struggle to understand is preferable to silent, invisible peace. Cultural resolutions, according to Jones, represent an aspiration that diminishes human experience. A “problem-solving” perspective negates realities of people whose stories are not told from the viewpoint of dominant authorities. As Jones notes,

My argument is that if we take this view—in the standard interpretivist and relativist fashion—that there are two possible readings of these historical events and we ought to be familiar with both in order to get the 'whole picture', or to ‘identify difference and multiplicity in order to resolve these’—if we take this kind of popular inclusive view / to reach a settlement—we miss, indeed, we avoid some extremely significant points. (p. 8-9)

Jones continues, asserting the value of embracing, seeking, and studying the realities of the struggle—not to resolve differences, but to understand and engage:

Of course, to recognise the contradictions, to see that some things may be incomprehensible and not mutually-resolvable, is an inherent part of the struggle. The struggle—if we can engage in it—is both positive and necessary. (p. 11) …

In ka whawhai tonu mātou [struggle without end] we are engaged in a relationship. This has to be seen positively, given it is engagement; it is not dis-engagement. To struggle with another is to give active and proper attention to the

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other, to relate to the other. Even as an enemy you are hoariri or hoa whawhai—an angry 'friend': one with whom it is worth engaging, someone with whom you have a relationship of struggle. (p. 12)

According to Jones, it is through the tensions that emerge during the engagement in cultural struggles that expressions, understandings, and learning occur. Struggles represent strength of relationships—an engagement of conditions that are in opposition to disengagement and alienation. The rhetoric of genuine struggle, then, signifies not combat (in contrast to peace), but commitment (in contrast to detachment). And, acceptance of perpetual struggle, perpetual tensions, implies an acceptance of the impossibility of an inclusive “truth.”

In terms of this study, this means that we seek understanding without resolution, and that we use terms and employ concepts that we accept as insufficient because of the impossibility of authentic, accurate translation. We believe that embracing the tension of creating a space of possibility under impossible conditions honors the perspectives of our participants and our readers.

Intersection of Cultures

Given the powerful influence of capitalism, corporatization, and colonialism on both hip-hop and Indigenous cultural phenomena, commonalities and intersections may not be immediately apparent. However, the narratives of study participants, hip-hop artists whose lives and work (deliberately linked both here and in their daily activities) reflect deep, intentional connections, explicate and clarify profound historical and contemporary associations. In the experiences of these participants, hip-hop and Indigenous worlds—and the coupled worldviews—are both compatible and mutually reinforcing.

Taylor and Taylor (2005) describe the cultural phenomenon of hip-hop in broad terms:

Hip Hop, the latest form of youthful expression by thousands of young people around the world, has evolved over the last twenty years. Once exclusively related to rap music, this form of expression has now become a lifestyle. The influence of Hip Hop can be seen in fashion, electronic design, auto design, movies, music, literary works, and hundreds of other mediums in every facet of modern society. (p. 210)

Clearly, hip-hop culture cannot be reduced to lyrics, graffiti or break dancing; as a cultural construction, it is performed through art, language, actions and interactions. More than a collection of artifacts to be exhibited, hip-hop represents a way of being in the world—a way of being that often involves a critical perspective of traditional definitions and relations of power:

In righteous indignation, adult culture will sometimes argue that decent society behaves according to a system of standards and values established and maintained by rules and laws. Hip Hop culture does not accept the truth of such claims as undeniable nor as unfaultable. (Taylor & Taylor, 2007, p. 211)

While the discourse of hip-hop is generally recognized as youth-oriented, in keeping with Jones’ discussion of perpetual struggle, it is important to acknowledge the debates that exist within this admittedly limiting categorical context. Reflecting larger societies in which it is


performed, conflicts within hip-hop involve distinctions among race, class, and gender (Weinstein, 2007). Although political divisions have emerged around the corporate appropriation of youth culture, including hip-hop, participants in Beat Nation intentionally seek to embody and perform in ways that are consciously critical of neoliberal norms, standards, and ideologies.

Beat Nation participants live in both hip-hop and North American Indigenous cultures. As mentioned earlier, these terms are not meant to represent categories, but to enable conversation around the meanings made within and through narratives of those whose stories have been traditionally told through lenses of cultures other than their own. Therefore, rather than attempting to describe the Indigenous cultural characteristics of this diverse group of participants who share two salient features, we will allow the words of the participants (albeit influenced by the questions and topics we posed) to function as cultural descriptors within the context of this study.

