Michele Bowersox

Professor Boudreau
MWF 9:05
October 19th 2016

Project 2 Final

Everyday millions of people turn on the radio, plug in their headphones, or even put a record
on. The one thing they all have in common: they are all listening to music. The impact that music
has on society today is unprecedented. Rap music, in particular, has a tremendous following by
men, women, and children; no matter the age. Every song has a unique message individualized
by the artists for their audience. Whether they speak from personal experiences, stories, or from
an outside point of view; the most common theme amongst rap music is violence. The
connotation of the word violence, expresses a sense of anger, fear, or even misunderstanding.
Rappers use these emotions to relate to their audience on a personal level. However, the question
stands: Is behavioral violence derived from rap music, or is violence a product of society?
Rap music is violent; the songs of the genre are filled with hate, aggression, degradation of
women, and an egotistical sense of self. Researchers say that rap music encourages an unhealthy
sense of superiority of men over women (Weitzer and Kurbin). Take Kanye West, a popular
rapper of today, West is known for his large ego and actually refers to himself commonly in first
person and as Yeezus a play on the name of the religious son of god Jesus. This egotistical
sense of self can lead to the audience having a lack of humility and respect. With a lack of
humility, the listener may distance themselves from others creating a sense of isolation. This type

of toxic environment breeds violent behavior. Although some may argue the case that rap music
encourages violent behavior, this ideology is simply easily disproven.
Gangsta-Rap is no longer relevant in music culture today but violence is still an incredibly
large component of Rap music. So I ask you, why is societys influence on rap lyrics so
enormous? Why is talking about the struggles of black youths such a lucrative business?
Research has proved that people find pleasure in the failure and misfortune of others (Ben-Zeev).
People naturally compare themselves to those around them, therefore listening to rap music for
the case that someone does not face serious challenges in their life might make them feel a sense
of superiority to those depicted in the lyrics. With this sense of superiority listeners justify the
struggles and challenges depicted in the songs lyrics, therefore receiving a sense of satisfaction
from the misery of someone else. Listening to rap music can give some listeners a feeling of
reassurance and verification of themselves, knowing that someone else has it worse off.
There is no question of whether or not rap songs are violent, rather if they are the
causation of the outrage. In Trisha Roses article, Hip Hop Causes Violence, she expanded
upon a study, researching whether or not graphic images of violence such as video games,
movies, or television shows directly encourage behavioral violence (Rose). Her review of the
study was inconclusive and she spoke of there being very little evidence to support the idea that
behavioral violence could be influenced by images. However, in 1961 Albert Bandura conducted
a social experiment proving this disposition true. The Bobo Doll Study was conducted by having
children watch an adult beat up an inflatable clown, afterwards the children were asked to play in
that very same room. The results concluded that if the children witnessed an adult pounding the
Bobo doll, they were more likely to show aggression too towards the doll (Bandura).

Albert Bandura coined the term Social Learning, concluding that learning may occur
through observations. If we apply this concept to rap music, then listening to the lyrics or
watching videos of violent rap songs will encourage people to learn to act in a similar manor
correct? Although Banduras Bobo study did come to prove that people learn based upon
observations, in this specific case causation does not mean correlation. If this were to be true
listening to a rap song and watching the music video would encourage an audience to start raping
if they learned from observation, not encourage behavioral violence.
Since rap music does not influence violence, but rather speaks of it, some might call
listening to rap music therapeutic. There is no dispute that the lyrical components of rap lyrics
contain graphic/violent images or stories. Could these stories be seen as a release of anger?
Musicians use rap music as a way to express their emotions, a way for them to release pent up
energy. In the case of many popular artists of today, many songs contain stories of drug abusive
or depictions of broken homes. The musicians use rap as their catharsis to release the demons
that plagued their past, in a form that can be considered gruesome or inappropriate. Therefore, a
listener of rap music probably liberates themselves from some of their anger listening to these
rappers talk about their aggression or past.
If rap music doesnt encourage violence, then why are they so closely related? There are
many contributors to violence, low academic orientation being amongst those. Low academic
orientation involves the young adults, the parents, and the school. A students placement into
courses are determined by test scores, therefore if a student so happens to do poorly they could
be placed in less academically rigorous course. These courses are not very challenging for the
students nor do the teachers care about the material they are instructed to teach (Crosnoe). If an
instructor holds no hope or expectations for a student than there is no extrinsic motivation for

