[ecrea] Call for Papers: The Power of Hip Hop

CALL FOR PAPERS: THE POWER OF HIP HOP

A one-day seminar on the role of hip hop in affecting positive social change

Papers from academics, practitioners and postgraduate students encouraged


TYPE: Seminar

DATE: Friday 8th July 2016

LOCATION: Rich Mix Cultural Foundation, London, UK

SUBJECT FIELDS: Contemporary History, Humanities, Politics, African 
American History, International Development, Contemporary & Popular Music

ORGANISATION WEBSITE: www.inplaceofwar.net <http://www.inplaceofwar.net>

PROGRAMME WEBSITE: www.inplaceofwar.wix.com/london2016 
<http://www.inplaceofwar.wix.com/london2016>


HOW TO APPLY

Abstracts of 200 words for 20-minute individual paper presentations, 10 
minute short papers/provocations or 60-minute round table discussions on 
targeted issues or topics are welcome.

For queries and submissions contact: (ines /at/ inplaceofwar.net) 
<mailto:(ines /at/ inplaceofwar.net)> / 07448 711 17

DEADLINE: 9AM, MONDAY 16TH MAY, 2016

In Place of War are seeking speakers and participants wishing to explore 
hip hop as a site of identity construction, activism, education and 
community formation. This is a multidisciplinary field and we’re seeking 
artists, academics, activists and postgraduate students with an interest 
in hip hop as a tool for bringing about small and large scale social change.

This event is funded by the Arts & Humanities Research Council, and has 
been developed in partnership with The Guardian, and forms part of a 
wider programme of events called Culture.Conflict.Change. The Power of 
Hip Hop academic seminar will precede a day of public talks and 
performances featuring international and UK artists, activists and 
entrepreneurs sharing how they have used hip hop as a tool for social 
change.

"Fight between my conscience and the skin that’s on my body / Man I need 
to fight the power but I need that new Ferrari"

In Vince Staples’ 2016 track ‘Lift Me Up’, he grapples with the double 
headed power of hip hop - acknowledging at once the empowerment and 
social mobility possible with celebrity and success; but also the 
importance of hip hop as a site of resistance and identity. Staples’ 
words also speak to hip hop as a force of economic mobility, albeit one 
that carries within it a trace of guilt at having escaped a level of 
deprivation still extremely commonplace in the 21st century.

These lyrics suggest a burden of choice upon the practitioners of hip 
hop. Why should these options – to enjoy success or to express oneself – 
be mutually exclusive? Does hip hop offer an opportunity for social 
mobility that also allows the marginalised to be heard? Or is it, 
rather, being degraded and subsumed by the cultural mainstream as 
another impossible, aspirational ideal that plays into the hands of the 
few at the top, whilst giving those at the bottom just enough to hope to 
maintain the status quo?

Or does this binary of money and ideology overly simplify the 
discipline?  Is the power of hip hop greater and broader still? Despite 
a conflation with worlds of consumerism and violence, hip hop is a site 
of learning, rehabilitation and expression for communities all over the 
world. Hip hop is offering alternative lives to gang members in 
Colombia, providing education in Venezuela, fighting for freedom of 
speech in Zimbabwe, raising political awareness in Senegal, and 
mobilising protestors in Egypt.

There is perhaps a contradiction within hip hop – a tool for 
self-determination and self-expression for a global subaltern, but also 
the vehicle and playground of the super-rich and famous. And yet to deny 
hip hop either of these roles might be to strip it of its unique role as 
a social leveller that has spread itself globally and across the social 
spectrum to move from a subculture to one of the most widely consumed 
forms of entertainment and art in the world.

The power of hip hop is also, of course, in its aesthetic merit - a 
mastery of language and physicality; an exercise in the relative 
textures of individual, collaborative and competitive art forms; a shock 
of colour, sound and beauty often out of a backdrop or deprivation and 
conflict. It is these sites of power that we look here to explore.

We welcome papers exploring, but not limited to, the following themes:

·       Hip Hop as a social leveller
·       The subjective perspectives of hip hop culture
·       The relationship between hip hop and religion
·       Hip Hop and its economic models
·       The role of Hip Hop across London’s diverse populations
·       Immigrant identities and hip hop
·       The role of hip hop in mainstream and alternative education
·       The characteristics of hip hop as a tool for social activism
·       Models of hip hop consumption: Grassroots vs. commercial
·       Hip Hop and entrepreneurialism

This event provides delegates the opportunity to showcase their work and 
network with other academics and practitioners operating within the 
field. We actively encourage inter-disciplinary discussion and learning 
and seek to promote this through all of the work that we do. All talks 
and presentations will be made available digitally via the In Place of 
War YouTube channel, with promotion by national partners. An e-journal 
will also be published featuring all presentations.

ABOUT IN PLACE OF WAR

In Place of War is a multi-award winning organisation based within The 
University of Manchester. We support artists and creative communities 
living in sites of war, conflict and humanitarian disaster to build 
powerful networks, create social change through creativity and 
demonstrate the value of the arts to public space, public life and 
public debate. In Place of War started in 2004 as an AHRC-funded 
research project on the relationship between performance and war. It has 
since received four different AHRC grants and one from the Leverhulme 
trust. It was awarded a THES Excellence and Innovation in the Arts award 
in 2010 and has featured in local, national and international media. In 
Place of War was also a finalist in the 2015 Guardian Higher Education 
Awards.

Today our work is spread across five core areas: research, education, 
digital networks and creative spaces, and artistic production. Our team 
is headed by Founder & Co-Director Professor James Thompson, and 
Co-Director Ruth Daniel.

--

<https://www.inplaceofwar.net/>

<https://www.facebook.com/inplaceofwar><https://www.twitter.com/inplaceofwar>

	

*Iné**s** Soria-Donlan
*Director of Production & Festivals
In Place of War
*
E: *(ines /at/ inplaceofwar.net) <mailto:(ines /at/ inplaceofwar.net)>

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