Cultural Disconnection in the Age of Neoliberalism: The Arts, Hip-Hop, and Community as Pathways to Personal and Social Liberation

Before discussing possibilities for resistance, it is important to consider the forces against which such resistance is operating. Cultural disconnection, that is, alienation experienced through dissonances among values of hegemonic cultural forces and the precious knowledge of one’s Native culture, is persistent for Indigenous youth, whose cultures have been subject to colonizers for generations. Neoliberalism represents the most contemporary colonialist perspective with which First Nation cultures are engaged in struggle, but the experience is viscerally familiar when set in a historical context. For instance, several Aboriginal communities have become dependent upon large-scale corporations to provide social-service and employment opportunities to their citizens, since the state has ceded its responsibility to the corporate world for providing for the well-being of citizens. Furthermore, some Aboriginal communities have been compelled to sell their land to corporate organizations, compromising their principles in the process, in order to feed their family members (Atleo, 2008; Slowey, 2001).

During interviews, participants complicate simplistic notions of Indigenous identity— which are often stereotypical when present and, even more often, absent or silenced in dominant cultural representations—and then describe the deleterious effects of colonizing. They often situate these descriptions historically and then establish links to current conditions. Three participants explicitly critique categorical implications of identity with respect to their own lives. Here, Seth alludes to a sense of cultural alienation that is exacerbated by school experiences:

I guess my cultural background is mixed Native and European. My mom’s side is from Wuikinuxv Nation and Klahoose Nation, which are two areas, two spots on the Northwest coast. My dad is Scottish. (Seth 1)

I come from a mixed background. I actually grew up with my dad who is Scottish heritage and my step-mom who is Phillipina and she actually raised me more than either of my parents so I kind of grew up really, definitely very mixed. And I guess it was that when I finally moved out on my own into Vancouver, I think I was definitely at that point where I felt really disconnected from the dominant society I guess, or Canadian society. I felt more an urge to learn more about the history and learn about like my culture and try to reconnect with my family because… I moved in with my mom for a little bit in Vancouver and she was

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always kind of pushing me to make those discoveries. I was kind of resistant to them at first but once I started getting into it and I started learning about the history, it was negative… It had a negative impact on me as well. I felt like basically, you know, my whole elementary and high school education was basically a big lie and I felt kind of gypped there. (Seth 7)

Crystal echoes the sense of disconnection raised by Seth. In addition, she expresses the challenges in finding and developing her own voice, as a woman and an artist.

…Growing up a Native woman, you know, a Native mixed blood woman in this country in this province, you can’t help but see the gaps as you travel from the reserve to the city when you kind of see dominate narrative and what’s playing out there and you notice the absence of voice, you know, that Aboriginal voice. I mean, it was all those experiences combined, you know, seeing that absence, that erasure of history of story, of voice that really cemented my interest in using creative expression to reassert those things.

And really my experience at Red Water Magazine—I was there for 4 or 5 years; it’s an Aboriginal youth publication—really that experience really showed me the power, and looking at different Native hip hop shows and stuff that were happening at the time really kind of illustrated the power of creative expression, to engage communities and to get people talking to create dialogue and so that was kind of in many ways the foundation for wanting to keep my work within a context of social justice. (Crystal 8-9)

And Regina picks up the possibility of the arts, particularly hip-hop, as a way to build and express an authentic sense of identity.

Someone approached me to write about hip-hop and Indigenous culture and you know, I always feel a little bit…I sometimes feel a little bit out of place because I, you know, writing for Indigenous productions and writing as an Indigenous person because, you know, from some people’s perspective I’m white. But, you know, so I struggled with it a bit. I was like, “Oh, I don’t know,” but the thing is that I know from a lot of people’s perspective even if you’re just part Native, you are Native. So I just try and…I just try and…I just try and stay aware that there’s…in our country, in Canada, there’s literally hundreds of thousands of people like me that are not ‘really’ Indian and not ‘really’ white. So I just try and be grateful that I have an opportunity to speak publicly.

