The Wagger Phenomenon

This week's reading talked about "colorblidness" which is the racial ideology that posits the best way to end discrimination is by treating individuals as equally as possible, without regard to race, culture or ethnicity.  This is relevant to this blog, since the hip hop culture is part of black culture, although nowadays it is argued that hip hop is part of culture worldwide, no matter the race. 

I always speak about my native country in this blog, so this post could not be different. In Brazil, there is many attempts to end racism and discrimination against black people. One of the attempts was to create a holiday called "Dia da Conscicencia Negra" which translates to "Black Awareness Day". This holiday is annually celebrated on Novemeber 20th as a day for people to reflect upon the injustices of slavery and to celebrate the contributions to society and to the nation by Brazilian citizens of African descent. It takes place during the Week of Black Awareness.

Another attempt to end discrimination not only against Black Brazilians but also against people from the lower classes, is a law that was passed by the President, in which a certain number of places will always be guaranteed for people who have studied in public schools. A lot of controversies have been raised regarding this issue.

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Hip Hop:

 The reading by Jason Rodriguez "Color-Blind Ideology and the Cultural Appropriation of Hip Hop" mentions the fact that "whites do not simply consume African American art forms. They also appropriate those forms for their own purposes." In the hip hop scene, color blind ideology provides the discursive resources for individuals to justify their presence in the scene, but it also provides opportunity for whites to use their racial power to appropriate the culture hip-hop, taking the racially coded meaning out of the music and replacing them with color blind ones. 

Here's a little part of a documentary "Blacking Up: Hip Hop's Remix of Race and Identity"   about the "wigger" phenomenom (a derogatory word used to describe whites that supposedly want to be black)  by Robert Clift. - This is a documentary about influence, appropriation and individuality in Hip Hop 

The first few minutes of the Documentary