A Rhetorical Analysis On Rap

Erica Hefnawy
Professor Serazio
Post-Millennial Analysis
May 2, 2018

Picture this: it’s Monday morning at 8:45 and your alarm has just gone off for your 9AM classes priming you for exactly 5 minutes to throw on the same outfit you wore all of Sunday. You make sure you have your necessities; your headphones and most likely a notebook or two and there you go, off to start your day. It’s a Monday morning though so you definitely don’t plan on seeing anybody so you have your head almost parallel to the ground and your headphones sinking into your ears. You hover your screen trying to open up Spotify as soon as your brain can find the little green icon and click “Top Hits” or your desired playlist. You might not realize this but this cycle continues

As noted in Terri Adams and Douglas Fuller’s research, there is an overwhelming amount of misogynistic ideology portrayed in “gangsta rap” specifically traces the connection between its prevalence in rap and the larger cultural picture of how black women have been characterized historically. A way of identifying whether or not a song is misogynistic towards women as noted by Adams and Fuller is that there are derogatory statements about women in relation to sex, statements involving violent actions toward women (with regards to sex), references of women causing trouble for men, characterization of women as “users” of men, references of women being beneath men, and references of women as usable and discardable beings. Although this is not a unique or new thing. This is not only something relevant to rap and hip hop but with country musicians “ lamenting about no good woman kicked him out, sold his truck, took his money, and slept with his best friend”, artists in rock “screaming about their latest groupie sexual conquest—misogynistic convictions have always had a home within the music industry” (Adams, Fuller). Similar to how this misogynistic theme in country and rock-n-roll is accepted and normalized into society, Like the

We are constantly surrounded by songs about that portray women in such a misogynistic way that after we are repeatedly exposed to it, we eventually believe that it must be true to reality. In a study done by Cundiff, she concluded that the more college-aged students listened to rap and hip-hop music lyrics, they began to believe more and more of the images and scenes portrayed in the songs. This is also extremely problematic because it shapes college-aged peoples opinions about important issues like sexual harassment, exploitation and abuse as noted in her article. “Lyrics significantly shapes audience attitudes toward the issue of domestic violence. This supports the finding that “misogynistic music also serves as a means to desensitize individuals to sexual harassment, exploitation, abuse, and violence toward women” and “legitimizes the mistreatment and degradation of women” (Adams & Fuller, 2006, p. 953). Exposure to misogynistic messages in rap/hip-hop music has also been shown to “increase hostile and aggressive thoughts,” which may correlate to “more permanent hostility toward women” (Russo & Pirlott, 190). Additionally, this can also contribute to personal attitude and actions about being a woman in