I don’t think there’s any rules about…well, you know…let me just put it this way, if somebody has…if somebody anywhere has an issue with somebody because of their race or gender or education or age or class, then they can fuck themselves as far as I’m concerned. (Regina 12, 13)

These participants raise important points about the implications of sorting people or categorizing cultures. This approach is reinforced when social institutions are based on curriculum and assessments that lack a critical pedagogical perspective as well when the


dominant elite generates pernicious stereotypes of citizens along the lines of race, class and gender in dominant media outlets, including newscasts, films, advertisements, and other forms of cultural "entertainment." Not coincidently, several participants describe feeling out of place, experiencing an absence of voice. This contributes to their feelings of disconnection, both from the dominant society and from Indigenous culture. Fortunately, for these participants, hip-hop and the arts offer a way to build an authentic sense of identity and (re)establish cultural associations.

It is significant to note that this description is not meant to illustrate a clean, neat path toward self-actualization. In reality, participants experienced, and still experience, struggles such as those described by Jones (2007). They struggle with/against stereotypes, social and cultural pressures, and personal/institutional expectations. Although these are introductory excerpts, through them participants reveal important points with respect to the deleterious effects of neoliberal phenomena and of hip-hop as a potentially counteractive force.

In the narratives below, the artists continue to capture how the arts, hip-hop, and community support have the power to ameliorate the alienation they experience due to their marginalized subject position in Canada. Seth picks up on “the big lie” of his formal education, asserting that community support and the arts offered a way to reconnect with a more authentic sense of identity:

So I felt I got the best education mostly from just going out on my own and finding different people. And the formalized education helped with, I guess, with being able to back things up academically. But I would say the arts…the education that I’ve had in the arts and the community have been more beneficial for me. (Seth 7)

Tyler describes an overall sense of social disconnection, narrating a hope that a lifestyle that is more authentically community-oriented might ameliorate contemporary alienation:

If you look at who runs most of the hierarchy of media and war and all these things…that’s a pretty tough thing to overcome. I mean, I think we can do it in our communities first and then we’ll worry about the rest of the world. But yeah, it would be great to see mass change towards a better lifestyle because I think it’s just ridiculous the way people are living these days, so disconnected from everything. (Tyler 18)

Renee contributes a similar perspective:

Well, I think what’s really important about Aboriginal youth who are using this form (hip-hop) is that many of them are becoming savvy to sort of what the form is and I think that’s always really important. I know some, I’ve met some young kids who just, you know, it’s a way to empower themselves. They found something that is current to their contemporaries, their friends, their peers and it’s a way that they can be heard. And as long as they can master sufficiently the form, they will be heard. You know, their voices will be actually acknowledged. I think that’s really important and I think that’s really important especially when you look at the legacy of the residential schools, what they left here in this land

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with people not being able to speak their language and people not being able to express themselves. So I think it is due now for Aboriginal youth. There is the uptake of hip-hop and rap is phenomenal amongst the youth and so it is a way to actually, very poignantly express themselves. I think the thing that I also find really heartening is that as someone’s commitment to the form deepens, that’s usually when they start becoming more aware of history and the other connections both within their own world view and teaching them the history and the roots of the form. (Renee 7)

Tyler asserts the importance—and the challenges—of connecting cultural heritage to Indigenous communities:

I wouldn’t say that it [Native culture] disappeared or anything, it’s just that people were just quiet about it so it was more difficult to find out information. Now there’s a pretty strong movement now, like within the last 5 or 10 years I would say. With, say, my parents’ generation even, who are trying to return to the traditional Potlatch culture…yeah. And it’s really complex to return to that too, because there’s a lot of laws and there’s a lot of protocols that have to be followed and they have to be decided upon by our elders that are still alive, too. So it’s a long process to try and return to that culture but it is getting more like that, yeah. (Tyler 15)

Seth explains the oppressive history of colonization on Indigenous culture, then reinforces the prospect of resistance through art:

I think it’s just…for me, it’s just apprenticing in the art that I’m…that it still holds a lot of importance in my life, and decolonization is basically the same thing. Because that art form is basically it was illegal to practice it until 1954. There was a ban, a Potlatch ban which basically is the banning of our culture and if people were creating this work they would get thrown in jail or fined really heavily. So for me making the art is a form of resistance. And now, I mean, the artists, if you’ve ever been to Vancouver, it’s around everywhere and people think it’s almost oversaturated now. But I still view it as an art form that is making it is a political act and making it is still a form of resistance because it was suppressed so heavily not that long ago. (Seth 14-15)

Likewise, Renee recounts her experiences investigating historical roots of hip-hop as related to Indigenous culture. When asked about connections between her own work and hip-hop, her narrative elaborates seamlessly the links between history and art—in terms of both expressive power and structure:

This is sort of my take, and my contribution to the online Beat Nation project. I was coming from the point of view that I went to Africa in 2004 to Senegal; I was the only invited Indigenous person from this land now known as Canada whose ever been invited to the African Vianal to present my work.


