Gender representation in Rap music

Representation of gender in Rap

Hip Hop magazine XXL features news, reviews and up coming projects from the worlds leading rappers. The magazines website features many more aspects of Hip Hop culture other than just the music these include new songs and videos, a fashion/lifestyle section (which features very insignificantly in the magazine.) as well as a section known as "Eye Candy". This section features user submitted pictures of women as well as professional model pictures. The women that feature in this section are very stereotypical and fit ideology that is enforced by rap music.

XXL magazine features many sections that reinforce and challenge the gender stereotypes that are put in place by rap music. Sections that reinforce gender stereotypes are numerous adverts for alcohol and cars which are put there to appeal to men. But going against masculinity is the numerous sections that are dedicated to men's health care/cosmetics as well as a large number of high end fashion articles and advertising pages which appeals to the 'new' man that is slowly emerging in rap music.

One example of this 'new man' in rap music A$AP Rocky and the A$AP Mob. The A$AP Mob is not entirely based around rap music, many members of The A$AP Mob have ventured successfully into music however the group was originally set up because of a mutual respect for high end fashion and creativity. With many of their members originally aspiring to move into the world of fashion design before they discovered rap music as a talent their is a strong presence of high end fashion amongst the members of group. This goes against the usual masculinity of the rap genre. Even though the content of the groups raps and videos being quite misogynistic and typically masculine in content, their fashion forward thinking shows a change in the future of rap and the decline of traditional masculinity. 

"Pimp" persona in Hip Hop
During the Gangsta rap era of hip hop in the late 80's and early 90's the idea of a rapper portraying himself as a pimp in some way became the popular style and even helped to define the conventions of the rap genre.
Rappers such as Snoop Dogg, Ice-T and all star rap group NWA portrayed themselves as Pimps (snoop dogg more so than the others). This expanded into the style of the music itself as well as the style of the rappers dress and the content of the lyrics featured more sexual references than the early days of rap.

The music video for The Next Episode performed by Dr. Dre ft Snoop Dogg, Kurupt, Nate Dogg was released in the year 2000 but does adhere to the gangsta rap genre from the previous decade. As a music video this song displays the misogynistic behaviour that features heavily in rap music such as the sexual objectification of women.

During this era misogyny was much more common in rap music (and was not only confined to the pimp persona or the gangster rap sub genre) which lead to a small decline in rap musics popularity as many rappers where criticized for their offensive behaviour and lyrical/video content. Some rappers stood against this and developed a more politically correct style of rap. Rapper and actor Will Smith helped with this step by simply staying away from sensitive topics and focus more on party songs. Other rappers developed a politically critical style, New York raised rapper Immortal Technique was at the forefront of this new alternative style in which rappers kept the same flow and musical style but the lyrical content was about opposing misogyny, violence and racism. These political rappers did this by making their raps into stories that audiences could relate to by adding a more personal feeling to the song; they refused to objectify women, condone violence or refer to each other as racial derogatory words which was (and still is) very common amongst rappers of African or other ethnic descent (more commonly African and Mexican/Latin).

Female Rappers who conform

The majority if women would consider the content of most rap music as offensive and not conform to the views and ideology of Hip Hop culture even if they were fans of the genre or artist. However many mainstream female rappers feel like they have to conform to these ideologies to appear as a "real" woman in the often harsh world of rap music. These artists include Lil Kim and Nicki Minaj whose raps contain often offensive content towards women as well as their over exaggerated images.  

Secondary sources

http://academic.csuohio.edu/kneuendorf/c63310/ArticlesFromClassMembers/Dongwoo.pdf - differences between the portrayal of men and women in rap music
http://cdn.rappersroom.com/upload/2013/04/ASAP-Rocky-GQ-8.jpg - decline of masculinity, slight transformation towards new man
http://hiphopanddiversity.blogspot.co.uk/2012/10/normal-0-false-false-false-en-us-ja-x_29.html - Male rapper Immortal Technique talks about women's right to respect based on the message portrayed in his song "Dance with the Devil"