them to do well, so that leaves the extrinsic motivation to do well up to their parents. Think of an
ideal living situation at home, you see two loving parents, enough food to never go hungry, and a
child to never need to want for anything. In reality 67 percent of black youth grow up in single
parent households (Jacobson), and according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, about 7 million
Americans work two or more jobs (Tahmincioglu). With that being said although it is not the
parents fault, they are not home to watch the child and to make sure they are on track in school.
With the lack of extrinsic motivators such as teachers and parents, adolescents have little
intrinsic motivation to do well to please themselves. They would much rather act out in
delinquent manners to gain attention from someone in negative light rather than doing well in
school and receiving no positive reinforcement for anyone. This absence of positive
reinforcement at home and in school creates the violence as depicts in common rap music.
The biggest influence amongst young adults is peer pressure. The need for adolescents to fit
in with their peers and gain their approval is necessary for their self-esteem. With that being said,
they could be easily persuaded to act impulsively upon poor judgement simply to impress their
friends. Mob mentality, or how people are influenced by their peers to acquire specific behaviors,
is the same way that those who are in a gang act. Gangs play of an individuals weakness and use
peer pressure to force someone to do something they may not traditionally do. In the case of
violence which is a product of peer pressure, a gang may force a new member to rob a
convenience store or to physically assault someone as initiation. The new member feels inclined
to comply to the request in order to gain approval of his peers, he only needs this approval
because of the lack of attention at home. If there was more parental supervision in a household, a
young adult would not feel inclined to fall under peer pressure, none the less feel the need to join
a gang. This causation of violence via peer pressure creates a toxic environment conducted by

the undying need of many young adults to live up to the stereotypes of what society says is a real
man or woman.
Building upon the statistics mentioned previously about the absence of parents playing a role
in the misconduct of a child, violence is a product of neglect. Experiencing negative life events
such as parental separation, the loss of a loved one, or any form of family disruption may lead to
aggression. When a parent does not dedicate enough time for their child, the child does not
receive an adequate amount of attention, therefore causing the child to act out to receive attention
even if the consequences are negative. This neglect can also encourage the young adults to turn
to anyone who would accept them, such as gangs, which can lead to selling drugs, possessing
weapons, and enviably violent behavior. The lackluster of parental supervision and support is a
major risk factor for violence (Saner). Further expanding upon that, young boys are 1.6 times
more likely than young girls to have involved themselves in any type of violent encounter, nearly
two times as likely to have hit or threatened to hit other people persistently, and about three times
as likely to have been involved in one or more type of predatory violence (Saner). Seeing that
majority of the Rap community are male musicians, some might say male rappers are likely to be
violent. However, rap songs are simply a reflection of their own environmental elements.
Trisha Rose speaks of the 5 different elements that contribute towards the social conditions
alike of those of rap songs: Chronic joblessness, urban renewal, drug-trade expansion, automatic
weapons and the drug economy, and incarceration over rehabilitation (Rose). These
environmental factors influence the way musicians perceive the world and how the share it. If
you grow up without the opportunity to get a job due to the color of your skin, and the only way
to make money is to sell drugs, such as crack, you become angry with the world. This aggression
builds as more oppression arises- the unfair treatment and brutality at the hand of police officers.