… I went to Africa in 2004 and that’s when I actually… met a ‘Grio.’ In the Wolof language they call them ‘Gioel.’ The roots of hip-hop do come from Africa and it is from the story telling tradition of these praise keepers – these Grio or Gioel – who are born into this caste and from a very early age they have to learn hundreds of song forms and these are these rhythms that we would call “fill”; that these are like patterns and song forms. They also have to learn a whole variety of ceremonies and they have to learn the history of their people and they have to learn the language really effectively because, really, they become the story teller or what’s known as ‘praise keeper.’ And they’re also, in some ways, known as a peace keeper. I actually witnessed it in action, how this works.

So it really intrigued me that this was somebody that you’re born into; you’re born into this caste. You, through the course of your lifetime, you learn this and you perfect it. I’ve sort of taken the whole take on hip-hop that really it’s not necessarily just a youth culture; it’s actually from that African point of view. It’s something that you would over time excel at; it could be like an elder led type of concept.

And then the other thing that I related it to was to a Cree point of view. Pre-contact and pre-camps, we had what was called ‘camp crier’ and this ‘crier’ would be an elderly person who knew the goings on of the whole camp, who understood all the relationships between all of the people and would sometimes settle disputes. But they also were imbued with the responsibilities to go around and on a daily basis sort of tell people out loud, chronicle, what was going on in the camp. You know, who had given birth to a child, who was starting a relationship, who had just brought home a moose, you know, things like that so there was this important chronicle.

So getting back… (to) my songwriting, the sort of point of view that I’m taking as well with my interest with hip-hop is that most hip-hop is based on the sort of 4/4 time and if you look at a lot of our languages they’re not necessarily (4/4 time). Like when I say,… speaking in Cree… like I could speak in 4/4 time but it may have a different rhythm to it. And I was, through my research, I was able to find… come across somebody who hereditarily would have been a crier in the camp who was actually speaking to a room full of delegates of the Assembly of First Nations… It was either the Assembly of First Nations or it was the Saskatchewan Federation of Chiefs. At any rate, this gentleman who is an elder now and who is a senior and he had arrived to the meeting on time and a lot of people had shown up late and he was irate and so in Cree he delivers this incredible speech. And as I listen to it and listen to him, you know, he was sort of orating and you can tell he was giving great example and great detail to sort of to ground his argument as to why he had, why he had the right to be upset and what he was talking about, I started to realize that the rhythm that he was doing it in was not in 4/4 time and yet here he was an example of somebody who would’ve been from that lineage of criers. And I started to think, you know, well maybe that’s the difference, is that we’re not looking at that da, ta, ta, da, ta, ta…. you

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know, there is a different rhythm especially when we’re looking at Indigenous languages. (Renee 5-6)

The intersections among race, culture, and art are powerful and empowering; each strengthens the characteristics of the others. Renee uses her own lived experiences to explore these junctures, which are not easily categorized but, in order to be explicated, are described in terms of rhythmic measures and cultural roles. Renee’s description presents historical commonalities of Indigenous culture and the African community she visits; however, the connections are complex and rooted in constructions of identity and meaning that begin at, or even perhaps before, birth.1Furthermore, the social value associated with grios/camp criers is not clearly translatable to the North American culture (particularly as it is being reshaped by neoliberal norms). As corporations rather than communities define what is “broadcast,” the nature of the media (and its messages) are increasingly alienating. Corporate-controlled megaphones echo the voices of the dominant social groups, reinforcing existing relations of power instead of amplifying expressions of those whose cultures seek to engage in genuine struggles.

In a similar vein, June provides a contemporary context, exploring nuances among history, education, and Indigenous cultural production:

I feel like when I see Indigenous people putting together support for hip-hop in general I am excited. And I also feel like there is a community of Native hip-hop people that…you know, when you think about hip-hop as a culture itself and then you add people who already have an Indigenous culture, I think it’s a very powerful thing because it’s sort of culture squared.

