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''Moments of Clarity'' and Sounds of Resistance: Veiled Literary Subversions and De-Colonial Dialectics in the Art of Jay Z and Kanye West

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2016, PhD, University of Cincinnati, Arts and Sciences: English and Comparative Literature.
“`Moments of Clarity’ and Sounds of Resistance: Veiled Literary Subversions and De-Colonial Dialectics in the Art of Jay Z and Kanye West” employs rap music as an object of inquiry into the question of contemporary manifestations of anti-Black oppression, demonstrating the ways in which the art of rappers Jay Z and Kanye West in particular, covertly elucidates the conditions and discursive and ideological mechanisms of power that make possible the exploitation, repression, and destruction of Black bodies in America. In the first two chapters, I argue that this illuminative potential is, in part, what attributes to the political utility of mainstream rap music. My first goal is therefore to make apparent mainstream rap music’s rightful place in Black liberation politics given its ability to unveil the functionality of age-old Eurocentric, white supremacist paradigms, such as rendering Black bodies incorrigibly animal, denying Black bodies access to subjectivity, or negating Black ontology. These ideologies give rise to exclusionary monolithic constructions of what it means to be human, pathological constructions of “blackness,” Black masculinity especially, and subsequently, the arbitrary conferral of power (to both state apparatuses and individuals racially coded as “superior”), which manifests in the form of systematic and institutional racism, and ultimately, Black male disembodiment. The final chapter of the dissertation underscores how the subversive capacity of the art form also owes to its sites of covert contestation of oppressive forces. Through Kanye West’s art, my explications reveal the clandestine presence of colonial mimicry and hybridity. These de-colonial strategies undermine discursive constructions of “blackness” that emanate from what I term the "white supremacist-colonial monster." In short, visual and lyrical narratives of Jay Z’s and Kanye West’s art covertly illuminate how ideology justifies hegemony, given that epistemological inaccuracies where Black culture and male bodies are concerned, “rationalize” the relations of domination in America, with respect to (but not limited to) the white-Black racial divide. Yet, as I interpret Kanye West as demonstrating in his 2013 track (and accompanying video) “Black Skinhead,” one method of subverting white supremacist-colonialist “monsters” that produce misrepresentations of Black identity is by satirically assuming the identity of the white oppressor and consequently carving out a third, hybrid space of identity in the process. Doing so exposes the ambivalence of their discourses and de-authenticates their power, thereby enabling the reclamation of an internally, holistically defined Black male identity. Literary texts--Ralph Ellison's Invisible Man, James Baldwin's Blues for Mister Charlie, and Toni Morrison's Beloved--serve as additional lenses through which to examine the subversive potential latent in the artistry of both Jay Z and West.
Sharon Dean, P.H.A. (Committee Chair)
Myriam Chancy, Ph.D. (Committee Member)
Sharon Lynette Jones, Ph.D. (Committee Member)
Earl Wright, Ph.D. (Committee Member)
333 p.

Recommended Citations

Citations

  • Battle, S. D. (2016). ''Moments of Clarity'' and Sounds of Resistance: Veiled Literary Subversions and De-Colonial Dialectics in the Art of Jay Z and Kanye West [Doctoral dissertation, University of Cincinnati]. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=ucin1479820190751642

    APA Style (7th edition)

  • Battle, ShaDawn. ''Moments of Clarity'' and Sounds of Resistance: Veiled Literary Subversions and De-Colonial Dialectics in the Art of Jay Z and Kanye West. 2016. University of Cincinnati, Doctoral dissertation. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center, http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=ucin1479820190751642.

    MLA Style (8th edition)

  • Battle, ShaDawn. "''Moments of Clarity'' and Sounds of Resistance: Veiled Literary Subversions and De-Colonial Dialectics in the Art of Jay Z and Kanye West." Doctoral dissertation, University of Cincinnati, 2016. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=ucin1479820190751642

    Chicago Manual of Style (17th edition)