Popular Culture Review Vol. 5, No. 1, February 1994 | Page 70

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Popular Culture Review

opposing drug dealing, but this wealth is also an implicit
endorsement of capitalism. Rap music as a form is recognized as
bringing tremendous wealth to artists who flaunt it with gold chains
and expensive cars.^® Moreover, it is not questioned that rap artists
are rich while their listeners may often be poor; this is accepted as
normal. This brings up an important point about "negotiating the
economics of slavery." That is, while the sale of African-American
cultural forms nwy show that African-Americans are competent of
overcoming poverty, it may also simply show them capable of making
a lot of money; sale of records for enormous wealth is not "negotiating
the economics of slavery"; instead it is simply "getting rich." Rap
musicians through their attainment of wealth, confirm elements of a
capitalist discourse which view this as a primary goal in life. This
is deceptive because not everybody can be rich—not everybody can be a
rap star.
The most fundamental way rap affirms elements of capitalism is
through the marketing of itself. As just noted, the wealth that is
gained through the sale of records is well known, and the equating of
music with great sums of money is not in the least bit questioned.
Moreover, through the association of rap artists with T-shirts,
medallions and especially basketball shoes, the music is further
commodified. The significance of commodification was brought out
powerfully by T.W. Adorno and Max Horkheimer in their famous
essay on the culture industry. They show that as cultural forms are
valued as commodities, people's lifestyles become based on the
exchange value of what they own. In the case of rap stars, the
exchange value of what they own is based on their fame; whether
they wish it or not, their style is appropriated and sold by the culture
industry. This is devastating to the music's attempt to be critical
both inside and outside of the African-American community to whom
it is addressed. For, any oppositional messages the music contains can
be ignored as the style with which it is associated is marketed and
sold. Put differently, under capitalism all aspects of "alternative"
culture are forced into the vision of a "normal" lifestyle: "Anyone
who resists can only survive by fitting in. Once his particular brand of
deviation has been noted by the industry, he belongs to it as does the
land-reformer to capitalism" (Adorno and Horkheimer 132). Rap
cannot exist outside of the conunodity system because "the new" may
always be used and defined by this system. The question is to what