And I feel like it adds a whole new perspective to that power that hip-hop has. And hip-hop adds a whole new power to the strength and power that Indigineity has. And I feel like it can only be good if it’s really truly watched instead of judged. (June 13-14)

Neoliberal influences on society and, in particular, education and the arts are exacerbating the extent to which youth (and their teachers) are being judged and evaluated rather than encountered and listened to. Standards and high-stakes assessments are just the latest form of corporate surveillance of and control over the actions—and even the thinking—of citizens in public settings. Valuing identities and cultural experiences that are grounded in community and participatory arts, instead of profit and competition, offers possibilities for reimagining a future beyond neoliberalism—a future in which student and teacher labor is purposeful, not alienating.

Cultural Consciousness

The study participants recognize that being connected to Native communities affords the potential to build a dissent movement to critique the debilitating influences associated with neoliberal capitalism in their own communities and across the wider society. Since First Nation

1 It is important to reiterate that the authors’ identities are neither indigenous nor African, so descriptions

intended to represent participants are necessarily limited by both language and cultural experiences.


communities have continually grappled with the dominant elite denigrating their way of life, language, and their very existence for hundreds of years, many people who identify as First Nation hold the critical insight necessary to recognize the detrimental impact associated with the latest manifestation of colonial imperialism: neoliberalism (Tuck, in press). Yet, several of the participants also hold the critical capacity to pinpoint several constitutive forces, such as the mass media and poverty, that block First Nation members from occupying oppositional identities towards the institutions and actors who are responsible for the suffering in their communities and in other social contexts.

Here, Renee details the social conditions that spark many First Nation artists and citizens to hold the critical capacity to determine what causes oppression in their lived worlds as well as to propel the same social actors to be involved in advocacy initiatives:

I travel all the time…I live on the road as an artist and a musician and everywhere I go I never see people sitting around, you know, just trying to bask in a recent, you know, gig. You know, people are so busy and the reason is because nobody has a cousin who isn’t, you know, at risk. You know, nobody has a relative who hasn’t had some travesty. Our communities, we’re dealing with 85% unemployment, we’re dealing with up to, what is it, 60, 65% people living off reserves and out in cities. We’re dealing with language loss. You know, we’re dealing with missing women. You know, it’s just staggering; so I don’t know anybody who’s not. Everybody I know is in some way a voice or out there looking on the sidelines in some ways, whether that be always being ready to do a gig for free for some cause. But pretty much everybody that I know is involved in some sort of other advocacy initiatives. (Renee 10)

I think that it’s almost inherent that you’ll find that, you’ll find that…it’s hard I think to find an Aboriginal person who’s not in some way really continually devoted to their community and to helping change and support the rights of Indigenous communities. So I don’t know if, I mean, I can think of a couple of fine artists who are older who are just focused on their practice and that actually is enough; they’re like beacons of life in the international world. I would say 99% of the Indigenous artists or creators that I know are involved in prison rights, or poverty issues, or homelessness or they’re involved with advocacy or they’re involved with youth injustices. I mean, the ecology, you know, multinational, you know, protesting against multinationals, deforestation, you know, you name it. I just don’t know any that aren’t. That is almost imbedded in calling yourself Indian. (Renee 9)

On the other hand, June’s narrative is reflective of how certain developments in modern society create conditions that block First Nation communities from operating from a critical standpoint in their daily affairs as well as prevent them from subverting the systemic forces responsible for social and economic inequalities:

I guess there are specific occurrences of awful things that could be addressed, but I think a lot of it is just things that we that is based on consciousness but unaware of what we’re doing. And I could think of a million examples especially within Native communities. I mean, obviously, and especially within Native

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communities, because I feel like our ability to be conscious, be aware is there; we have the tools and so when we don’t use them it’s blaringly obvious. Wherein when you have people that don’t have a culture, don’t have those necessary tools or the tools right there in front of them to use, then it’s, “Oh, this is how we are. This is what we do.” But when the alterNative is there and when you choose not that it’s very obvious, I think. (June 15)

Tyler is more specific in terms of the obstacles to engendering a collective consciousness in and across First Nation communities. For instance, she details how the mass media, in part, is responsible for society's "marginalizing" First Nation communities, as some people are not given the critical education to "not be affected" by racist, sexist, or other stereotypes. She also captures how poverty, alcoholism, and suicide make it "difficult" for youth to maintain critically engaged in a struggle to eliminate oppression:

Because growing up, if there’s a society marginalizing other people, if you’re in that marginalized group a lot of times people go with what they’re seeing in the media or what they’re seeing. And you see it with, just with women’s issues; the way that women are treated in the media or wherever. But basically, I mean, you have to be empowered and educated somewhat to be able to not be affected by those stereotypes that are being portrayed to us, you know, which is usually the whole reason is to sell things to you, you know?