To many it feels like they are trapped and give up hope to be better than what they are
surrounded by. The only way many have escaped the never ending cycle of injustice, and lack of
social advancement is through commercializing their struggles. Rappers continue to justify the
use of black youth distress in favor to maintain a revenue (Rose). This use of commercialization
for entertainment is advocating for violence to continue in these rural communities, which is not
okay.
Recall the 80s group N.W.A, majority of their songs depict drugs, sex, and most importantly
violence amongst the lyrics. Some might say that their controversial album Straight Outta
Compton is filled with vulgarity and hatred of authority. Although this may be true, is it
justified? N.W.A.s song Fuck Tha Police, illustrated the racial profiling and discrimination
occurring in Compton, California in the 1980s. Artists such as this group were amongst the first
to truly express the cruelty and malice crimes that black youths were facing in LA in 1988.
According to BBC, Gangsta rap forced America to confront the issues in its ghettos
(Laurence). Ice Cube depicts police officers having a sense of entitlement and authority to kill
whomever they wanted based upon the color of their skin. N.W.A shined light upon the horrors
occurring in the streets of the city of Compton, A young nigga got it bad cause I'm brown, And
not the other color so police think, They have the authority to kill a minority, Fuck that shit,
cause I ain't the one, N.W.A seized the opportunity to retaliate against police brutality through
the medium of rap music. A group such as this saw the oppression their city of Compton was
engulfed in, saw their people drowning in the social conditions fueled by American Society, and
brilliantly took control and created a voice for those of the oppressed.
Violence in music is just as prevalent in todays culture as it was in the 80s. Current rappers
take experience and influence form current events into their own music. In 2016 alone there has

been multiple tragedies at the hands of police brutality, and musicians are joining movements in
order to support the oppressed and those who face injustice. Movements like Black Lives Matter
have the support of popular artists like, Jay Z who are raising awareness for police brutality and
all the unnecessary deaths cause by police officers. In his song Spiritual, he speaks, I am not
poison, just a boy from the hood that got my hands in the air, In despair don't shoot, I just wanna
do good, illustrating the true horrors that have played out such as this exact situation time and
time again. Some might ask is behavioral violence influenced from rap lyrics? Violence is a
result of our society creating obstacles for people based upon prejudice, rap is an outlet for many
to see these injustices and rise up against them, fighting back with support in movements, with
music exploiting police brutality, and the enlightenment of the dangerous conditions so many
black youths live with on a daily basis.
Hip Hop artists and rappers exploit society for the creation of the violence, their songs
consist of strategic lines willing to expose the true horrors of some peoples everyday realities.
Many artists such as Dr. Dre, Twista, and Murs are credible artists who recognize the oppressive
events and deaths that occur in neighborhoods similar to the ones the grew up in and encourage
their audience to stop. In Dr. Dres song, Were All in The Same Gang, the rapper talks of
wanting the death and violence to stop - Bullets flyin', mothers cryin' / brothers dyin' / Lyin' in
the streets / That's why we're tryin' / To stop it from fallin' apart and goin' to waste., Dr. Dre
recognizes the pain and hurt being created and encourages for the violence and suffering to be
over with. Too many lives are taken unjustifiably, there is no need to kill your own. This same
concept is expressed in Twistas song, 2009 Self Destruction, and Murs song, Walk like a man.
Rappers recognize the need for a social movement or a sort of wakeup call on society today, and
they are being shut down and look over by the media forcing the stereotype of violent and

dangerous lyrics instead of recognizing the lyrics for what they are, a reformation to a better
America.
Every day you will witness some act of violence even in the most minuscule form, such as
killing an ant, how you interpret the violence is the key to understanding the source of it. Rap
Music does not encourage violent behavior. Listening to rap lyrics may even enrage you, but it
does not have that much of an influence to create a physically dangerous environment for
someone. Even though artists may commercialize the struggles of their youth, it is the
environmental factors that contribute to the create and advocacy of violence. Factors such as lack
of parental supervision, single-parent households, negative life events, peer pressure, and the
tragedies that surround us daily become the elements of what we know to endorse violent
behavior.

Works Cited

Rose, Tricia. "Hip Hop Causes Violence." The Hip Hop Wars: What We Talk about When We
Talk about Hip Hop--and Why It Matters. New York: BasicCivitas, 2008. 35-36. Print.

Bandura, Albert. "Influence of Models' Reinforcement Contingencies on the Acquisition of

Imitative Responses." Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 1.6 (1965): 589-95. Web. 16
Oct. 2016.

Crosnoe, Robert. "Academic Orientation and Parental Involvement in Education during High
School." Sociology of Education 74.3 (2001): 210-30. Web.

