Hip-Hop within and without the Academy [Hardcover]

Snell and S?derman, both of whom teach music education, explore how hip-hop music has come to be used 'by many artists throughout the world to articulate their unique sense of marginality.' The music has become the chosen mode of expression for young peoplewhether First Nations youth in the US and Canada or communities in Britain, Norway, and Swedenwho have experienced a sense of exclusion or disenfranchisement. Populations around the world borrow from hip-hop and blend it with their own traditions. In addition to discussing this, the authors explore efforts to add courses on hip-hop to college curricula and to music education coursework in secondary schools. And they examine the tension between scholars who write about and critique hip-hop and practitioners who create the music: Who is qualified to 'speak' for or about hip-hop? Whose voice is 'authentic'? Though it is dense, technical, and abstractand marked by specialized jargonthe book offers significant theoretical insights. Intrepid readers will find this study valuable and worth the effort. Summing Up: Recommended. All readers.The section on the academization of hip-hop  what the books title describes as hip-hop within the academy  was promising as it is an area that is rarely well covered compared to the more common emphasis on the convergences of youth, politics and hip-hop. . . .Snell and S?derman are appropriately attuned to the ways in which public education is increasingly inflected by the demands and agendas of the neoliberal state.Music educators will not be the only ones who benefit from this rounded, wide-ranging and yet focused study on the background, uses, meanings, and educational potential of hip-hop. This very readable account has the rare gift of being both entertaining and scholarly. It gives much food for thought as well as practical advice for teachers, and it represents a much-needed addition to the literature on both hip-hop and music education.Snell and S?dermans book is a wel“%