... And you know you wanna have a good name back home and you wanna do well for your community and you wanna, like…for me, like, I just always wanna go back home with everything that I learned because not everybody back home gets a chance to travel the way that I do and learn all the things that I got to learn. And I think that it’s really important to share that with the youth. You know, we do have a lot of issues back home; there’s still a lot of residual effects – anything from residential schools to general poverty and we have high suicide rates, we have alcoholism, we have…it’s a tough place for kids to grow up. (Tyler 15)

However, three participants feel that hip-hop, the artists, and other educational initiatives do have the potential to foster collective consciousness in First Nations communities, which is capable of overturning the economic system responsible for the communities' alienation and marginalization. Here Renee details the importance of the arts in generating personal empowerment and collective strength:

I think that for me, like, I think arts and cultures really just empower people because they give you a sense of who you are and they give you strength, strength in your background... (Renee 7)

Renee's and Regina's narratives below point to how hip-hop has been instrumental in fostering a collective consciousness amongst some First Nation communities as well as for nudging youth to struggle in activist pursuits:

Renee: I’d say, I don’t know about the mainstream and I can’t comment on things, like, I’m no expert in the Black community but definitely what I’ve heard from Aboriginal youth it’s like they, they’re taking things to the next level.


There’s a woman named Maria Campbell who’s a storyteller and she’s kind of legendary in this land and one time I was having a conversation with her and she said that she thought it was the generation after the generation that dealt with residential schools who would start to, you know, start to be able to frame things not from that first person point of hurt and travesty but they would be able to start reframing and talking about things in ways that would be much more creative and I definitely think hip-hop is doing that for the youth.

Seth: My work is very professional. In fact a lot of people who look at different projects of mine sometimes say it isn’t Indian but I think it’s because so deeply imbedded in the work is Cree concepts, Cree worldly concepts. So I don’t use feathers in my work, I don’t use beads in my work, you know, you won’t find any Indian braids in my work unless I was really subverting it. So I guess that’s my whole practice has been ways to subvert that sort of stereotypical notion of what an Indigenous person is, and mostly just because of my looks as well, too. I’d never be the type of person you’d stop and say “How” to on the street.

BP: Do you see [Indigenous hip-hop artists] getting involved in political work, activism at all?

Regina: Yeah, I believe art is political activism and I believe making music and making positive rap music is making a political statement. Because believe me it would be a lot easier for me to put on the high heels and the false eyelashes and the corseted outfits and sing about like the club and the champagne and like getting laid. Like, it really is an easier sell music as a woman. That’s politically charged, I think, to not do that.

Seth: I think a lot of my early work like in my early 20s and late teens it was definitely created while I was looking into the music in the first place. And then as well I would have a lot of political messages in my work. I was making those discoveries about the history in Canada. So it affected my work that way in terms of I was almost making it activist art that you would see on posters and stuff like that and doing stuff directly in the streets; messages and stuff like that.

Finally, June's narrative demonstrates the importance of imagination in engendering a collective consciousness of the forces, policies, and structures responsible for the alienation of labor and other forms of oppression at today's historical moment:

June: I feel like the future will be different. I’m excited about big change. I feel—I really believe—in the 100th monkey phenomenon, wherein if a hundred monkeys all feel one way or think the same thing they inadvertently affect monkeys that they don’t have any contact with. You know, since 100 monkeys are washing their fruit, then monkeys on another island will instantaneously start washing their fruit.

JG: Right. Collective consciousness, kind of?

Cultural Logic 6 1

June: Absolutely. And the more that we find…I feel like just as unconsciousness is contagious, consciousness is also contagious; and I feel like the role of people who are finding their own truths are contagious, it really is contagious. (June 15-16)

To resist the forces of alienation, it is essential to spark awareness of the factors that contribute to alienation from labor and learning. Youth, and those who seek to educate them, must foster an appreciation of their own stories, their own sense of truth, and justice. Such consciousness is a critical component of imagining positive change.