Jacobson, Louis. "CNN's Don Lemon Says More than 72 Percent of African-American Births
Are out of Wedlock." @politifact. CNN, 29 July 2013. Web. 18 Oct. 2016.

Tahmincioglu, Eve. "More Women Holding down Multiple Jobs." Msnbc.com. NBC News, 21
Mar. 2010. Web. 18 Oct. 2016.

Saner, Hilary. "Concurrent Risk Factors for Adolescent Violence."Adolescent Health 19.2
(1996): 94-103. ScienceDirect. Web. 10 Oct. 2016.

Laurence 13 August 2015, Rebecca. "NWA: 'The World's Most Dangerous Group'?" BBC. BBC
Culture, 13 Aug. 2013. Web. 18 Oct. 2016.

Weitzer, Ronald, and Charis E. Kubrin. Misogyny in Rap Music. 1st ed. Vol. 12. N.p.: SAGE,
2009. PDF.

Self-Analysis Project 2

During my time working on Project 2, I ended up struggling quite a bit with my topic and
attempting to find something interesting and surprising that hasnt been spoken of before. There
also is not a lot of current research done on the associations of rap music and violence, which in
fact that is pretty surprising to me. I feel very strongly for trying to clear the name of rap music
and dissociate it with the causation of violence, and focus on my purpose that rappers are the
story tellers to book of violence. I am very passionate and angry with all the great tragedies the
United States have faced in this year alone, and I believe that rap music plays a huge component
in exposing the injustice that many African Americans face. Many artists have been underrated
and looked over when their music preaches of nonviolence and the urgency for America to wake
up and recognize the great loses they are facing, far too often. I believe that my paper effectively
gets my point across of just about how passionate I am for rappers to become recognized for who
they are and what they have been doing as a social movement. I found some research and studies
on the concept that people actually receive satisfaction and joy from the suffering of others and
that not only surprised me but really sickened me, especially because I have succumbed to
promoting the same music. In some rap songs artist will talk about the death and murder of their
loved ones, the great loses theyve experienced while growing up in the hood, and I sit there
listening to the songs on repeat not truly comprehending the lyrics behind the rhythmic beat. It is
not enough to just sit and listen to their songs, they creating a social movement, asking for

reform and we have to actually change and get up and work for it. My research question always
revolved around violence, society, and rap music, but to nail down my research question I did a
lot of research and discovered what question fit best with all the information I found. I originally
began writing this project about how violence in society effected rap music but that evolved into
whether people believed rap music was the problem or if society was the creator. My research
question now is more elaborate and complex giving me the opportunities to expand upon
different perspectives as well as my audience, so they are able to formulate their own opinions
too. It turns out research papers are very extensive and time consuming, I found this out by
spending plenty of time conducting research to find the right sources than reading and re-reading
the same sources again to familiarize myself with them. I did not want to rely too much upon my
sources for my essay because I wanted to have my own perspective and not just every other
sentence ending in a source of another persons ideas. Moving on to project three I very much
look forward to working in the different mediums. This project will be much easier in my
perspective because I am not the most talented writer and would consider myself pretty creative.
For project 3 I plan to create a water color painting to express the fear and oppression that many
face in society today as expressed by rap artists, all through a symbolic painting. It is sometimes
difficult to express how one feels through words, in my case a water color painting is completely
subjective and the audience can take whatever message the pleas from it. I also plan to write a
poem, such a haiku to communicate my emotions of my purpose through that of a short story like
verse. My last genre I will use is a twitter poll/ interviews where I can take the publics
perspective and understand their point of view on the subject matter of the events occurring in
today. This way no one on twitter has read my argument and will be completely unbiased in the
topic and can get an anonymous majority point of view. The most important part of Project 2 that

I will incorporate into Project three is the purpose on my research paper, in my genre I plan to
incorporate the emotions that many black youths feel on an everyday basis. The feeling of fear,
hopelessness, and oppression. This lack of power will be communicated throughout my three
genres which is all inspired from my research in project 2. By the end of project 2 I must admit
my topic does seem a little exhausted and my professor was right to really choose a topic that
youre extremely interested in, because it does make it a lot easier to complete and dedicate all
this time to.