Youth Empowerment, Hip-Hop and Critical Pedagogy

In their narratives, the hip-hop intellectuals in this study demonstrate understanding of schooling structures as political spaces that, through policies, practices, theories, and rituals, "generally sustain the dominant economic and class relations of the larger society" (McLaren, 2009, p.72). Yet, they are also aware that schooling structures have the potential to "generate emancipatory cultures," where teachers and other community members guide students to hold the critical insight and courage necessary to challenge the political and economic forces that lead to unjust power relationships in classrooms and other social contexts (Darder, Baltodana, & Torres, 2009, p.11). Furthermore, they demonstrate the importance of employing youth culture as critical pedagogy. Not only does employing youth culture support the possibility of eradicating the social distance between adults and youth inside and outside of schools as well as preventing youths' alienation from schooling practices (Gosa & Fields, 2012), it sustains the prospect of "facilitating the critical consciousness of youth" (Morrell & Duncan-Andrade, 2002, p. 89).

In the narrative below, Seth illustrates, through his own schooling experience, how most schooling structures are predicated on perpetuating authoritarian relationships between adults and youth. According to Seth, despite the fact the administrators at his high school were Indigenous people, they created an authoritarian school culture that purposively excluded the students' out-of-school culture (what he calls politics) (Low, 2011). The teachers also failed to account for different teaching modalities that might be capable of spurring students to learn. This debilitating environment ultimately nudged Seth to seek other educational outlets, such as the world of hip-hop, which allowed him to explore his own interests. He explains:

Seth: Not too long ago I was at university; I was at this different school called The Institute of Indigenous government where there was a group of us, a group of students who tried to start a student union; and we were basically oppressed by the administration and we were told that we could not bring politics into the school, which was… Originally the intent of the school was to produce Aboriginal lawyers and teachers and journalists and the school began a dramatic shift while I was there into a whole different promotion of how we should be. And through that fight, through that fight it was a major decision for me to leave academics and find…I found that writing about something that I found oppressive, writing about it wasn’t doing it for me so I moved more into visual expression and I think…it was interesting because that oppression came from within; the administration were all Aboriginal people and it was definitely an eye-opener for me that…(revealed)…dysfunction and definitely the mainstream ideals crept their way into all elements of our culture as well in different age ranges and


methods of administrations or methods of governing your school definitely were not Indigenous ideals from what I saw. (Seth 22)

Additionally, June captures how asymmetrical relationships between educators and students prevent the creation of authentic learning environment in schools, where the academic community is committed to growing intellectually, socially, and emotionally with each other. According to June, this happens because adults believe their knowledge and experiences are more valuable than those of their students. To ameliorate this asymmetry, June believes adults must stop fearing they will "lose" power if students offer "unique perspectives" in their classrooms:

Yeah. And just like…And I think that in the classroom a lot of educational…I would say in general the relationship between youth….“youth” and “adult” lifestyles have been fear-based because the power positions or the believed power positions then become blurred, you know…Because there’s a saying in the Tewa language, when you approach someone with respect in the sacred ceremonial space, you say,….(speaks in different language)….and that is, “My younger older one.” And with that quote, ‘my younger older one’, you approach anyone with absolute respect and when the head of the ceremony comes to you and says, (in another language)…“With my respect my younger older one,” because it is an understanding that the younger one may know more than you know. They have experiences you may not know—both when you are younger and when you are older. It doesn’t matter if your 15 and I’m 60. And I think that a lot of Indigenous people, because of our westernized way of being, have forgotten a lot of the reasons why we say that. And if we remember we know it’s because everyone is at a different place and has unique perspectives that are all valuable. And when we understand that youths may have something that we may not have instead of fearing our loss of power and actually stopping humbly and asking “What do you have? What do you see?” (June 13)

Despite the fact the participants have witnessed "horrible things" happen in schools, they provide several important insights as to how schools may function as socially-generative spaces to promote students' critical understanding of their world, speak to students' interests and concerns, and move students to tackle systemic inequalities in schools and the wider society. Continuing the conversation about his academic experiences, Seth details the importance of generating a curriculum that focuses on the historical struggles of marginalized groups and the lived culture of the student populations. The curriculum has the potential to guide students to understand why power differences exist in their schools, communities, and in the society at large.

BP: Interesting. And then having said that, what do you think about how can society be changed? What can happen in these schools? What outta be done, I guess, based on this event?

Seth: I mean, it has to start in the elementary school curriculum. And I think that’s actually happening here. We have Aboriginal liaisons here now at school for Native students…they teach the Native students more about history and culture but I think it should be expanded, I guess, to the rest of the class. I think

Cultural Logic 6 3

they have First Nation Studies classes in high school now, which they never had when I was in high school. But so it definitely starts with education. I think that’s the main key… (Seth 22-23)

June explains why schools must embrace, rather than denigrate, youth-driven cultural manifestations. Here, she explicates how incorporating students' cultural capital through hip-hop or punk becomes a method of making students feel "empowered" and sets an example of embracing non-judgmental forms of leadership:

Looking at hip-hop or punk rock or this DIY movement…you know, in my frustration the tribe wouldn’t let anybody skateboard; they were confiscating youth skateboards because the elders were scared that they were going to hit them on the sidewalk. And I said, “Build them a skate park. Give them a place to go,” you know. And this is part of their building themselves and this is still how you look at Apache skateboards and Native skateboards and Native punk rock and hip-hop stuff that incorporating youth culture, be it whatever it turns out to be, then it is a method of empowerment and understanding and non-judgmental approach to leadership. (June 17)

The participants also provide critical perspectives in terms of how educators ought to function in the pursuit of making education a transformative rather than a debilitating social experience. Here, June illustrates the importance of educators investing in schooling with people who believe education has the power to raise "consciousness" and to "answer questions," while not allowing themselves to be "victims" in schooling structures that are often "very victimizing."

June: I think I’m addicted to school. I’ve noticed that I’m a school addict and I feel like a lot of it is learning. I really, really desire to be a non-victim in the face of something that can be very victimizing. And so it is an incredibly wonderful challenge to be in a situation that has so much creative and healthy potential and be the one to make it so. I choose to make it so and I will make the best of this experience because it is an incredible opportunity to invest the time to raise your consciousness.

JG: And those are the people who are being invested in schooling with you.

June: Yeah. And relationships.…I was talking to a friend of mine recently and he was like, “Ah, school, whatever, school’s overrated.” And I hung out with him for a while. We’d sit around and play computer games. And I realized I wanna be around people who want something else, who are actively working towards enlightenment on whatever enlightenment means for them; they are wanting answers to questions and they are actively pursuing that. And I think school is a beautiful environment for people who are just like hungry for it. And that is what I truly love about being in school, is being around a group of people that want to push themselves.


We just have to keep raising our awareness and talking about it and not letting it go under the shadows because it’s not an issue that has been dealt with yet. (June 19-20)

Two other participants also express awareness that youth must be provided educative experiences to empower them. According to Tyler, adults must guide students to have the agency to "make informed decisions" and to work with others to bring about change. June recognizes the importance of artists viewing themselves as leaders. She believes artists are educators who hold the power to foster students' critical understanding of the world.

Tyler: I think that the young people have the ability to shape everything. They’re the ones that will be in control of the world, and, you know, we are the population. And I think that, I guess, the most important thing is empowerment and education; not necessarily formal, but just being educated enough so that we can make informed decisions and empower ourselves to run our own communities. Because it’s not just…you can’t just say, “Oh let’s change this,” you have to actually have enough people that want to do the jobs and wanna actually work out their doing things because it’s a lot of like just human empowerment I guess. (Tyler 13)

June: As an artist you’re actually a teacher and as a spiritual leader you are a teacher as anybody who is in a leadership position is a teacher. And so what then constitutes sort of evolved teaching/learning process, you know what I mean? (June 11)

It is in the intentionally-conscious intersections among art, education, and culture that possibilities for reimagining pedagogies exist.

Conclusion

As the narrations of participants indicate, neoliberalism represents a contemporary form of colonization—one that perpetuates and exacerbates the deleterious effects of capitalism on humans: alienation, commodification, and exploitation. These effects, which are compounded by intense focus on mutually reinforcing systems of evaluation and competition, amplify the dehumanizing experiences of schooling for traditionally marginalized youth. Discouraging as these conditions are, they do not depict the whole picture. Through critical consciousness, purposeful leadership, and meaningful application of labor, change is possible.

Further research is needed to focus on how hip-hop offers a means of personal and cultural empowerment for Indigenous youth. As mass media seeks to appropriate and profit from cultural phenomena, educators can deliberately cultivate authenticity through pedagogies that value youth and labor as human constructions, not merely consumable commodities. For this to happen, teacher leaders must align with students, working to forge connections that overcome the alienation from self and society that allows neoliberal ideology to claim and maintain its colonizing dominance. In keeping with Marx, solidarity represents possibility to reimagine a society in which education helps students to learn in order to become more true to themselves and their cultures, and to value humanism over capitalism.

Cultural Logic 6 5

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Reimagining Solidarity: Hip Hop as Revolutionary Pedagogy

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